Job Bait’s February Executive Job Market Report, based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data, indicates some dismal realities.
They’ve compiled maps and graphs of pertinent data:
→ Employment Trends with maps showing employment trends by State and industry sector from December 2007 to December 2008.
→ New Jobs with a table showing the number of new jobs by State and industry sector from December 2007 to December 2008.
→ An overview with the bad news — Finding a job today is much more difficult than the mid-to-late 1990s and 2004 to 2007 … and almost twice as difficult as the last two recessions. And the good news, so to speak — Optimistic forecasts show a bottoming out in mid-2009.
Conversely, according to Execunet’s January Recruiter Confidence Index survey of 260 executive recruiters, 36 percent are confident or very confident the executive employment market will improve in the next six months.
These findings are down slightly from 40 percent last month and up from all time lows reached in November 2008 (26 percent). In 2008, search assignments declined by two percent, which marked the end of four consecutive years of double-digit growth (2004 to 2007).
Mark Anderson, President of ExecuNet, said:
While not immune to the problems plaguing the economy, the executive employment market has fared better than the broader labor market during this recession. In this type of an environment, agile executives capable of aligning themselves with specific markets are positioned to succeed, as much of the assignment growth in recent months has been concentrated in a select number of industries.
Recruiters’ short-term confidence remained virtually unchanged from December to January.
The Recruiter Confidence Index is based on a monthly survey of executive search firms conducted by ExecuNet, reported in the Executive Insider monthly newsletter. Introduced in May 2003, the RCI is a leading indicator for the executive employment market.
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