The employment outlook won''t improve anytime soon, according to a new Job Opportunities Survey, jointly conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) and CareerJournal.com, The Wall Street Journal''s executive career site. The 538 human resource (HR)
professionals and 591 employees/job seekers responding saw little improvement to the U.S. job market during the first half of this year. In fact, neither group expects companies to increase hiring, or for the job market to greatly improve by the end of 2002.
Most job seekers (57 percent) and HR professionals (68 percent) believe that since January 2002, the job market has generally not improved or has remained the same. Job seekers (24 percent) were considerably more pessimistic than HR professionals (8 percent) in believing that the job market had not at all improved since January.
For the remainder of this year, however, 40 percent of employees/job seekers were hopeful that the market would generally improve. Forty-four percent of HR professionals thought that it would remain the same. This perception was
reiterated when 61 percent of HR professionals said their organization would not increase hiring over the next six months, adding credibility to the claim
that the U.S. is in the midst of a jobless recovery.
Despite the reports that the economy is strong, the job market remains highly uncertain, said SHRM President and CEO Susan Meisinger, SPHR. HR professionals are among the first to know whether an organization will
increase hiring. The lack of confidence they exhibit about the job market for the rest of the year should warn us that job recovery is expected to remain stagnant and job seekers most likely will have difficulty finding new
employment opportunities.
Respondents in government (28%) and finance (28%) industries were the least optimistic that the job market will improve by December, while
wholesale/retail trade industries (46%), services (profit) (45%) and manufacturing (durable goods) (44%) were the most optimistic that the job market would improve by the end of the year.
Job hunters and HR managers were hopeful that hiring demand would have improved by now, said Tony Lee, editor in chief of CareerJournal.com. Unfortunately, it doesn''t look like there will be a turnaround this summer,
and the fall isn''t looking any better.
Layoffs
For the first half of 2002, 39 percent of HR professionals indicated that
their organizations had conducted layoffs. Similar correlations were found
with job seekers, with 31 percent saying their organizations had conducted
layoffs and 36 percent of the employees/job seekers responding said they
themselves were unemployed. All industries indicated layoffs had occurred,
however, the high-tech industry had the highest percentage of layoffs with
two-thirds of organizations downsizing their workforce.
As for the remainder of 2002, 55 percent of HR professionals stated that they
did not anticipate further layoffs. For job seekers, there was much less
optimism with 41 percent believing their organization would conduct layoffs
before year''s end. Both groups remain considerably uncertain about the next
six months with 25 percent of HR professionals and 19 percent of job seekers
simply stating more layoffs may occur.
Financial Well Being of Employees
Finally, it should come as no surprise that nearly half of HR professionals
(48 percent) and the majority of job seekers (76 percent) do not believe that
employees are better off financially now than they were at the beginning of
the year. HR officials also remained uncertain as to whether employees will
be financially better off in the coming months.
Other interesting notes from the survey include perspectives of the job
market according to the size of the organization. Thirty-one percent of
small organizations, 26 percent of medium and only 17 percent of large
indicated that the job market had generally improved since January 2002.
The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) is the world''s largest
association devoted to human resource management. Representing more than
170,000 individual members, the Society serves the needs of HR professionals
by providing the most essential and comprehensive set of resources available.
As an influential voice, SHRM is committed to advancing the human resource
profession to ensure that HR is an essential and effective partner in
developing and executing organizational strategy. Founded in 1948, SHRM
currently has more than 500 affiliated chapters within the United States and
members in more than 120 countries. Visit SHRM Online at www.shrm.org.
CareerJournal.com (www.CareerJournal.com) is the premier career site targeted
to executives and professionals. Featuring more than 30,000 top-level jobs
and 2,500 articles on all aspects of job hunting and career management, the
site attracts over 500,000 unique visitors monthly. CareerJournal.com
features salary data, negotiating tips, popular columns from the Journal, and
exclusive content from its own dedicated news staff. The site was recently
awarded a gold star and named Best Executive Career Site by Yahoo! Internet
Life magazine, was named Editor''s Choice as best executive job site by PC
Magazine, received a Best of the Web award from Forbes magazine and was
selected Best Site by CareerXRoads in their 2002 Directory.
SHRM/CareerJournal.com Survey Forecasts Little Improvement in Job Market
.