Minnesota Headhunter

2010 U.S. And Minnesota IT Jobs See Increase In Q3 To Continue In Q4

While the Minnesota and U.S. IT employment did not get hit as hard as the 2001-2003 recession no doubt many jobs were lost.

Here in Minnesota we saw a noticeable tone change to the positive this spring, specifically March 2010. By noticeable I mean it went from “sucks” to “eh, the light at the end of the tunnel may not be a freight train coming at us after all.”

Yeah, it was that bad but we have seen a significant number of jobs posted and filled in Q2 and Q3 and expect this to continue into Q4.

I am talking about the IT job market in general, the aggregate. Certainly throughout the “Great Recession” we have seen pockets of strength:

• .Net
• Java
• C++
• PHP
• Mobile
• SharePoint

Many with those skill set had no idea that there were bad times going on.

Minnesota Jobs And Employment Report: July 2010

It’s been a while since I blogged about jobs reports and with some mixed signals we are getting in the local and national economy it is time to start following them again.

Today the State of Minnesota (all states), Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED), released job numbers for July 2010.

9,800 jobs were created for the month. June numbers were revised up from -3,700 to -800.

The unemployment rate is at 6.8% unchanged from June.

The U.S. unemployment rate is 9.5%

40,900 jobs have been created since the beginning of 2010 and we are +29,100 over the past 12 months.

Job Gains - July (Year to Date):

5,500 (+14,200) Education and Health Care

4,300 (+11,100) Professional and Business Services

Minneapolis Ranks #1 In Medical Device & Minnesota #6 In Quality Of Life

Business Facilities magazine (July/August 2010) ranks cities and states on a number of different categories.

We missed on a few I thought we should be on and a few we need to get better with so we can be ranked.

From the 2010 Business Facilities Rankings Report:
Metro Rankings

Top 10 Metro – Medical Devices and Equipment

#1 Minneapolis, Minnesota

#2 New Haven, Connecticut

#3 Salt Lake City, Utah

#4 San Jose, California

#5 Madison, Wisconsin

Texas #1 In CNBC Top States For Doing Business 2010, Minnesota Ties for #8

CNBC has announced its America’s Top States For Doing Business 2010 with Texas finishing in first place.

Rounding out the Top 5:

• #2 Virginia
• #3 Colorado
• #4 North Carolina
• #5 Massachusetts

#8 is Minnesota tied with Utah.

Our neighbors:

• Iowa (#6)
• South Dakota (#7)
• North Dakota (#12)
• Wisconsin (#29)

Minnesota Recruiters Hiring And Jobs Survey | Spring 2010

Leading up to Minnesota Recruiters Conference 10 held April 30^th, 2010 at Best Buy Headquarters I sent out a Survey Monkey link to gauge what hiring looked like during Q1 of 2010 along with expectations of Q2 and 2010 in general, what jobs and skill sets were most an least in demand and how Recruiters and HR professionals felt about their own job security.

This is not a scientific survey. The survey link was sent multiple times to the Minnesota Recruiters email list of 1900 Recruiter and HR professionals with a 10% response rate.

While not scientific the results do show what most in the Recruiter and HR community have been seeing and talking about over the past weeks and points of conversation during the conference.

Do Unemployment Benefits Create Lazy Job Seekers?

A couple of weeks ago the San Francisco Federal Reserve released an Economic Letter (research paper) titled Extended Unemployment and UI Benefits and the Internet blew up. Not literally but close.

Let me get my personal view out of the way.

I believe that 95%+ of unemployed people want to work and are working hard to find a job. I do believe there are those who have no problem getting a check to stay at home. I base my number on the folks I see, hear from and do job search, LinkedIn and Social Media sessions with/for.

I see that most folks really do want to get back to work.

More than that (and this is me taking a shot at my conservative friends) we are not talking about a lot of money. Minimum wage or so. Do you really think that most people want to stay home for that?

Moving on…

US Job Growth An Ongoing Concern

I still need to post a bunch of employment statistics from recent weeks and with this post am jumping ahead a bit.

This afternoon I had a long chat with a reporter who was curious about why my optimism about job growth was so low.

Sure it is likely we are out of the recession, corporate profits are up and some temporary hiring (a forward looking indicator) has started but we have a long, long way to go.

Here is a recent chart of job losses and duration by recession:

Executive Search Firm Boyden Outlook Finds Need for CEO and C-Level Executive Mobility and Flexibility

– Top Global Executive Search Firm Reports Technology, Energy, Consumer and Life Sciences among Sectors with Some Pent Up Demand for Executive Talent –

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--As globalization shifts corporate priorities, mobility and flexibility will be required for even star executives, as prospects for senior management often shift from the West to the developing world, according to the quarterly Boyden Executive Outlook released today.

“CEOs can come from any market due to the globalization of business,” said Chris Clarke, President and CEO of Boyden World Corporation. “Many of the best opportunities are shifting away from the West, while changes in government policy and taxation are making corporations consider locating operations in countries with less restrictive policies.”

What Is The Definition Of Unemployed?

In good times and bad times and regardless of political party I have said that the way the United States government, specifically the Bureau of Labor Statistics, states unemployment statistics is B*** S***. CRAP I say!!!

In the coming days I am going to be doing a bunch of posts about recent labor statistics including what many consider “real unemployment” numbers by age, race, location, etc.

How is it that the media folks do not pick up in this? My guess is they do not get it and do not see the need to educate themselves.

For now I leave you with what I think is the best way to understand the different definitions of unemployed in the United States (hat tip to Toby Dayton of Diggings for the video):

Is Your Major Metropolitan Area A Smart City? Mine Is. Minneapolis/St. Paul #4

I do not put a lot of emphasis on surveys because how one measures, asks questions and differing criteria can give varied results.

But I am competitive.

And I am a homer.

So when The Daily Beast announced the results of their survey and Minneapolis - St Paul is #4 I am going to blog about it.

They ranked cities with 1,000,000+ in population (including suburbs) from 1 to 55 and came up with the following order (click America's Smartest Cities—From First to Worst to get their criteria, slide show and brief commentary on each city):