New data released last week by the Bureau of Labor Statistics can help you find available talent with solid transferable skills. What does the report tell us?
Highlights of the Occupational Projections
The occupational projections cover 818 different occupational titles. If you are seeking talent to fill open positions, you should be interested in two pieces of information about these occupations—growth (or decline) and replacement needs.
Occupational Growth
Fast-growing occupations face stiff competition for talent. On the other hand, declining occupations may be a source of skilled workers with transferable skills.
Replacement Needs
Replacement data reflect the need to fill positions due to employee turnover, when a worker changes occupations or leaves the workforce. High replacement numbers tend to ease the effect of occupational decline. For example, postal service mail carriers is the occupation with the second highest decline, 79,200 jobs. However, the need for 102,700 replacement workers makes it an occupation for which we can expect to see continued recruitment.
Job Title |
SOC Code |
Decline, 2012–2022 (Thousands) |
Replacement Needs, 2012–2022 (Thousands) |
Sewing machine operators |
51-6031 |
-41.7 |
7.7 |
Farmers, ranchers, and other agricultural managers |
11-9013 |
-179.9 |
150.2 |
Postal service mail sorters, processors, and processing machine operators |
43-5053 |
-38.6 |
9.4 |
Data entry keyers |
43-9021 |
-54.2 |
26.3 |
Word processors and typists |
43-9022 |
-26.2 |
3.7 |
Postal service clerks |
43-5051 |
-21.3 |
10.2 |
Computer operators |
43-9011 |
-12.7 |
7.2 |
Door-to-door sales workers, news and street vendors, and related workers |
41-9091 |
-14.2 |
9.3 |
Molding, coremaking, and casting machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic |
51-4072 |
-19.2 |
15.1 |
Textile knitting and weaving machine setters, operators, and tenders |
51-6063 |
-5.4 |
3.5 |
Fallers |
45-4021 |
-2.9 |
1 |
Textile cutting machine setters, operators, and tenders |
51-6062 |
-4.2 |
2.5 |
Textile winding, twisting, and drawing out machine setters, operators, and tenders |
51-6064 |
-5.6 |
4.4 |
Reservation and transportation ticket agents and travel clerks |
43-4181 |
-19.5 |
18.5 |
Textile bleaching and dyeing machine operators and tenders |
51-6061 |
-2.7 |
1.8 |
Key Strategies for Talent Acquisition
If you are having difficulty finding workers with the exact skill set that you need, you should consider recruiting workers who are leaving declining occupations. Some of them are good candidates because they have experience in your industry. Others have both the “soft skills” that you are seeking and the aptitude to learn the job.
The down side to this strategy is that the biggest declines in job numbers tend to be concentrated in relatively low-tech functions in just a few job families. So you will not find a large variety of these workers, and you will have to teach them the technical side of your business.
Here is a table that shows recruiting needs that are most likely to be filled by this strategy.
Recruiting Need
|
Strategy
|
Health Care Occupations are among those with the most projected job growth.
|
Recruit from declining occupations for which customer service skills are common. Examples include door-to-door sales workers, ticket agents, and travel clerks. |
There are large numbers of job openings projected for accounting and secretarial jobs—particularly medical secretaries.
|
Try recruiting from declining occupations for which data management skills are important. Examples include any of the six entries on the declining occupations table (above) whose SOC code starts with the “43” prefix. |
Due to the aging of the workforce in the skilled trades, there is a significant need for replacement workers.
|
You might have success with workers from any of the “hands-on” jobs that are in decline. Examples include farming and production occupations. |
According to the Manufacturing Institute, as many as 600,000 manufacturing jobs are going unfilled. The growth is largely in Advanced Manufacturing.
|
Six of the entries on the declining occupations table (above) are production job titles. Individuals with experience in these jobs already have basic manufacturing industry knowledge. Many of them would be good candidates for Advanced Manufacturing jobs. |
If you missed the first three articles in this series, click here to access the other blogs, which include three additional recruiting strategies for businesses.