Professional jobs market seeing recovery

In India, professional jobs market making a substantive recovery after a major loss of confidence at the start of 2015. The Antal Global Snapshot by international recruitment firm, Antal International on the hiring and firing trends covering more than 9,500 organisations in 30 key countries has found job prospects for professionals and managers continuing to improve.

The 'Global Snapshot' project asked 9,570 companies in major markets whether they were currently hiring at professional and managerial level. It then asked whether they planned to do so in the coming quarter and whether they were currently letting staff go or were planning to do so in the next three months.

Current hiring across the globe was up from 68 per cent of respondents in January 2015 to 70 per cent now. And the percentage of organisations intending to hire in the coming quarter was also up from 66 per cent to 68 per cent.

In India, 2,292 companies took part in the survey to find out the hiring trends at professional and managerial level. The survey found that the percentage of companies currently hiring in India stands at 63 per cent, a 10 per cent rise year-on-year and per predictions made in September 2014.

This indicates that the continuing growth of the Indian economy is reflected in the demand for qualified managers and professionals. Recruitment levels remained positive with 88 per centof organizations planning to increase their head count and 29 per centof businesses currently shedding their staff.

The accounting (79 per cent) sector along with education (78 per cent), e-commerce(74 per cent), SSC/BPO (73 per cent), IT(67 per cent), banking(65 per cent), pharma (62 per cent), FMCG (60 per cent), to name a few, reported the highest percentage of current hiring as nearly all of those questioned reported they were currently taking on staff in these fields.

Whereas in the next quarter sectors like ICT Hardware (83 per cent), electronics(75 per cent), accounting (74 per cent), e-commerce (71 per cent), SSC/BPO (69 per cent), marketing advertising (68 per cent), show positive hiring trends.

As far as Disciplines are concerned, experienced professionals in several key disciplines such as accounting & finance, human resource, operation and sales & marketing are in markedly short supply in India. It said that construction and banking professionals can expect high levels of competition for jobs in the coming months.

Joseph Devasia, Managing Director Antal International, India said, "The 18th AGS, which discovers hiring trends across global markets shows that in India consumer focussed industries led by ecommerce companies (74 per cent of those surveyed) are leading the hiring march, and will continue to do so in the next quarter too."

He added that while Q3 may have seemed to slow down a bit, more than 60 per cent of companies across all sectors are hiring indicating a clear strategy focussed on growth. He also said that telecom and real estate/infrastructure seem to be shedding the highest numbers of staff, which was expected in the current business climes.