Poor jobs market

Polarbeary

Just wondering - who else is finding it hard to find a job? There's quite a few PA/secretarial jobs advertised in London. I've had many interviews as I've posted recently but no job.

Had an interesting chat with the lady at an agency I'm dealing with. She said she has people with many years experience on good salaries who have been made redundant and have been job hunting for months - laid off from financial companies. She thinks the job market is in a bad way and the election and referendum is having a huge impact. This is especially the case for finance sector jobs. I've heard at least two other recruiters say the market is especially slow right now.

Is it the stay/leave EU debate? The time of year (end of financial year), uncertainty about the economy or heading into a recession? The US election? Yet official unemployment figures are down - 10 year low at 5.1%!

I would be really interested to know your thoughts. How bad are things outside London?

xapprenticex

All by design, we moved away from self sufficiency to working for a handful of families who own everything, we just have to hope they throw us a few crumbs... or go self employed.

makeyourdaddyproud

There are still many industries that are struggling to recruit, even in London.

It's just that most MSE complainants want jobs where there's little effort involved, or ones where they can simply park their bum for 8hrs a day.

Of course such jobs will be thin on the ground.

Polarbeary

Hubby has said his bank and many others are making staff redundant or have hiring freezes.

Plenty of minimum wage, zero hour contracts going though. Funny that.

Sanne

I started looking for a job towards the middle of August (South East, Brighton region) and interviewed for the job I accepted in the beginning of November so it took me about three months to find something suitable. In comparison, when I looked before that (summer 2014) I had something new within two weeks, though this may have been pot luck that the right job was advertised at that time.
I should add that I had an interview offer after less than a week this time round but turned it down as I didn't like the sound of the business. Had I been desperate (I was in secure full time employment so was very picky) there would have been jobs to go for earlier which I dismissed for various reasons.

Generally, vacancies seemed to vary depending on what you were looking for, jobs in some areas are few and far between whereas there's large amounts of vacancies in others. (If you're a software developer with knowledge in .NET you won't be struggling for example!)

Quite a few others have left my previous employer over the last few months and all had found jobs to go to, but again, they have jobs that are in demand. On the other hand I know a couple of people (one of them an office manager) who have been looking for a while now and haven't found anything suitable.

So I guess it depends - for some industries/jobs the market is quite possibly slow, for others it's still fine.

[Deleted User]

Pretty dire - I've seen job market since 2012 as a rapid mover on'er although 6 months now consistent employment for me so there are some miracles. lol!

1 recruitment consultant urged someone who just scoped (a considerably lower value role and only at 6 months contract) to stop looking as they had asked their unrelated consultant to carry on looking with what they accepted being 'short term'.. RC said job hoppers are getting severly less tolerated like never before, even if work situations are getting worse. (a year or 2 ago I would have said differently but now find myself agreeing with this as it is starting to ring true)

I have another friend coming up for 5 months unemployment that I would never have believed it.

It really started to hammer home how bad it was last September.
But I've had hundreds of jobs so maybe just desserts or what pulls me through, undecided. Perhaps both sides have to higher want.

I was fortunate enough to work through the last recession even if it was min wage in East Anglia - was it like now? For some positiveness something always happens when least expected is another of my favorite lean too's.

Firetastic

And yet on the news today the unemployment figures are down. But not in Scotland I might add. They're up ho hum.

I'm very sceptical about the unemployment figures.

And round where I live there's really not anything. Sad to say 2 years unemployed Monday just gone.

SomeRandomGuy

There are plenty of jobs advertised in my area but there are crazy numbers of people after each one.. Quite often the job is advertised for a few days only before being taken down as they receive the required number of applicants in that time frame.

I think for many jobs there is an over supply of labour and therefore the market is heavily stacked in favour of the employer. Low pay and questionable T&Cs seem the norm around here. Employees are effectively disposable and can be replaced within hours.

I am also very sceptical about the unemployment figures. Is someone on a 0 hour contact who is getting perhaps 20 hours a week of work really 'employed'? Nobody can live off that kind of job on a long term basis.

Firetastic

SomeRandomGuy wrote: »

There are plenty of jobs advertised in my area but there are crazy numbers of people after each one.. Quite often the job is advertised for a few days only before being taken down as they receive the required number of applicants in that time frame.

I think for many jobs there is an over supply of labour and therefore the market is heavily stacked in favour of the employer. Low pay and questionable T&Cs seem the norm around here. Employees are effectively disposable and can be replaced within hours.

I am also very sceptical about the unemployment figures. Is someone on a 0 hour contact who is getting perhaps 20 hours a week of work really 'employed'? Nobody can live off that kind of job on a long term basis.

I once went for an interview and 300 people applied for the job. The guy said he was going to interview every one and he would come in on his days off to do so.

eilidhcatriona

I can't speak for London, but Aberdeen is bad just now - I've been at risk of redundancy (safe now thankfully), I work in the oil industry, so I've been looking around at what is available and speaking to agencies. The current oil industry issue means that loads of people are being made redundant and there aren't enough new jobs for them. There are very few vacancies for the more technical jobs. People are getting desperate and applying for everything they can - several hundred for every job. I can't blame them, but it means that it makes it harder for people who are genuinely qualified and have the experience necessary for a job to be noticed, as they are just one of 300 CVs.

Firetastic

eilidhcatriona wrote: »

I can't speak for London, but Aberdeen is bad just now - I've been at risk of redundancy (safe now thankfully), I work in the oil industry, so I've been looking around at what is available and speaking to agencies. The current oil industry issue means that loads of people are being made redundant and there aren't enough new jobs for them. There are very few vacancies for the more technical jobs. People are getting desperate and applying for everything they can - several hundred for every job. I can't blame them, but it means that it makes it harder for people who are genuinely qualified and have the experience necessary for a job to be noticed, as they are just one of 300 CVs.

That's the problem isn't it? People apply for any job because it's the only jobs there are. For example in my area there's loads of care jobs. However not everyone wants to or can do care work. So you end up with people who aren't really interested in doing it long term.