The ADP National Employment Report just released by the ADP Research Institute stated that 213,000 jobs were added in September, marking the sixth straight month of employment gains above 200,000.
According to Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Analytics, “Job gains remain strong and steady. The pace of job growth has been remarkably similar for the past several years. Especially encouraging most recently is the increasingly broad base nature of those gains. Nearly all industries and companies of all sizes are adding consistently to payrolls.”
In the report, ADP displays a Historical Trend chart that illustrates employment levels rising almost back to where they were just prior to the Great Recession. The chart also shows that these numbers closely reflect those reported by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. This is great news for our economy.
Even with this optimistic view, the fact remains that at the end of July there were 4.7 million job openings in the US. This number has changed little in the past two years. People are still looking for employment, and many jobs remain unfilled. The primary reason also remains the same, there are not enough qualified workers for the open positions.
Employers are looking far and wide for qualified talent and associations are in a unique position to help fill those open positions. We believe in the power of an association job board.
In February, we discussed how social media giant LinkedIn would be a disruptive force in the job board market in 2014. We found that many association professionals had never viewed LinkedIn as a competitor. Sharing LinkedIn’s job board strategies and tactics provided a new perspective about what associations should consider for their own job board initiatives.
In June, we highlighted that LinkedIn was moving fast towards their goal, yet niche job boards remained highly effective and extremely popular with recruiters. In fact, according to According to US News and World Report, industry specific job boards are more useful to employers than non-specific larger job boards.
YourMembership believes in the role associations play in helping both members and prospective members find relevant jobs in their chosen field or industry. That belief was a driving force behind our recent acquisition of the Job Target Career Center Business Unit. You might say we “doubled down” on our bet for association career centers.
Looking at the top ten association job boards we currently work with, they are on track for a 25 percent increase in revenue in 2014 compared to the previous year. Passive job seekers are playing a big role in that growth. As the economy continues to improve, people previously content to stay in their current positions are now ready to seek out new opportunities. Associations should be poised to help meet that growing demand.
But it’s not just non-dues revenue that is at stake here. We believe a strong career center helps position an association as the number one career resource for their members and prospective members within their industry. Offering an online job board or career center is an extremely effective way to provide value to members, prospects, and employers in need of qualified talent.
As we finish out the year and move into 2015 the stakes have never been higher. Associations able to elevate their presence by having a strong job board strategy will come out winners. We’re betting on it!
