Though job surfing remains the third most popular activity among all internet users in India, not many searches are translating into real jobs. Job portals such as Naukri, Monster and leading consultants like Ma Foi, Kelly Services and ABC Consultants are facing the heat of the slowdown in the recruitment market.
?We witnessed a 30% slump between March and December 2008. But the number of jobs across industries are steadily increasing. We have approximately 45,000 jobs posted on our site currently,? says Sanjay Modi, MD, Monster India, Middle East and South East Asia.
Advertisements by companies are the prime source of revenues for job portals. For Naukri, the advertising rates start at Rs 850 and go up to Rs 1 crore. For instance, posting permanent vacancies costs more than the contractual ones. ?Naukri.com earned Rs 631.23 million in the first quarter of 2008, an increase of 35.6% over the corresponding quarter in FY 2007-08,? says Sanjeev Bhikhchandani CEO, Naukri.com, ?but by the end of the year, we registered a negative growth of 12% year-on-year?. Unfortunately, Bhikchandani?s efforts to raise revenues through services like paid resume writing have not yielded results.
Looking for cost-effective methods, employers are opting for contractual recruitment over permanent. ?Due to the slump, the temporary or contractual recruitment went up by 15% while the permanent recruitment went down by 11%,? says E Balaji, CEO, Ma Foi. Vishal Chibber, HR Head, Kelly Services agrees, ?Permanent recruitment went down by 10-15% and contractual recruitment gained by 20%.? Kelly registered a growth of 40% in turnover in 2007-2008, but in 2008-2009 it could only manage to maintain the status quo.
?IT, real estate, retail, media and advertising sectors didn?t deliver as per expectations. Instead, education, pharma, health, FMCG, telecommunication and insurance helped us tide over this rough patch,? explains Bhikchandani.
The rising popularity of government jobs helped too. ?PSU offers went up by 10-15% as compared to a single digit last year,? adds Shiv Agrawal, CEO, ABC Consultants.
Balaji says that though the first two quarters of 2008 saw growth, the market dipped in the next three quarters. However, the second quarter of 2009 has been comparatively better. Modi too feels that the market started stabilising in early 2009, with the job index touching 8.1% last month. ?Job opportunities rose by 8-10% during April-June 2009,? he adds. However, Chibber dismisses this trend as
routine. ?Generally, the first and the last quarters of a financial year are not so good as the second and the third. The turnaround that we are now witnessing might be also due to the cycle that regulates Indian business.?
However, that is not denying the fact the job market is improving. Though recruitment has been less, it has not come to a stand still. The candidates, with their subdued demands, have become more rational ? with company profile and job security scoring high over salary hikes. Indeed, the economic slowdown has left few not wanting to play safe.