Many Metro Vancouver employers say they plan to hire staff in 2018's second quarter, giving the city a “strong hiring climate,” according to a ManpowerGroup employment outlook survey released March 13.
According to the survey, 27% of employers plan to hire more staff, and 2% say they anticipate cutbacks.
Taking seasonal variations out of the data, Vancouver’s net employment outlook – those companies that say they expect to hire more staff minus those saying they plan to decrease staff – is 21% for Q2. This is four percentage points higher than in Q1 and seven percentage points higher than in the same period last year.
Seventy per cent of those surveyed said they plan to keep staff levels the same.
Across Canada, 20% of employers say they plan to add staff in Q2, making this the strongest hiring forecast since 2011, according to ManpowerGroup. Three per cent anticipate letting staff go.
“The second quarter of 2018 is expected to see steady gains for Canadian job seekers,” said ManpowerGroup Canada regional director Yvonne Tennenbaum. “While Canada experienced a net loss of jobs in January, the employers we surveyed are forecasting varying levels of job gains across all industry sectors, regions and organization-size categories.
“Prospects for the upcoming quarter remain strong, led by exceptionally strong growth in Quebec, where employers are hiring across multiple sectors.”
The strongest outlook, countrywide, is in the public administration sector, where the net employment outlook is 20%. This is followed by durables manufacturing (19%) and transportation and public utilities (17%).
Large companies – defined as those with 250 employees or more – have the strongest hiring intentions, with a seasonally adjusted outlook of 29%, followed by medium-sized companies (50 to 249 employees) at 18% and small companies (10 to 49 employees) at 11%.
@EmmaHampelBIV
