The Outlook for Jobs is Improving in Line with Employers' Confidence in the Economy

Copyright (c) 2011 Alison Withers

The latest survey by the UK's Recruitment and Employment Confederation in April 2011 suggests that more employers are planning to add to their permanent workforce during the coming year with more than a third suggesting that they would be adding to their existing staff.

In the short term, however, only 23 per cent, say they are planning to grow their permanent workforce in the next three months and 64 per cent intend to keep numbers static.

For the time being the emphasis remains on using temporary and contract staff remains strong with 93 per cent saying they will either keep their use of agency workers at existing levels or grow them in the short-term and 81 per doing the same in the longer term.

The most up to date unemployment figures also showed a slight decrease, all of which suggests that things might get slightly easier for job seekers as the year progresses, tying in with forecasts that private sector investment and trade will start accelerating in the second half of the year.

As most temporary and contract work tends to come via specialist recruitment agencies and demand in this sector remains high it makes sense for job seekers to use their services.

For anyone who has been unemployed for a while or knows they will soon face redundancy signing on with an agency as soon as possible is sensible.

Agencies have reliable and wide-ranging contacts with employers, many of whom are long-term clients with whom they have built up a relationship of confidence and trust. This is a resource that can be extremely useful to job seekers in what is still a very competitive situation.

Very often agencies have a long term relationship with candidates who they have placed successfully and therefore will go back to them when they feel it is time to move on from their current job or to move their career progression up a level.

Building a good reputation as a candidate with an agency takes time, effort and honesty but it is worthwhile both to ensure continuity of employment while employers are still focused mainly on temporary or contract work for their requirements for PAs, administrative workers and executive PAs.

It also helps in developing experience in a variety of situations to build a comprehensive CV that will support the candidate's ambitions for developing their career.

Feedback from the agency, which will normally have followed up a successful placement of a candidate with a client, can also help to identify any skill gaps that can be improved with periodic training courses and can help an individual to polish their skills and abilities for the future.

If the results of the survey on employers' growing confidence in the economic recovery prove correct now is a good time for candidates to start developing their experience and skills to be ready for the new opportunities that will develop in the second half of the year.


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Latest survey results suggest that employer confidence in the economic recovery is gathering pace and now is a good time for PAs and those in administration aspiring to become executive PAs to start polishing their skills and adding to their CV. By Ali Withers.