No real surprises here from the Manpower quarterly survey of 16,000 U.S. companies regarding their hiring plans for the fourth quarter. From the report:
Twenty percent of firms surveyed said they will be open to hiring in the upcoming fourth quarter, about flat with the 21% who said they intended to hire in the third quarter this year.For more than two years — 11 quarters, to be exact — the portion of firms who said they planned to hire has hovered around 20%.
Interesting that it consistently stays at 20%. I’m no statistician (but I did take it twice in college for . . . nefarious reasons), but that consistency would force me to look at my survey in more detail. Maybe the questions should be reworded?
Interesting piece of information in the article:
“Some key technical skills still are in shortage, including welders, truck drivers, health-care specialists, IT [workers], engineers. They are in high demand, whereas the lower-skilled non-specialists are in lower demand and there’s ample supply,” he said.
The welder position again (I put that in here for Amitai). I’ve been working on an IT position for the past 9 months – not kidding. The numbers are simply not there and finding them has been tedious. The position finally filled this week, but it was a struggle to find the right person with the right skills.