Each week, we’ll brief you on notable stats and happenings related to current events impacting the job market now or in the foreseeable future.
Holiday Benefits Up, Graduate Salaries Down
Pay & Benefits on the Rise
The Glassdoor Local Pay Report states that U.S. salaries have been on the upswing since the summer doldrums as we head into the holiday season. In-store and online retail roles are seeing the biggest hikes: Warehouse associates’ pay rose 4.3%, store managers’ 4.0%, cashiers’ 3.7% and warehouse associates’ 4.3%.
As Baby Boomers age, more insurance agents and healthcare workers are needed – in turn, salaries have increased. Salaries rose 5.3% for insurance agents and 3.4% for licensed practical nurses. Our specialized vertical reports on Financial Services and Healthcare reveal growing trends and best practices for these competitive industries.
In Tech, business development managers are in-demand as companies are looking to grow to the next level: salaries for these workers rose by 3.8%. Java Developers had the lowest increase at 0.3%, as well as programmer analysts at 0.2%. Pay for maintenance workers and lawyers decreased by 0.6% and 0.2%, respectively. Information Technology is not only an industry but also fills competitive roles across sub-industries. See if your organization is on target with the strongest offers within our latest report here.
Our recent Annual Recruiting Benchmark Report for 2017 outlines all the latest trends in salaries, fees, and performance. Check it out here.
Holiday Bonuses are Larger but Fewer
A survey released by Accounting Principals states that bonuses will see a 66% increase in value this year – from $1,081 in 2016 to $1,797 in 2017. Last year’s survey had 75% of HR and hiring managers planning on giving employees monetary holiday bonuses…this year that number dropped to 63%. Instead, 38% of respondents say they are giving monetary donations on behalf of employees – this is up from 7% last year.
Bachelor’s Graduates Salary on the Decline
For those graduating in 2017 with a Bachelor’s degree, the average salary fell 2.9% from that of 2016. This data is from a survey conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers. The overall salary for the class of 2017 is $51,022, while in 2016 it was $52,569.
U.S. Unemployment Lowest in 17 Years
The U.S. unemployment level is now down to 4.1%, the lowest since December 2000. “This labor market is still really firing on all cylinders,” says Scott Anderson, chief economist at Bank of the West in San Francisco. However, overall wages are only up slightly at 2.4% growth in October year over year.
BountyJobs Bites
What Savings Account?
According to the New York Times, three out of four Americans do not have enough saved for retirement, and 45% haven’t saved any money at all. The Center for Retirement Research finds that balances for 401(k) and individual retirement accounts of people ages 55 to 64 were on average about $135K in 2016…which only amounts to about $600 a month retirement income.
2017 Top Startups
LinkedIn takes a look at the top 50 startups in the U.S. – “To put the list together, we analyzed billions of interactions between professionals and companies that were founded less than 10 years ago and received at least one round of VC funding. Our goal was to determine which of these companies generate the most interest among professionals and are the most desirable employers.”
Top 10:
- Uber
- Airbnb
- WeWork
- Lyft
- Slack
- NIO
- Rubrik
- Dropbox
- Houzz
- Convoy
For the full list of 50, visit this page.
Women in the Workplace Report Released
Sheryl Sandberg’s nonprofit organization LeanIn.org recently put on a ‘Women in the Workplace 2017’ report along with McKinsey & Company. Data was gathered from 222 companies and more than 70,000 employees. Many valuable insights were gleaned, such as “66% of companies have strategies for diversity hiring, but only 25% set gender diversity targets”. Take a look at more data points released here.
Developing Nurse Managers
Paula McKinney, DNP, RN, NE-BC, vice president of nursing and CNO at Scotland Health Care System in Laurinburg, North Carolina ran a recent study, ‘”Improve Nurse Manager Competency With Experiential Learning,” published in the October 2016 issue of Nurse Management. 86% of the respondents said they had no formal leadership development when they first became a nurse manager.
“If you promote someone to nurse manager and [he or she leaves] you within 12 to 18 months, you’re losing a great deal of money. It could be up to $100,000,” McKinney says. “I think there’s some cost savings involved in better preparing them to be leaders and managers instead of letting them be out there on their own to flounder and then they end up leaving the job.”
IT Education Not Up to Snuff
New research from Robert Half Technology UK states that more than nine in ten CIOs (92%) believe that the IT education provided by colleges, universities and technical schools doesn’t meet the demands of the employment market.
IT Security was the biggest disappointment with nearly six in ten (59%) saying that this is one of the critical areas that IT educators need to focus on. Digitization at 23%, Business Intelligence at 20% and Software/Application Development at 18% were the next three found to be of concern.
Boo! Scariest Workplace Tasks
A study released by Powwownow found that 53% of UK workers felt that “giving negative feedback to colleagues is the scariest task for them in the workplace”. A distant second was making a phone call in front of co-workers at 36%. So much so that one in five said they would ignore that task in order for it to hopefully go away.
More Than Half Just Settle
A CareerBuilder survey cites that 56% of candidates accept the original offer when negotiating a new job. According to the research, “those who avoid it say they don’t attempt (to negotiate) because they don’t feel comfortable asking for more money (51 percent), are afraid the employer will decide not to hire them (47 percent), or, they don’t want to appear greedy (36 percent).”
Keep the Referrals Coming
Fast Company wrote a piece telling how Ernst & Young may be planning on hiring more than 15K people next year. Back in 2010, the company stated that about 30% of its hires were from referrals. Cut to 2017, and the company is looking to have 50% of its workforce from referrals.
Dan Black, Ernst & Young’s recruiting leader for the Americas, states, “Referral candidates perform better and stay longer. In fact, external research has shown that referred workers are up to 30 percent less likely to quit and have substantially better performance on high-impact metrics. Other studies indicate that even so-called “weak” connections are likely to lead to placement and better job outcomes.”
Are You Achieving Today’s Hiring Best Practices?
HR thought leader Josh Bersin recently wrote about the seven practices of high-impact HR, which include:
- Designing better employee experiences
- Leveraging HR technology
- Leading corporate digital transformation
- Understanding/supporting agile and team-centric org models
- Working with leadership to craft a culture of trust and accountability
- Designing the HR function as a network of teams, breaking down silos
- Continuously developing your HR talent
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, American employees have lost, on average, a full week of vacation since 2000. 40% of U.S. workers currently find work “highly stressful.”
