India's June quarter hiring plans weak: Manpower

India has emerged as the most optimistic nation for hiring globally but recruitment plans for the next three months of the year are considerably weak as employers remain hesitant about adding new employees at this time, global staffing services firm Manpower says.

The Manpower Employment Outlook Survey of hiring trends released today reveals that only 25 per cent of employers have positive hiring plans for April-June 2009.

The outlook may be the most optimistic reported globally but historically this is the second weakest forecast from Indian employers as they remain hesitant about adding employees. For the January-March period of this year India reported the worst-ever net employment outlook of 19 per cent.

"Overall there is a big size wait-and-watch syndrome among employers in India as 64 per cent of the employers remain undecided about hiring intent for the next quarter," Manpower India Managing Director Naresh Malhan said.

The forecast, based on a survey of 3,600 employers across seven industry sectors, says employment outlook is marginally better than last quarter when outlook was the weakest ever.

"Lot of companies are rationalising every cost that they are incurring and examining them very microscopically. The job market at present is very tight in the organised sector. If we add the unorganised sector as well, it is going to be even bad," Malhan added.

Elaborating further Malhan said: "Global meltdown seems to have taken its toll on the hiring pace in the Indian job market. This relatively slow pace in hiring in the second quarter can be attributed to the employers' focus on maintaining their workforce at current levels."

Besides, hiring intentions across all industry sectors have softened as organisations are reviewing their requirements at the beginning of the fiscal year, he added.

A zonal-wise analysis shows that employers in all four regions predict a strong labour market with the most optimistic forecast in the east, which has a net employment outlook of 27 per cent. Meanwhile, outlooks for the South, West and North are 24 per cent, 23 per cent and 22 per cent, respectively.

Meanwhile, hiring forecasts from across the globe is notably weaker this quarter as compared to 12 months ago, confirming that the situation in the global labour market has definitely deteriorated, the survey said.

Employers worldwide continue to cut back on hiring in Q2 of calendar year 2009 compared to the year-ago period, with US employers reporting the gloomiest outlook since the 1982 recession.

In the Asia-Pacific region employers expect the downturn to take a toll on the job prospects. Of the eight countries and territories surveyed in the Asia-Pacific region, India is showing more positive intentions than any other country.

Employers in Singapore, New Zealand and Taiwan expect the deepest cuts in their payrolls, from three months ago.

"The caution that began to set in across Asia Pacific during the first three months of the year is expected to accelerate in the second quarter... Our data shows extremely weak hiring ahead for the region, similar to the pace seen in 2003 during the SARS pandemic," Manpower Inc Chairman and CEO Jeffrey A Joerres said.

This may indicate that in this difficult economic environment, employers are struggling to manage the tension between generating a profit and maintaining their workforce infrastructure.