Jeffrey Joerres, CEO of Manpower Offers His Outlook On Employment
Thursday, December 11, 2008JEFF YASTINE: Joining us more (sic) to talk about the outlook for the job market, Jeffrey Joerres, CEO of Manpower, one of the world's largest employment agencies. Mr. Joerres, welcome to NIGHTLY BUSINESS REPORT.
JEFFREY JOERRES, CEO, MANPOWER: Thank you, great to be here.
YASTINE: You know, the first question is what about these recent job losses, how much worse is it going to get by your guesstimation?
JOERRES: Yes. We clearly are in an area where we are seeing things that we've never seen before. So you have to put it in that context. Having said that, when you look at what companies are doing in the fourth quarter, it's very much in line with what we have been hearing from our clients and actually hearing from our surveys. And that is that companies really were either seeing a lessening demand or were hearing about how terrible the environment is and really are trying to get themselves better positioned for 2009 by announcing the layoffs, by naming the names and trying to get as many of those people out of the organizations that they are in now and unfortunately, on to the street. And that's what we are seeing in the jobless claims of the 533 and that's some of what you are seeing, which I think we would be seeing these announcements almost daily now up until the end of the year.
YASTINE: What's your sense, give us some perspective here on just how bad this is perhaps compared to other periods and other cycles of economic slowdowns in this country.
JOERRES: You know, any time you are in an economic slowdown, it feels like it's the worst one. Because you are not quite sure of all the variables that got you there. But we can clearly say and clearly look at this, that the speed that it happening, how long the U.S. has been in it and we can't forget about how much the rest of the world is affected. So what we are seeing in India, what we are seeing in Western Europe, what we are seeing in Japan is also going to be affecting the global market. So I would have to say, you know, if we looked in the '80s it would look close to the '80s. You probably heard that some of the number of 533 and the combined two months were closer to '74. So we're in an area right now that we think and unfortunately believe it will get worse. But it is a time where being a job-seeker is going to be more stressful than ever before.
YASTINE: We talked so much about the places in the economy, where jobs are being lost. Are there any bright spots here, any silver linings in these clouds that we can look at and say here's where jobs are at least being maintained, some stability there or by some chance being added?
JOERRES: Well, I mean, there are companies even in one of the more difficult industries like manufacturing that are still doing well, except there are so few of those, they are so far, that you really can't say that that is a good place to be. We're seeing manufacturing take out jobs because of demand and manufacturing take out jobs for productivity. You know, you heard and I'm sure everybody knows health care because of demographics will continue to grow. But health care is a bit hollow for some job-seekers because it's hard to get into that profession. It's not something you can just jump in and say this is what I'm going to be in is a health care professional tomorrow. Services, services are better than manufacturing. We're still seeing some services particularly of course in the finance side. But even some insurance companies are hiring. They're hiring in selective ways. So if you have unique skills, you're able to present that in a unique way, there are opportunities that are going to be very hard to find though.
YASTINE: Mr. Joerres, we saw this situation earlier this week and last week where we had these workers in Chicago that took over a facility that was being closed down. They were being laid off. Would you expect to see more of that kind of -- you might say labor unrest simply because it is such a strange situation out there in the job market?
JOERRES: It's very stressful situation. And people that have dual income families, possibly both of those partners have been laid off. The amount of stress associated with that, particularly with some of the holiday seasoning (sic) coming up, it can be difficult. I would like to think that the way companies are doing it and some of the things that the government is talking about will ease some of the pain, so I think we have to be cautious about all of the tension in the system and make sure that it doesn't get to a point where we would embarrass ourselves or create an environment where it gets even harsher because we have so much tension in the system.
YASTINE: All right, we'll end it there. We're out of time Mr. Joerres. Thanks for your time on the program.
JOERRES: Thank you.
YASTINE: My guest tonight, Jeffrey Joerres, CEO of Manpower.
