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As we enter the last few months of 2011, a cloud continues to hang over the job market. In the latest Glassdoor Employment Confidence Survey, there is a growing uncertainty among job seekers about their chances of landing a job and a decreasing number of employees feeling optimistic about their company’s outlook. These findings are just the tip of the iceberg in the third quarter report.
Some of the more recent layoff announcements include a frightening 35,000 postal workers at USPS and 30,000 frustrated banking employees at Bank of America. While this seems dismal, keep in mind that mass layoffs have been going on for a long time; and even in a good economy, there were pink slips a plenty. The difference is that now candidates must clamor for the available jobs and compete with their peers like never before.
Earlier this month, Bank of America announced 30,000 jobs would be cut, in addition to the 6,000 jobs already cut in 2011. Since the mass layoffs news broke, employees at Bank of America have continued to turn to Glassdoor to share their perspective on what it’s like to walk the halls of the bank branches as well as in the corporate offices.
The fear of layoffs on Wall Street is distracting workers and exacerbating an already dismal pace of business.
With pink slips fluttering on Wall Street and markets reeling from debt crises in Europe and the U.S., finance professionals are avoiding risky decisions, validating poor ideas to win favor with managers, jumping to more stable firms and steering clear of collaborative projects that could reflect well on co-workers — all in hope of surviving the next round of layoffs — according to bankers, finance consultants and recruiters.
While most recent economic trends are not as encouraging as they could be, you will be pleased to know that according to a survey conducted by Harris in Q1 of 2011, three out of five workers who were laid off last year have gotten new jobs. Whether you are concerned about layoff or simply want to make a career transition, these numbers should bring renewed optimism.
Not sure where the economy is headed and how your career path will look in the next 6 to 12 months? You’re not alone.
It’s no secret that the job market has remained tight over the past several months, and so it shouldn’t be too surprising to hear that employees are more pessimistic about their ability to get rehired within this the next six months should they lose their job. In addition, employee concerns about layoffs and pessimism about pay raises have risen to the highest levels since the height of the recession.
Today, Glassdoor released the latest Employment Confidence Survey, conducted by Harris Interactive, and found layoff concerns were up five percentage points this quarter…
The MySpace ship is sinking fast, and it’s estimated that about half of the employees who haven’t already abandoned it will be set adrift in the next few days. Parent company News Corp. is selling the social networking company — that it paid $580 million for in 2005 — to the highest bidder. It should bring an estimated $20 million to $30 million, according to AllThingsD, although bidding seems to be heating up, and the final price could be higher.
The economy has been a rough ride for just about everyone and so it may not be too surprising to hear that many are planning to head for ‘greener’ pastures in less than two years.
We just released the results of our latest Employment Confidence Survey and found 73 percent of employees expect to leave their job for a new employer in the future, 38 percent expect to leave their job in less than three years, 28 percent expect to do so in less than two years and 14 percent expect to do so in less than one year.
This may be driven by rising optimism around the job market. Among full-time, part-time and/or self-employed adults, 40 percent say they believe it is “likely” they could find a new job matched to their experience and compensation levels within six months if they lost their current job – the highest level in six quarters.
That optimism doesn’t necessarily carry through employee confidence in what’s happening within companies. While employee confidence in the job market rose in the first quarter, confidence in future job security, pay raises and company outlook remained relatively flat. And while reports of layoffs are down, 40 percent of employees say their employers made changes to the number of staff, organizational structure, compensation and benefits, or other perks in the past six months. In fact, rates of pay cuts, hiring freezes and job restructurings rose in Q1 from recent quarters.
In his mid fifties, Sam took a job that was a little over his head working for a boss who was a real hard case. The situation got really uncomfortable for everyone involved. Both Sam and his boss lost their tempers a couple of times. Ultimately, Sam was offered the opportunity to leave before being fired.
All of the folks involved were very careful to never describe the job change as ‘being fired’ because that made it possible for Sam to collect unemployment insurance.
When the unemployment insurance ran out (sometime later we’ll talk about whether or not unemployment insurance is a helpful thing), Sam had to start to look for a job. His job search efforts were half hearted while there was a regular check coming in. A badly bruised ego and a tough economy put him in the difficult position of having to explain the firing and the employment gap.
When he finally got a hold of me, his panic was palpable.
I listened as he told me about how he’d screwed himself and created an impossible situation. He was certain that there was no way out. It wasn’t entirely my fault, he confided.
I gave him a few pieces of advice that you might consider if you have some ‘resume challenges’:
It’s no wonder employees and job seekers are having a hard time getting a handle on the state of the job market and whether our economy is showing any improvements. In November, the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that the unemployment rate creeped up from 9.6% to 9.8% which analysts expect will only drop down to 9.7% in December. In parallel, the Conference Board reported that consumer confidence which had improved in November, decreased slightly in December.
To shed more light on what is influencing and impacting today’s workforce, Glassdoor has just released the results of its latest Employment Confidence Survey that reveals what those on the front lines, the employees and job seekers, are really seeing and feeling. Below are highlights showing where they are feeling optimistic, unsure and where they’re seeing changes at their company or in their job search.
Starting on a high note…
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