From “Herman Trend Alert,” by Roger Herman and Joyce Gioia, Strategic Business Futurists

While job postings between January 2008 and January 2009 have declined in all industries, there are still almost 1.88 million jobs that require skilled workers.

According to a release by Indeed.com last week, the industries that experienced the least contraction were education and healthcare. Job postings in these industries declined by nine and eight percent respectively

Indeed.com is one of the aggregators of job postings from job sites, newspapers, associations and company career pages. The company releases its Industry Trends report to help job seekers and employers navigate the job market.

Looking at job seeker trends in 12 major industries, Indeed.com’s assessment reflects major losses in the numbers of postings in most of the major industries. Not surprisingly, the greatest losses were in real estate (58 percent) with accounting second at 53 percent. The numbers of postings in the other major industries including construction, banking and finance, hospitality, information technology, manufacturing, media and newspapers, retail and transportation all dropped by between 43 and 48 percent.
 
These declines are certainly substantial and reflect a significant contraction in the United States economy. Their Industry Trends report provides a unique perspective on the nationwide job market.

Industry Trends presents a picture of job numbers and job seeker traffic in each industry — including top job titles, keyword searches and cities — and their changes over the last year. Industry Trends may help job seekers target their job searches more effectively and improve their chances of getting hired. It may also give employers a better understanding of the supply and demand for jobs in their industries. To read more, visit www.indeed.com/jobtrends/industry.

The other side of this picture, often overlooked except by employers in need, is the demand for skilled workers. In fact, the numbers of postings in this report totals to more than 1.87 million. The recently unemployed will fill some of those jobs. However, others will continue to be vacant because we simply do not have the trained workers to fill them — even with a national unemployment rate of 7.6 percent. Employers would do well to take this opportunity to reinforce their pipelines, through the schools or colleges.