Tulsa Short by 60,000

[dsjeffries]

From KTUL:

quote:Tulsa - If you are looking for a job, odds are you can find one in Tulsa. In fact, many employers are having a tough time filling positions. One study estimates when it comes to the workforce, Tulsa is short by 60-thousand professionals. And, as NewsChannel 8's Burt Mummolo reports, the shortage affects both blue and white-collar industries.

Some say the big gap is a perception problem, with people believing Tulsa is a poor place to work. Whatever the cause, it is an employees market out there with employers saying 'Help Wanted!'.

At Apsco, Inc., sales of air cylinders have tripled over the past three years. Business is booming. But, keeping up with it? President Larry Mocha is feeling the pinch of the workforce shortage.

"How can we get people to help us grow," Mocha says. "Tulsa can't support the kind of growth that we have."

Mocha's sister, Suzanne Braddy, is in charge of finding bodies to fill the orders.

"We can't find people who will come and stay," Braddy says. "It's hard to find people who have the work ethic that we're expecting here."

"We'll have an interview, or she will with someone, it'll go real well, we'll offer them the job, they'll accept it, and then never show up for work," Mocha adds.

And, those employer blues aren't just blue-collared. Jennie Miller with Beck Design is looking to add three architects by year's end. But, with a pool of local applicants so shallow, firms end up fighting each other for the same talent.

"So, unless you go to another firm and try to recruit people that way, it's really hard to find people," Miller says.

So what gives? Josh Roby with Tulsa Young Professionals says it's an issue of perception in some ways.

"Today's young professionals will find the cool city with the lifestyle that they want and will then move there and find a job after the fact," Roby says. "So does Tulsa have a cool problem? We're working on that, we're working on that."

If having an abundance of jobs ever becomes cool, Tulsa will have it made. But, in the meantime, Mocha says it's hard to find someone who'll show up for the job after the interview.

NewsChannel 8 spoke with one human resource director at another company, who says her biggest challenge when trying to get people to move to Oklahoma is trying to convince them that Tulsa's not that bad.

Tulsa Young Professionals was formed two years ago and so far, has three-thousand members. Their goal is to attract and retain young professionals to the Tulsa region.

I bet nobody knew that Tulsa was having a tough time recruiting this crowd. []

[cannon_fodder]

Gee, watching the news day to day I would never imagine such a fabled place exists.  I thought there was nothing but massive layoffs and evil corporations all being corporations and stuff.

Too bad the economy in the rest of the country is doing well too.  Until there is a downturn SOMEWHERE it is hard for a region to attract the added workers it needs.  

and while I'm at it... lets kick all the Mexican's out of Tulsa because clearly we dont need their labor.

[DM]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

and while I'm at it... lets kick all the Mexican's out of Tulsa because clearly we dont need their labor.

I am going to assume you meant the illegal Mexicans.

[Double A]

Here's an idea, Larry Mocha, if you need workers  offer higher wages and competitive benefit packages. People won't work for your slave wages.

Perception, more like reality, YP's won't relocate to Tulsa or Oklahoma because of our repressive laws against workers, religious extremists, and the fact that you can make more money just about anywhere else you go.

[AMP]

Many monotunus jobs, where when you look at the people performing them, you get the song Da ba dah bam bah, da ba dah bam bah.

The Boatman's Song where dozens of men are rowing the boat along. The Vulga Boatman's song.

Many jobs are better filled by temporary employees.  Temporary meaning people that are seeking part time or are willing to take jobs that are monotunus and have high turn over. Most these types of jobs have high turnover no matter what the pay or benefits.  It is the type of work more than the pay rate that creates the higher turn over of employees.

Thus the high number of Temporary Personnel Staffing services and contract labor in today's market.    

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Volga_Boatmen's_Song

[Double A]

You make it sound like people choose to whore themselves out to temp agencies or to work as (misclassified)independent contractors in these jobs. It's the employers who make the decision to choose to hire through temp agencies or engage in 1099 abuse to avoid paying taxes, benefits, worker compensation, and unemployment insurance costs.

