Society for Human Resource Management (02/05/15)

In January, recruiting difficulty for key positions reached a four-year high for both the manufacturing and service sectors, according to the Society for Human Resource Management’s Leading Indicators of National Employment Report. January was the ninth consecutive month recruiting difficulty reached four-year highs. Survey results from this month show that a net of 24.8% of manufacturing and 14.4% of service-sector respondents had difficulty recruiting for key positions, which notably represents a 17.2-point increase in manufacturing and an 8.4-point increase in the service sector when compared with January 2014.

More employers also reported raising pay for new hires in January—15.8% in manufacturing and 16.7% in the service sector, which equates to 13.5-point and 7.4-point increases, respectively, when compared with a year ago.

While steady hiring will continue in both sectors for February, layoffs also are expected to increase in both sectors when compared with the previous year—6.7% of manufacturers will cut jobs, as will 13.9% of service-sector companies. Yet, a net of more than one-half of manufacturers (50.5%) and more than one-third of service-sector companies (36.7%) will add jobs in the coming month.