This just reported by Time Magazine - "In March, approximately 1.9 million U.S. employees quit their jobs. That's 100,000 more people than the number of workers who were laid off that month—and the first time in 15 months that there were more resignations than firings." Employers should be alarmed. The risk and costs of turnover could be significant. Why?

- 60% of employees say the plan to change jobs when the job market recovers.
- Turnover will be far more significant than in the 2002-2004 recovery due the the depth of the recession.
- Most of the people previously let go people won't be called back. 

Are you prepared?

Read more: http://money.blogs.time.com/2010/05/25/its-quitting-time-why-workers-are-leaving-their-jobs-in-droves/?xid=rss-topstories#ixzz0p8h2x2oV

Job postings on corporate career pages are widely considered the best near term indicator for the demand of certain talent. According to Linkup, a generalist job search engine, the number of jobs posted on corporate career sites for the Engineering & Architecture category is up 25% over the last 6 months. ASHRAE Jobs, which has been operating for less than a year, has seen an even more significant increase over that time of 35%.

The supply of engineers does not increase with demand due to the high employment levels in this discipline. Recent surveys have shown that as many as 82% of job searches being run in this category are being done so by fully employed professionals. And, total engineering employment has dropped by only 12% during the recession while overall construction employment has dropped by 28%.

What Can You Do? No one disputes  a structural shortage exists of skilled U.S. engineers, or that the shortage will increase as the baby boomer generation moves into retirement. What few people consider, however, is that international outsourcing of engineers can be a logistical and managerial nightmare considering the on-site nature of engineering and construction. Therefore, organizations that recognize engineers are an increasingly scarce and high-impact resource, and move to secure engineers now while they are available, can create a strategic competitive advantage for themselves.

That does not mean you need to hire all this talent and have them sit in waiting for the market to catch-up. Rather, what you can do is gobble up all the names, contact information and resumes of people that are currently on the open market of the type you will be looking to hire later in the year or in 2011. Essentially, you’ll begin building your pipeline for future needs. And, it can be done for as little as $3,000, which is a fraction of what you will have to pay headhunters when you have the needs and don’t have the pipeline to satisfy them. Here’s how:

- Identify the types of positions you know will need at some point
- Highlight positions that historically have been difficult-to-fill
- Create a master job posting and promote it as positions you “are always looking for good people”
- Receive and store applicants and resumes in a place where it will be easy and convenient to retrieve in the future.
- Periodically e-mail these job seekers with information designed to keep them warm such as press releases on new business, changes to your benefits plan, new product offerings, etc

Capital investments in energy efficiency for commercial buildings will rise this year according the fourth annual Energy Efficiency Indicator released by Johnson Controls this week. This follows a decline from last year.

· 52% plan to make capital investment in energy efficiency in 2010, up from 46%.
· 60% plan to making operating budget expenditures in energy efficiency programs, up from 55%.

Energy retrofits will impact talent acquisition strategies in a couple different ways. First, the increase in activity will simply increase the need for more qualified HVAC, electrical and controls professionals. Perhaps more importantly, however, the implementation of these technologies will require new kinds of talent that are not traditional to our industry. That could include IT and programming types for digital controlled technologies, powerline electrical for the integration of on-site renewable and smart grid/smart meeting technologies, and RF for the wireless transport technologies. Engineering firms, contractors, and building owner/managers need to be prepared for both general expansion and new technologies.

JCI Energy Efficiency Index

That’s the new name tagged by Washington for energy efficiency initiatives funded through (ARRA last year’s Stimulus Act). Yesterday, Earth Day, Vice President Biden announced 25 communities that will participate in the $452 million in stimulus funding to support these initiatives. A full list can be found in the link provided below.

Don’t confuse this announcement with the Homestar initiative currently running through Congress. These are separate programs.

Retrofit Ramp-up

The HomeStar Energy Retrofit Act of 2010 cleared the House Energy and Commerce Committee on a 30-17 vote. Two Republicans -- Wayne Whitfield of Kentucky and Tim Murphy of Pennsylvania -- crossed over to vote with 28 Democrats. The bipartisan legislation would create a $6 billion rebate program to retrofit exiting homes for energy efficiency. In addition, Homestar would create 168k jobs in 2010 and 2011.

