Ain’t nothing flying RN

28 Jun Ain’t nothing flying RN

Photo by Chris Briggs on Unsplash.

I feel like Orlando Miner is doing for the housing market what I’m trying to do for the job market: waking people up to reality. 🙌🏻

Last week, he published the video, “Zillow To Sellers ‘It’s Over’ | Housing Market #21,” and you can watch it here:

In the video, he references an article about the San Diego market:

“San Diego home buyers and sellers dealing with housing market changes. Homes that would typically fly off the market aren’t anymore and this appears to be a new trend for San Diego.”
–https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/local/san-diego-buyers-sellers-dealing-with-housing-market/509-2e72227d-403d-4c49-b852-3f43a7403f23 (emphasis mine)

*Prepares for rotten tomatoes to get thrown*

In my observation, ain’t nothin’ flyin’ off the market right now. Heck, even the airplanes ain’t flying as much these days. (Yes, bad pun, I know. But it was right there.) What do I mean by this?

In the same way that overpriced houses aren’t flying off the market as they had been, I’m already seeing the same thing in the job market.

I know, I know. This is NOT what anyone wants to hear, but I’m trying to be honest.

Sure, I could be a social media panderer and tell you, “Nothing to see here. Move along, move along” or “Even in a recession or 70s era stagflation, who cares. Keep job hoppin’ and spending money and YOLO.”

Pfffft. 💨

But at the risk of being punished by certain algorithms (which is happening, I’m 99% sure), I would rather tell you the truth as I see it. And I’m seeing longer days-to-hire times. Even companies that say, “Oh yes. We’re nimble and we move fast. We learned valuable lessons from The Great Resignation and we don’t lollygag around on hiring good talent,” are in fact lollygagging around on good talent. Last summer, the average days-to-hire rates ranged from about 30 days for admin/clerical roles up to almost 50 days for engineers. Боже мой! No offense, but these stats were collected in the midst of The Great Resignation and the numbers feel slow as Christmas to me. So let’s think about this: if most professional jobs ranged from 30 days to 50 days for a candidate to get from application to actual employment, how much longer could that process go in a recession? I mean, if companies were willing to slow-butt around in a heavily candidate-driven market, how much slower could they get in a client-driven market?

Here’s the thing: I believe that reality is here. Some companies and hiring managers have varying definitions on what it means to move fast. I get it – it’s been that way forever. My idea of moving fast is being wrapped up in one week or less while someone else may think moving fast is dragging a process out for 3 or 4 months. I’ve told the story before about a cashier who shared her employment struggles with me:

She told me, “I have work history in retail and I applied all over town. I can only work daytime hours because of the schedule that my kids have, and this place was the only place that even bothered to call me back, let alone bring me in for an interview. No one else even responded to my applications at all, so I came here. I’m happy here but it was sort of like this was the victor by default.” And I thought, Yeah, I can’t say that I’m completely surprised by that. It’s certainly disheartening because you have so many employers crying that there’s a labor shortage and bemoaning the fact that nobody wants to work anymore.
–https://www.buzzsprout.com/1125110/10298900

Applied all over town and only one store called her in. This reminded me of the man who said he applied to 60 jobs but only received 1 interview. But yet: no one in America wants to work. 😒

To sum it up:

Slowness in the markets has an impact on a lot of us. If you’re trying to sell a house and no one wants to buy it, you’re stuck with it. If you need a job ASAP but managers want to drag along at a snail’s pace, you’ll need a game plan of how to fill the financial gap. The same is true for business owners and freelancers, too. If your potential clients all seem to have the urgency of a sleepy sloth, you need a game plan of how to float by until they move their butts.

This is not pandering – it is reality.

***

For exclusive content you won’t find here, become a Patreon Patron!