(serious) Research help needed, please

I don't think it has effected me - yet. I got a new job and a pay rise in the recession. Although I am now also getting the boot, that would have happened recession or not.

I'll have to wait and see whether I'll be able to get a decent job in a couple of months, but I'm hopeful :001_smile:

As a graduand, I've found it very difficult to get a job in this climate.

According to my uni's careers service, while vacancies in accounting firms have dropped sharply many have found that applications are down disproportionately. So we're having employers lacking good candidates and candidates unaware of good employers. Perhaps people are assuming there are fewer jobs than they are and are just not applying?

A highly unscientific straw poll of my friends who will also be graduating next month revealed that for every one who has secured a graduate level position, there is one who is taking their part-time (not graduate level) job full-time and two or three who have no job to go in to.

EDIT: But you're talking about industry rather than practice. I don't know anyone who has secured an industry accounting-related job. I'll be heading down to the recruitment agencies at the start of next week though, as that's what I've decided to do. (Concentrate on the industry and CIMA side. I spent a little while talking to a CIMA past president, and he seemed broadly optimistic)

Hi Helen,

Hope you are well?

As some of you may already know, I work for a high end recruitment agency and any one of us here can tell you this recession has been dreadful. From a company going through rapid expansion less than a year ago, we are now half the size we were last October, going from around eighty plus staff to now just over forty. While it's obvious to say that the non-performers have been let go, it's also clear that the current quality of staff, both internally for ourselves and externally for our clients, isn't up to scratch. Without meaning to be political, the UK graduate culture over the last ten years has meant many people with degrees having high salary expectations without any experience. Some of the industries where this didn't often matter, IT and design, are now fewer due to the recession and the availability of genuine quality, more academically skilled people has also declined as seemingly less British people now want to study/work in our core markets such as finance, accountancy, electronics etc. Much of our turnover now comes from abroad as the UK talent pool seems to be ever shrinking in our operative sectors. Good news for those wishing to study & work in these areas, bad news for the UK as a whole as the rest of us have to support those people with unwanted, soft degrees who won't consider other work.

I wasn't in accountancy for previous recessions but from speaking to those who were (and working in the recruitment industry) this is by far the worst crisis ever. Luckily I got into accounts four years ago having retrained but I don't envy those now trying to get finance related roles without experience.

recession f*cked me as lost my job and cant find one. and since im GOING to pass my final two exams.... going to be a qualified tech which no job ?

The cashflow situation is crippling everyone. Some of our best clients are well known, international banks whose current and abusive payment policy seems to be to never pay within terms while querying every invoice for as long as they can until they're almost on the verge of facing legal action.

Before this, we operated a fair payment policy towards our suppliers, however as a result of the omnipresent cash contraction is, I've now been asked to introduce an unethical policy of not paying anyone within terms, be they Monster.co.uk or the local window cleaner. Employment-wise, I realise why we have to do it to keep ourselves in business but the moral issue is another thing.

For us, one of the most laughable things of the recession is we're having to safeguard our own money in the same banks who aren't paying us for some of the services we're providing to them! Crazy...

Thanks Baggy!