Rob Clark: SEEK Country Manager says number of job ads posted to site continue to drop

The job market is slowly rebounding from last year's low point.  

SEEK's latest Employment Report shows job ads dropped for a second month, down three percent month on month. 

Applications per job ad fell two percent. 

Country Manager Rob Clark told Mike Hosking this is just a small drop, and we're still at record unemployment levels. 

He says the job market in the last 12 months has been flat, leaving Kiwis struggling. 

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The job starts for June there with us adds it
down for the second month in a row, we've seen
a full of three percent applications per job though interestingly
also down two percent. But what's going on in the
public sector? Government and Defense is up fifty fifty one percent.
Defense I get because they've got issues anyway. Rob Clark
has six country manager in his back with there's Rob morning.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Good morning.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
The big number of rises that we're seeing here the
government Information and Tech ICT managers up forty two percent.
Is that a bit of monthly noise or is something
going on there?

Speaker 2 (00:27):
It's a bit of monthly noise. Really. ICT have had
it sort of a bit tough over the longer term,
but they did have quite a good June and a
couple of roles in particular, you know, saw some quite
strong demand.

Speaker 1 (00:37):
Okay, the government in general, is there something going on there?

Speaker 2 (00:41):
Well, it's worth noting that this time last year at
the absolute bottom, and we all know that they've been
through some pretty torrid times in Wantington in general. So
what we're seeing there is just a bit of a
rebound from a very very low base.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
Okay. The applications per job is that people walking away
from the market, or they went and got a job.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
That is just a situation where the supply of talent
is outstripping a demand, and so there's just simply a
lot of people applying for fewer roles.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
Yeah, but there's not as many as there were. I mean,
normally you're seeing an increase in the number of people
applying for limited number of roles. If that number is dropping,
that indicates either they've got work or they can't be
bothered looking anymore, doesn't it.

Speaker 2 (01:21):
Well, it's a pretty small drop. We're still at record level,
so I wouldn't read into anything into one particular month
because that's been growing for quite some time. So it
still remains really competitive out there for jail seconds.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
Do we know at any given stage what part of
the job market is filled by people who may or
may not work depending on their mood or vibe or circumstances,
versus people who have to work.

Speaker 2 (01:43):
Well, eil Stat's in New Zealand's probably the best place to
look at that in terms of the unemployed, and you know,
those who choose to work and don't choose to work.
The participation rate in New Zealand is typically quite high,
so the proportion of the working population is higher out
to the total population and sort of as slightly high
in Australia typically. So yeah, we're still seeing a lot

(02:06):
in that regard, more in the part time space recently,
just as people look for any kind of role they can.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
There's only three regions that went up, Southland, Gisbon, Marlborough.
Is there something specific there? Is that hot related? Is
the region going off? What's happening?

Speaker 2 (02:21):
We would see that as sort of monthly noise really,
like you know, we saw a bit of a bump,
and those markets are relatively small, so we see a
bit of up and down. Particularly.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
I was hoping for something a bit better than that.
But it's not your fault. All the other regions are
the rest of the country have gone down. When's the bottom, Well,
we think we're at the bottom.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
You know, if you think about the last twelve months,
it's literally been flat and so it's just a bit
of a grind, as our customers would describe it. We
still see areas where roles are hard to fill, particularly
the highly skilled areas, but by and large it's just
a flat market at the moment that there's still seventeen
thousand jobs on sea as of this morning, so there's

(03:03):
still a bit of activity going on.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
Good stuff, Rob, appreciate your expertise as always Rob Clark,
who is the SIAK country manager.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
For more from the mic Asking Breakfast, listen live to
news talks. It'd be from six am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio