Q4 employment outlook up 25%, says Manpower

Q4 employment outlook up 25%, says Manpower
The Financial Express, September 9, 2009, Page 3

fe Bureaus, New Delhi

Job market in India is coming full circle from the time it started going downhill from September 2008 when the Lehman Brothers debacle took place.

This upbeat trend in India is evident in the recent global quarterly study conducted by Manpower which shows an uptick in the job market here as companies reinitiate expansion plans even while things are not going so well in Europe and the US.

According to Manpower survey, the net employment outlook for India stood at 25% in Q4 compared with 19% in Q3 in the calendar year (CY) 2009. The survey was conducted on 5,700 small, mid and large sized employers across seven sectors of which 25% had intentions of hiring in 2009.

‘Seasonally unadjusted’ responses to employment outlook as answered by employers to whether they would increase, decrease, stay neutral or don’t know between Q3 and Q4 2009 stood at 30% versus 36%, 7% versus 2%, 45% versus 56% and 18% versus 6% respectively. Apart from the up in “increase responses” from 30% to 36% between Q3 and Q4 also noteworthy is the “decrease in hiring” responses that dropped from 7% to 2% and “don’t know” responses that dropped from 18% to 6% thus signifying more opportunities for employment in the forthcoming quarter, said Naresh Malhan managing director of Manpower India. Sectorally too there were clear trailblazers of the seven sectors that comprised the survey respondents. The wholesale and retail sector showed significant improvement in net employment outlook from 21% to 34%, services sector rose from 15% to 25% and finance, insurance and real estate sector went up from 11% to 19% between Q3 and Q4 2009.

The fact that these sectors are amongst the largest employers in the country further validates their positive intent expressed in the study. “Transportation and utilities” on the other hand stood at 16% down from 18% last quarter and showed “least optimistic forecast by employers in this sector”.

Globally countries in Asia and the American region are the ones showing positive employment outlooks this quarter. 17 of 35 countries surveyed expect some positive hiring activity in the quarter ahead. Following India, Brazil had the next highest net employment outlook of 21% followed by Columbia, Peru and China at 8%.