A/E Turnover Tipping Point 1: Slowdown

Written by Josie Summa on 7/09/09 • Categorized as recruiter's corner

About Author: Josie Summa is President and Principal Search Consultant at Redmond Consulting, Inc., a professional search firm operating within the engineering, planning and consulting markets serving public transportation in North America.

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Resume SMALLAssuming the people you have on staff now are those whom you need to succeed when the market recovers, what are you doing to assure them of your support, despite these uncertain business conditions? What are you doing to bolster your employees’ sense of security?  If there is some idle time, how are you keeping them busy in a productive manner?   
Today, I’d like to share the first of four (and perhaps the most obvious) “event” that triggers a consultant to look about for a career growth opportunity.  It’s timely because many can relate to it right now.  
Tipping Point 1 of 4: Downturn in the Business Cycle
There is no doubt that when backlog is looking light, your employees will be looking for higher ground. This tenant is true in any economy. Why does this happen? Well, probably the number one reason is that a light backlog threatens an employee’s sense of security.  He will invariably ask himself “where is my future work coming from?” and, for an answer, will look inside and outside his own organization.
This feeling of anxiety is amplified by the conditioning a consultant undergoes as he is indoctrinated into the business. If a billable employee becomes incapable of reaching his target utilization rates, he knows he is not meeting expectations, and that lousy feeling eats away at his morale. 
With more time available for hand-wringing, he starts to see the big career picture and worries that this lull in the business cycle means his career has stalled. Maybe it has, or maybe it just feels that way. 
But what does this all mean in the current employment market? I can assure you that there are not a lot of unemployed civil engineers walking the streets today (perhaps with the exception of new grads or those entrenched in a few market segments tangled up in the bubble). 

However, there are a lot of individuals who are willing to look at a new opportunity. Why? The simple answer is “insurance.“ There are some really great people in our market who find themselves in a situation for which they have no recent benchmark: light backlog, delay of contract execution due to funding difficulties, watching peers lose their jobs, etc. These individuals are more receptive than ever to investigating opportunities, but that doesn’t mean when the dialogue culminates that they are willing to go anywhere.  

What is your firm doing to make sure they won’t?

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