HEY, TECHIES: Not So Quiet on Tech Job Front

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

Not So Quiet on Tech Job Front

By Suneel Ratan

02:00 AM Oct. 20, 2003 PT

SAN FRANCISCO -- Tech job postings on two popular online employment sites have increased sharply, a sign that the long moribund job market may finally be turning around.

Craigslist tech job postings in the San Francisco Bay Area have doubled from a year ago and are up 50 percent from six months ago, said CEO Jim Buckmaster. Activity has particularly picked up in the past four weeks, he said.

A similar picture has emerged at Monster.com, one of the Web's biggest job sites. Overall listings are up 19 percent in the past six months, said founder Jeff Taylor. The increases are centered in such tech job categories as software development (39 percent), call center jobs (36 percent) and engineering (21 percent).

Noting that activity in the San Francisco area often presages shifts in the broader tech marketplace, Taylor said, "I've spoken to a couple of people in San Francisco in the past 48 or 72 hours, and San Francisco is popping right now. We're being anecdotal here, but in the past four or five weeks, San Francisco has come back to life."

MORE AT: http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,60854,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_6

[RuB]

1. We'll know when the job market is turning around when

newspapers start making money on help wanted adds. So far they are losing money badly.

[Dagaz]

4. The Chronicle has a funny ad

Their trucks say "join the taxpayers club". Read the Chronicle help wanteds.

[RuB]

11. Wow. Unemployed in SanFran's gotta be hard.

Went to a few of great concerts in the late 60's, bought a bag of weed on a streetcar that was pure unadulterated bogus that my friends and I passed around at a concert at the Filmore. I lived there in the mid 70's for a while. I love San Francisco but wouldn't want to live there.

[Lithos]

2. Up sharply and healthy are two different things

Any increase from nothing is a large increase.

Also did they discuss the type of work involved? Contract? Also note that the salaries are mere fractions of what they used to be?

L-

[lcordero]

3. nothing but smoke and mirrors

About 3/4ths to 4/5ths of the jobs advertised don't exist.

[lysergik]

5. Exactly.

Most of the jobs advertised have already been filled internally or advertised and then the position itself has been downsized.

I remember when the Seattle papers had an entire section full of tech jobs, now you're lucky for half a page length of one column in the classifieds.

Going on 8 months of unemployment for me and its been a very very dry period compared to the other times I've been laid off the in the past 3 years.

[lcordero]

7. sorry to hear that

:(

[mhr]

6. I'll Echo The Sentiments of Others

These new job postings could be nothing more than:

1. Resume Harvesting, and
2. Posted for legal reasons to cover jobs filled internally.

[Selwynn]

9. Er... huh?

I'm a manager.

There are NO legal reasons to post jobs because you filled them "internally." EDIT -- in my state. I can't claim to know all state laws.

You can harvest all the resumes you want without posting a job. You think there are six billion resumes out there for people without jobs? We never post a position just to see resumes.

I do however have another explaination for why you're seeing job postings. It's the new fiscal year in November. Probably many places are doing exactly what I'm doing - a scant ammount of hiring while there's "new money" in the coffers.

[papau]

13. When hiring a H1 visa, you need to post and show you tried for American

Fall postings for Actuarial, engineering, management interns to be trained and sent to manage in another country, etc. are all posted at this time to cover the hires you made last month.

The call center jobs are the time zoned low pay jobs done mostly overseas, but for which you need a small US group to cover the 9am EST Stan to 7 pm Est block of time.

And there has been a modest pick up in Tech (IBM will hire 10,000 while Sony will fire 20,000 - but net-net an increase)

[TreasonousBastard]

14. Around here...

we have all sorts of job postings for everything from cooks to accountants, but a fair amount of them are required postings when someone wants to bring his brother-in-law in from somewhere and have a job ready.

Green Card job postings. A lot are pretty obvious.

[Selwynn]

8. That's because its the new fiscal year - new budgets

It won't last.

Your friendly manager. :)

[AP]

10. What, did the Republicans pull and Augusto Pinochet-CIA

Wall St special? Are they no longer putting the screws to the CA economy now that they got rid of the sociali... I mean, conservative Democrat? Did the bond rating go up?

[foreigncorrespondent]

12. Hmmmm!

Well the head hunters haven't come knocking on Sapphocrats door in three years, and counting.