Hiring is supposed to improve during the second quarter, but many job seekers would like to see more, an employment expert says.
The Manpower Employment Outlook Survey reports that Hoosier companies “expect to hire at an active pace” from April to June. Of the 282 Indiana businesses questioned about their intentions, 19 percent said they will add more workers.
Five percent of the companies questioned said they will reduce staff levels. The majority – 72 percent – intend to maintain staff levels. Four percent are uncertain.
The survey, released today, has a margin of error of plus or minus 0.61 percent.
Fort Wayne workplace consultant Steve Corona said the report is encouraging, but it still “feels like we’re in this holding pattern … and I don’t know why that is.”
Corona, owner and president of Corona Consulting, was in Washington D.C., on Monday for an industry conference.
“I suppose there are a number of factors why hiring isn’t stronger,” he said, adding that corporate America’s lack of confidence in the economy is a major reason.
Even so, progress is being made. The outlook for second quarter’s net employment increase in Indiana is 14 percent, based on the percentage of employers that plan to add workers versus reduce staff.
“Employers’ hiring expectations for the second quarter of 2013 are improving compared to Quarter 1 2013 when the net employment outlook was 7 percent,” Manpower spokesman Pat Hevrdejs said in a statement. “Compared to one year ago when the net employment outlook was 15 percent, employers are similarly confident about their staffing plans.”
Indiana is on par with the rest of the nation’s hiring intentions. Of the more than 18,000 employers surveyed nationwide, 18 percent expect to create jobs, 5 percent expect layoffs, and 73 percent of the companies expect no change to staff levels. The remaining 4 percent are unsure.
Job prospects in Indiana appear best in several sectors, including manufacturing, transportation and utilities, wholesale and retail trade, education and health services, according to the survey.
Gains in those categories, however, aren’t enough to make job hunters happy, Corona said.
“It’s great that hiring is better,” he said, “and we did think things were improving, because homes that had been on the market were starting to sell.”
Northeast Indiana existing home sales rose about 17 percent in January compared with the same month the previous year, a February report from the Upstate Alliance of Realtors showed. The organization, which tracks data from Allen, Adams, DeKalb, Huntington, Noble, Wells and Whitley counties, said 398 homes sold in January, up from 341 in January 2012.
Corona is cautiously optimistic.
“We’ll have to monitor this on a month-by-month basis to see if hiring patterns are starting to (really) loosen up,” he said.