Total US Construction employment increased by 15,000 workers last month to 5.59 million employed. While an increase of less than 0.3% might seem trivial, it does seem we have hit the bottom of a long and stressful downturn. This is the first month since June of 2007 where the construction industry added jobs. That’s right –it’s been 34 months! The employment numbers are available through the BLS and are seasonally adjusted, indicating this is a structural improvement and not a seasonal one.

The BLS is reporting the Engineering and Architecture industry was flat for the month at 1.28MM employed.

The Homestar Energy Retrofit Act of 2010 was introduced into the US Senate the earlier this week. The $6 billion program will create rebates for consumers who purchase and install energy savings equipment including high efficiency HVAC systems, hot water heaters, insulation, energy efficient doors, etc. Consumers will receive rebates at the point of installation and then contractors will be reimbursed by the government. The House version of the bill is currently in subcomittee and is expected to be formally introduced in April.  

Because of Homestar addresses two major policy issues - energy efficiency and job creation - it is expected to have bipartisan support and could become law very soon. The government estimates Homestar will create 168,000 new jobs, the majority of which would be created in 2010.

Homestar  President Obama on Homestar  

Last year, ARRA appropriated over $50 billion to infrastructure construction including highways, bridges, water/waste-water management and the Smart Grid. Additionally, the bill appropriated another $20 billion to energy efficiency building retrofits for federal, state and local buildings, and home weatherization initiatives. While 2/3rds of those dollars have been awarded, only 6.5% have made its way into the economy thus far.

Just last week, the Jobs Bill included another $20 billion in appropriations for highway and mass transit construction. What's next? In his recent state of the Union Address, the President called on Congress to fund Home Star, a $6 billion program for home energy efficiency retrofits, and earlier this month Senators Merkley and Pryor introduced legislation for Business Star, a similar program for Commercial Buildings.

The rampant spending is driven partially by larger socioeconomic considerations including encouraging energy efficiency, use of mass transportation, and renewable energy. More important, however, political considerations surrounding job creation and increasing the flow of private capital have taken over. Expect job creation to be priority #1 now that health care legislation is behind us. By some estimates, that $100 billion should drive an additional private investment of between $300 and $400 billion and create some 730k jobs.  Construction and facilities is an easy target because these jobs cannot be outsourced internationally and can be created quickly.

You can find more details at: Recovery.gov ,  Jobs Bill , HomeStar , BusinessStar , Energy Efficiency Job Creation    

Venture capital infusions towards Energy Efficiency is on the rise,  reflecting acknowledgment that the best bet for clean technology resides in efficiency as opposed to renewable generation. Energy Efficiency refers to the amount of productive work accomplished per unit of energy expended. Technology solutions for Energy Efficiency are targeted towards Residential and Commercial buildings, which consume 2/3rds of all gas and electricity produced in the US, along with the Grid itself (and the integration of building consumption to the Smart Grid).

However, technology development is only the beginning. Next is commercialization and these tech companies will need distribution strategies and local integrators to install and service the equipment. Are the wholesalers, contractors, and integrators prepared for this transformation? Those that get out in front of this technology may very well become the next generation of leaders in the engineering, construction and facilities industry.

You can find more on the venture flow here.

Venture Capital to Energy Efficiency

The trend away from general purpose job boards seems to be accelerating. According to this article authored by Jared Shelly on HRE Online, the marketshare for the 3 general purpose boards was 17.1% n 2009, down from 31% in 2006. Aggregators, niche boards, and Linked-in are all up over that same period.

A primary problem with general purpose boards (as well as aggregators) is "resume bombardment" or the large infusion of unqualified applications that have to be sorted through. One Monster exec went so far to say that "fewer doesn't necessarily mean better." Huh? Tell that to the overworked recruiter or hiring manager.

You can read more at Betting on the Boards