Job prospects gloomy in face of slump

By JULIE MIDDLETON

The best job prospects in the next six or seven months will be in the legal, electronics and IT fields.

Managers in other industries doubt there will be much going, says the TMP Job Index Survey.

The survey, which is published every six months, measures employers' confidence and how likely they are to take on more staff.

Overall, 52 per cent of hirers did not expect to change staff levels, 35 per cent indicated they planned to take on more people and 12 per cent predicted a reduction in numbers.

It was clear that managers expected the slump in travel, caused by the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, to continue into the middle of next year.

About a fifth of employers surveyed in tourism, chemicals and oils, transport, manufacturing and media expected to cut staff.

The only upbeat notes came from those involved in turning intellectual capital into gold.

More hirings were expected by 55 per cent of legal practices, 52 per cent of IT operations and 52 per cent of electronics-based businesses.

The telephone survey early last month covered 1602 of TMP's 4500 clients. They range from small businesses to heavyweight corporates such as Telecom and the Bank of New Zealand.

The news was "not all that cheerful", said TMP Worldwide strategy director Dr Kaye McAulay, and went against several years of upward trends.

"This is the first time we've seen a downturn in hiring expectations since July 1998," she said.

Managers had been fearing a recession before September 11, she said, and their pessimism was fuelled by the terrorist attacks and their aftermath.

South Island employers were more optimistic than those in the North Island, reflecting the south's larger proportion of agricultural-based export businesses, she said.

Despite the general gloom, small businesses - nimble and focused - were the most optimistic that they could ride out the storm.

Dr McAulay, citing an Australasian TMP survey which compared attitudes on both sides of the Tasman, said New Zealand was in better heart than many other countries.

The New Zealand survey confirmed something small-business owners already knew - they took the least sick leave. In 78 per cent of companies that employed fewer than 20 people, staff were likely to take no more than five days' annual sick leave.

But it was a different story in companies with more than 200 employees. Just 38 per cent of these companies reported annual average sick leave per employee of zero to five days. For 27 per cent of them, the annual average sick-leave rate was six to 10 days.

Dr McAulay said people in small companies often felt a greater sense of responsibility, loyalty and ownership, especially when there was no one to take their place.

There was more "redundancy" built into some larger organisations.