The days of a job for life are certainly over. In much the same way that people will not stick with a bad marriage, it is reported by the Small Firms Association that out of a total of 340,000 people who changed their jobs in 2007, 290,000 of these people cited a failure to get on with their fellow employees or managers as their primary reason. The balance is made up by the 47,000 who left because of dissatisfaction with salary, 17,000 becasue of boredom, and 20,400 for various other reasons.

Interestingly, this survey also reports that an employer cannot rely on higher wages to retain staff. Companies that compete for scarce talent on a cash only basis leave themselves vulnerable to the next offer that comes along.

A recent OECD report lists Ireland as one of the only countries in the World where the gap between higher and lower paid workers is not widening.

We contrast to the worst offenders in that we are not suddenly leaping from being an agrarian economy to being an industrial one. This circumstance is a factor in some of the rapidly growing Asian economies, and has a knock on affect in many first world countries where pay must remain low for industrial workers as they compete with the likes of an assembly line worker in China or India.

As our economy seems to be so prevalently based on construction, one wonders does this have a bearing on our status – if the Chinese could export houses, 15% of our workforce would have to take some major wage cuts.

JM

With the addition of 80,000 new jobs to the workforce in the year to February 2007, it seems like it is all good news for the country. However, this latest Quarterly National Household Survey points out that two thirds of these jobs applied to just 3 sectors – construction, education and health. It also indicates that employment growth has peaked.

It is a clear worry to the economy that so many are employed in construction. One in every five males now works in construction – that is 14 per cent of the entire workforce, and it seems that many of the workers in this sector are non-nationals, and this is reflected by the fact that 3 out of every 5 jobs created in this employment surge went to non-nationals. There are many that feel that this sector is now hitting the brakes just short of a cliff.

These people are no longer viewed as pessimists, and it will take some deft handling by the next Government to compensate for the constriction of this sector. Forget all the clichéd blandishments of the election hopefuls – this is a pivotal moment for the economy, and to draw on a quote from the Clinton campaign: “It’s the economy, stupid”. Without naming names, it will be the party with the best fiscal CV who will gain power.

JM

Mercer Human Resource Consulting has conducted a global survey on quality of life to assist major companies in placing
employees in International roles. Dublin scored 8th in the European Union, while London came in at number 11. When measured against the whole World, Dublin ranks in 27th place for quality of life.

The criteria for this survey were as diverse as levels of air pollution, healthcare, and the presence of various animals and insects.
Zurich scored highest for overall quality of living, while Baghdad came in last. So much for liberty.

In order to provide a better service to our jobseekers, Jobsearch.ie has developed three stand alone sub-sites to our main site. Each of these sites will more comprehensively represent a category from our main site - Financial Jobs / Computer & IT Jobs / and Construction Jobs.

Financial-Jobsearch.ie - for financial jobs in Ireland.
Computer-Jobsearch.ie - for IT / Computer jobs in Ireland.
Construction-Jobsearch.ie - for Construction and Engineering jobs in Ireland

At the moment these sites list jobs, resources and salary surveys pertaining to their categories, and in due course, we hope to gradually increase the amount of information and interactivity available on each of these sites, and build them into a one stop shop for jobs and information relating to each of the categories that they represent.

Sales people are the most important people in any company. The old image of the sales person conjures up images of the hawk like car salesman using every trick in the book to get the docile customer to commit to the most expensive car on the lot. This was the “because you’re worth it” school of sales (not quite consigned to history yet) - it might not be practical or what your family needs, but you deserve it for all the crap you have had to put up with in life. Selling to emotion but not to need.

Well these days are mostly gone now, thanks to the successful sales mentors who started to study sales and apply a form of science to it - sales can not be a con; sales must serve genuine needs.

When I started out in sales I digested everything I could about becoming a better sales person: I attended seminars and read all of the sales material out there, as I knew if I got good at sales I would always have a job no matter what, no matter where.

The sales industry is a bit like the entertainment industry, every year many thousands of people enter and every year there is a mass exodus as people just realise that sales is not for them.

I would say the first thing about selling something is finding an area or product that you believe in. If you’re not excited about it, and if you don’t feel like it would really benefit the customer, well then don’t sell it. You have got to really love your product: the enthusiasm you show about your product will have a massive effect on your sales.

If you feel like this is a product which suits you and you could sell it, the next thing would be to really research the company, how they market the product, what their plans are in regards to marketing. Then if you are convinced that this company and its products are going places, then make the decision that you are going to make this sales role a success.

Sales has become a lot more sophisticated since the days of knocking on doors, or standing in the garage forecourt in a dodgy suit. Now we have a plethora of sales roles to choose from or aspire to. To name a few: Account Director, Account Manager, Agency Sales, B2B Sales (business to business), B2C Sales (business to customer), inbound sales, outbound sales, field sales, and every industry now has its specialist sales staff: medical sales reps, construction sales reps, media sales agents, the list and choice goes on and on.

