India’s 3rd quarter net employment outlook lower than last year: Survey

There has been a little dip in the net employment outlook in India according to a survey. Thirteen per cent of the employers who participated said they expect to hire employees in the third quarter of 2019. Zero per cent believe that there will be a decrease, but 61 per cent believe that there will be no change. Culminating all the responses, India will see a 13 per cent increase in the net employment outlook in the third quarter of 2019. If we compare the net employment outlook with the previous quarter, there is no change, but comparing the data with last year’s third quarter, that is, 2018, the number has fallen by three per cent.

Amongst the 44 countries covered in the survey, India managed to grab the number 10th position in terms of highest net employment outlook, with Japan leading the race with an increase of 25 per cent.

The survey has been broken down into different parts by bifurcating all the data. The comparison has been made in terms of the size of the organisations, different regions of the country and different sectors or industries.

In terms of size of the organisation, the participating employers were divided into three broad categories, such as small-sized organisations with 10 to 49 employees, medium-sized organisations having 50 to 249 employees and large-sized organisations with over 250 employees.

Small-sized enterprises came out to be strong with 13 per cent increase in the net employment outlook, with medium and large-sized organisations showing 12 per cent increase in net employment outlook each. Comparing the hiring prospects in large and medium-sized companies, the numbers do not look too good. On comparing the outlooks of both the groups with the second quarter of 2019, it was revealed that there has been a three per cent decline for large employers and two per cent for medium-sized employers.

Also, comparing with the outlooks of the previous year’s third quarter, large employers saw a decline of four per cent and medium employers three per cent.

Coming to the hiring plans of employers in different regions, the South came out with the best numbers where an increase of 14 per cent in net employment outlook is forecasted. Following the southern region, 13 per cent increase in outlook is expected in the West with 12 per cent and nine per cent in the North and East respectively.

Comparing the outlook numbers with that of the last quarter, the East has seen a decline by three per cent in the net employment outlook. Outlook remained stable in the South and West with no change in the North region.

But comparing the outlook numbers with the third quarter of 2018, every region has witnessed a decline. The hiring outlook declined by seven per cent in the East and five per cent in the North. The South and the West regions saw a decline by four per cent and three per cent respectively in the net employment outlook.

To compare and measure the data, the survey has also divided the data into different sectors.

Amongst all the sectors, the services sector came out on top with an increase of 16 per cent in the net employment outlook. Hiring plans looked weak in the transport and utility sector, with an increase of only six per cent in the hiring outlook for the third quarter.

Comparing it with the previous quarter, the transport and utility sector saw a decline of seven per cent whereas two per cent decline was seen in finance, insurance and retail.

All the sectors saw a decline in the net employment outlook when compared with last year’s third quarter. There was a significant drop of nine per cent in the public administration and education sector, and outlooks declined by seven per cent in the finance, insurance and real-estate sector as well as the wholesale and retail trade sector. The services sector and the transport and utility sector also saw a decline of four per cent in their outlooks.

The employment outlook survey was conducted by the Manpower Group, a global workforce solution company, for the third quarter of 2019. It involved interviewing 4951 employers in India. In the global survey, 59,000 employers participated from across 44 countries.