An article in the Society for Human Resource Management’s staffing publication (Staffing Management) reviews the results of the Leading Indicators of National Employment Survey released May 7. According to the article by Theresa Minton-Eversole the unemployed might have a better chance of finding a job in the next few months .
Overall the survey shows that the percentage of manufacturing companies that are hiring is the highest since fall of 2007 and in services the highest since summer of 2007. Also the survey indicates that good workers are getting harder to find.
The LINE Employment Report surveys four key areas: employer hiring expectation, new-hire compensation, recruiting difficulty for top level talent and job vacancies. The survey covers HR departments at more than 500 manufacturing and 500 service sector companies, which employ more than 90% of the nation’s private sector workers.
Results include employment expectation increases of 48.7% in manufacturing and 37% in service sector. This is the seventh straight month of predicted increases. In recruiting difficulty, manufacturing indicated an 18.9% increase and services a 14.2% increase. New hire compensation increased in April by 7.2% in manufacturing and 10.9% in services.
LINE survey results for job vacancies cover both exempt and non-exempt positions. This indicator can be one of the early indicators of a shift in supply and demand in the labor market. In the manufacturing sector 18.7% of respondents reported an increase in vacancies in April.
The survey noted that most companies had held their salary levels through the period of high unemployment and are now increasing some compensation for the harder-to-fill positions. Job seekers are still accepting lower wages and benefits than in the past overall. Employers may have to change tactics as the pool of candidates for positions of strategic importance gets tighter.
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