But before you decide to enter the world of sales, you must be sure that you have the personality. Sales requires dogged persistence. If you are the type of person who gets discouraged by failure or rejection, don’t even think about making a career in sales. You have to be like the old Scottish King, Robert the Bruce - Having been defeated by the English, Bob the Bruce was hiding in a cave and feeling completely discouraged. While waiting for the heat to die down, he watched a spider building a web in the cave’s entrance. This spider fell down time and time again, but finally he succeeded in building his web. So Bruce decided also to return to the fight and told his men: “If at first you don’t succeed, try try and try again”.

JG

To search for Sales Jobs on Jobsearch: Sales Jobs in Ireland
Or try our specialised Sales Jobs site: Sales-Jobsearch.ie
You can also find sales jobs on salesrecruitment.ie: Sales Recruitment

There has been quite a bit of gloom in the media lately - with the leak of jobs made evident in the grim announcements by Motorola and Proctor & Gamble, but a suvey by Manpower would suggest that these losses do not necessarily reflect a shrinking workforce. Twenty per cent of employers polled stated that they planned to increase jobs in the coming months, while just two per cent stated that they would reduce jobs.

The poll was conducted across 665 companies, and interestingly the Hotel and Catering section were found to be by far the most optimistic - a result of the new transatlantic open skies agreement and a million more Americans maybe? The least optimistic proved to be the pharmaceutical sector. This was part of an International poll conducted by Manpower, and another surprise is that Ireland ranked second only to South Africa in terms of hiring activity.

In a joint confidence survey conducted by Eurocom Worldwide and its Irish partner, Simpson Technology and PR, the European technology employment sector, including Ireland, gets a clean bill of health. Nevertheless, the loss of jobs to low wage locations is set to continue and accelerate.

Even with the inevitable loss of jobs to the Far East, it emerges that 63 per cent of European Technology companies intend to increase IT Jobs by 63 per cent, with just 4 per cent anticipating cuts. Further to this though, 81 per cent of respondents believe that technology manufacturing jobs are being lost to low cost countries, while 60 per cent believe that service jobs are going abroad.

The job seekers most in demand in the European IT sector are Software Engineers and IT sales staff and job growth is anticipated in IT security, mobile services, and customer management.

There is no doubt now that Online Marketing is the next big thing. The fact that Online Advertising in Ireland is increasing by between 40 and 60% per annum, and as one and a half million people in Ireland now have internet access and the rollout of broadband continues, advertisers are flocking to this medium.

It offers other major advantages in comparison to traditional media - this is a medium that can be surgically directed at particular markets combined with analytics that traditional media could never offer. These are the reasons that this medium is gathering the momentum of a freight train.

According to Prosperity Media and Marketing Recruitment, when it comes to the digital marketing sector there is currently a major skills shortage in Ireland. Whether you are a traditional marketer or someone who is interested in getting into marketing, you should definitely add SEO (Search Engine Optimisation), SEM (Search Engine Marketing) and general online marketing to your skillsets

The following Salary Survey is provided by Prosperity Recruitment (www.prosperity.ie ) It was condicted amongst the following types of Companies:

Digital Agencies
Advertising Agencies
E-Commerce sites
Search Engine Companies
Search Engine Marketing and optimization Companies

Agency

SEO Specialist Junior €23k-€27k Senior €30k-€37k
Account Manager Junior €28k-€35k Senior €35k-€60k
Account Director €60k-€150k
Online Planner €35k-€42k

Digital Media Sales Agencies

Online Sales Director €75k-€120k
Online Sales Manager €60k-€75k
Online Account Manager €32k-44k
Online Sales Account Executive €30k-€32k

E-Commerce

Head of Digital €75k-100k
Online Marketing Manager €50k-€75k
Online Editor €50k-€65k
SEO/PPC Marketer €30k-€37k
Online Coordinator €28k-30k

To search for Marketing Jobs on Jobsearch.ie: Marketing Jobs in Ireland

he Central Statistics Office has just released their monthly employment index (February 2007) and the figures confirm that there are still jobs being created in the Construction sector, but at a slower rate.

For example, October of 2006 had growth of 3 per cent, while November showed jobs growth of 2.5 per cent, but December dipped further to growth of 1.9 per cent. Overall, the average growth for 06 was 2.3 per cent, while the average growth for 05 was 3.7 per cent.

The fact that there are 280,000 people working in Ireland’s construction sector, this is clearly the engine of our economy, and any fall off here will have wider implications.

It is also reported that while construction activity is declining in the housing sector, it is increasing in commercial construction projects, and there will of course continue to be huge activity on the roads and other infrastructural projects due to the many billions earmarked in the NDP

To view Jobsearch.ie Construction Jobs: Construction Jobs in Ireland To view Jobsearch.ie Engineering Jobs: Engineering Jobs in Ireland