Wednesday, April 16, 2008

My Support Team is telling me that no one is sure where the economy is headed

One of my team members summarized a meeting he just sat on as follows: Nobody is really sure which direction the economy is going to take and data is indicating that employers are not taking drastic steps to reduce or increase the workforce. In fact, planned cuts to the workforce have been scaled back. According to the MonsterTRACK survey 59% of employees still intend to hire recent college grads, entry level pay is up 9.7% over last year. The “retirement” boom may reduce hiring in the immediate future as many boomers have lost value in their house and retirement portfolios. Average time of unemployment remains in the 3 month range, with a full 90% of workers finding an equivalent or better position. In particular, professional service talent tends to job +industry hop (i.e: Healthcare administrators, accounts tend to JOB HOP – making it even more important to have a pipeline of talent for these kinds of positions (and I would guess that these are the types of candidates that are always passively looking). The difference in this recession compared to last is the root of the problem: in the early part of the decade the .com bubble burst, this time sectors related to mortgage back securities are feeling the pinch: some financials, construction, and related retail. Sectors that are GROWING or RECESSION RESISTANT: Energy (traditional, green, and new), security in general, Security information technology, hospitals, other healthcare: Home health aids, medical assistants. Agility is increasingly important to business. Vurv hosted this event, and in their two minute commercial the pitch was for software that can help mergers, acquisitions, and restructuring.

This sounds to me like the agility offered by software as a service may be a real plus in a slowing economy. What do you think?

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