Hiring strong but new hire compensation remains flat
Hiring in August is expected to be moderate to strong compared with one year ago, according to a report from the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) that looks at current-month hiring expectations.
In the service sector, 41.2 percent of HR professionals said their company plans to hire workers, while 6.1 percent will cut jobs — leaving a positive net of 35.1 percent. The remaining 52.7 percent expect no changes to staffing levels in August.
In the manufacturing sector, 56.2 percent of companies will hire, while 6.3 percent will trim payrolls — leaving a hiring net of 49.9 percent. The remaining 37.5 percent expect to hold steady with no hiring or layoffs in August.
On an annual basis — comparing August 2013 with August 2012 — service-sector hiring will increase by a net of 6.5 points and manufacturing-sector hiring will increase by a net of 9.3 points.
The findings are detailed in the monthly SHRM Leading Indicators of National Employment®, or LINE Report. The report provides a human resource snapshot of hiring expectations for the present month. Respondents include HR professionals from 500 private service-sector companies and 500 manufacturing companies.
“Though the employment-expectations and recruiting-difficulty indices are up, we are still not seeing the uptick translate into a significant increase in new-hire compensation,” said Jennifer Schramm, manager of workplace trends and forecasting at SHRM.
The SHRM LINE Report includes the only national monthly employment indices featuring a new-hire compensation index and a recruiting-difficulty index.
The August 2013 report’s new-hire compensation data shows:
- A net total of 6.1 percent of manufacturers increased new-hire compensation in July 2013 (the most recent month available), down 0.4 points from July 2012; and
- A net total of 8.3 percent of service-sector companiesincreased new-hire compensation in July 2013, up 2.1 points on an annual basis.
Regarding the recruiting-difficulty index:
- A net total of 17.3 percent of service-sector HR professionals reported more recruiting difficulty during July 2013, an increase of 12.2 points from July 2012; and
- A net of 20.2 percent of manufacturers experienced difficulty filling key jobs in July 2013, an increase of 4.3 points from one year ago.
To read the full SHRM LINE Report, visit:http://www.shrm.org/line and click the “SHRM LINE August 2013” link. Follow SHRM Research on Twitter@SHRM_Research.
Media: The SHRM LINE Report is released at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time on the first Thursday of each month. The SHRM employment expectations index describes the same time period referenced approximately one month later in the Employment Situation Report issued by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Press release from One Last Time: Yes, Financial Rewards DO Really Improve Performance, ALEXANDRIA, Va., Aug. 1, 2013,SHRM LINE Report: August 2013 Hiring Expected to be Strong; New Hire Compensation to Remain Flat