[guido911]

Thanks Double A for your moronic take on what is good news. Incidentally, how many people do you currently employ? Are the wages you pay competetive?

Cannon: Obviously you have been listening to KFAQ again for your news on Tulsa's job marker.

[Conan71]

60,000 jobs?  But, but, but we have a sh!tty economy in Tulsa, just can't be.

[Who Cares]

Yeah but what the story doesn't tell you is that most of job openings only pay $9-11 an hour.

[swake]

quote:Originally posted by Who Cares

Yeah but what the story doesn't tell you is that most of job openings only pay $9-11 an hour.

No, I think what the story is telling is that it's higher end jobs that are hard to fill. We have a shortage of people for high paying jobs and plenty of workers at the low end (some of questional legality) pushing the low end workers into that $9-11 range of employment, above that and workers are hard to find.

[tulsa1603]

Besides not believing the story...

I thought this line was funny:

"NewsChannel 8 spoke with one human resource director at another company, who says her biggest challenge when trying to get people to move to Oklahoma is trying to convince them that Tulsa's not that bad."

One time I was working with a client on a very contemporary project.  We were faced with eliminating an element of the design due to cost, and she was very concerned about how the project would look without it, so I said "Oh, it won't look that bad" to which she replied with a smile on her face "So you're saying it WILL look bad, just not THAT bad..."  So are they saying that Tulsa's bad, but not THAT bad?  

[dsjeffries]

I also don't have much faith in the story... Given Tulsa's size, I just don't think that we could have 60,000 professional job openings.  I don't think Tulsa has 60,000 in ALL its job openings.  

Notice how there are no sources given, just lines like, "one company", "some say", "one study estimates".  Where's the study?  Who performed the research?

Anybody??

[DM]

quote:Originally posted by tulsa1603

Besides not believing the story...

I thought this line was funny:

"NewsChannel 8 spoke with one human resource director at another company, who says her biggest challenge when trying to get people to move to Oklahoma is trying to convince them that Tulsa's not that bad."

One time I was working with a client on a very contemporary project.  We were faced with eliminating an element of the design due to cost, and she was very concerned about how the project would look without it, so I said "Oh, it won't look that bad" to which she replied with a smile on her face "So you're saying it WILL look bad, just not THAT bad..."  So are they saying that Tulsa's bad, but not THAT bad?  

I agree that Tulsa has an certain image to overcome. But IMO Tulsa is not a bad place to live. When we told all our friends that we were moving here, they told us all kinds of stuff that was not true. Flat dessert, racist, etc... I found Tulsa to be a very interesting city with tons of potential and fortunatly Tulsa has started to tap into that potential.

Tulsa does have some bad things about it. But what city doesnt?

[YoungTulsan]

You have all of these "jobs" that are in need but cant be filled?  Pay more.  Thats how the market works.

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

The best way to find out about an area's job market is to use the obvious tools such as Monster, Yahoo Hotjobs, Careerbuilder, or others and do a search on some high-tech, professional jobs that have decent wages.

Over the course of a career that has involved quite a bit of job searching as a consultant, I've found that the jobs listed below are pretty indicative of how the high-tech job market is faring in a given area.

This is just my opinion, of course, but I've had a lot of years judging the prospects for a given area using this method.

Below are the results of my pseudo-scientific search on job prospects for Tulsa, Omaha, and Albuquerque; three areas that are of similar size.

Tulsa
Engineer (chemical, manufacturing, industrial, software): 100 (contract and full-time; all professional engineers)
Writer (Technical, Business, Marketing, Proposal): 5
Business Analyst: 45
Total: 150

Omaha
Engineer: 90
Writer: 3
Business Analyst: 75
Total: 168

[b}Albuquerque
Engineer:67
Writer: 1
Business Analyst: 40
Total: 108

Judging by the results, Tulsa is basically on par with cities of similar size; better than Albuquerque, but not quite so good as Omaha (but both cities are larger, although Omaha metro area is smaller and probably Albuquerque as well).