Payroll behemoth ADP announced yesterday that the private sector only lost 20,000 jobs last month. As this article notes, this is actually good news.  Further, one of the talking heads in the article indicates that we should begin to see job growth in the next couple of months.

The article also notes what we are assuming is good news for reliability engineers and the industrial maintenance community:

Other companies are adding to payrolls. Caterpillar Inc., the world’s largest maker of bulldozers and excavators, is recalling 100 workers at its large-engine center in Lafayette, Indiana, spokeswoman Bridget Young said in a Feb. 18 e-mail.

The Peoria, Illinois-based firm forecasts sales will increase as much as 25 percent this year and last month announced that it recalled more than 500 workers. “Caterpillar may be recalling or hiring employees in business units at various facilities this year based on demand fluctuation,” Young said.
Hopefully this is a start of a economic turning point and that we will begin to see more activity in the job market.  For those of you pursing reliability engineering jobs and predictive maintenance jobs, we encourage you to visit our site and get your profile set up so hiring companies can find you.

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We came across an interesting blog yesterday over at Interns Over 40 which is a blog dedicated to helping skilled workers over the age of 40 find a new career.  The post we read with great interest and thought we would pass along was this one – 6 Lies We Tell Ourselves About Job Interviews which was a guest post from Michael Neece of www.interviewmastery.com.

I will let the post speak for itself about the six reasons, all which we agree with completely.  Its a very well written post and provides some great insights that essentially identify how talented people can become over confident about their abilities.  This is something that isn’t uncommon for the members of our community who are looking for reliability engineering jobs.

However, what really struck me in the post was this tidbit:

17-to-one is the ratio of job interviews to job offers during a recession. During a recession, the average applicant will interview for 17 different opportunities before he/she gets one job offer. When job openings are plentiful and candidates are in high demand, the ratio drops to 6-to-1, meaning it takes only 6 interviews to get an offer during the good times.

17 interviews to get a job in a recession versus 6 during normal times.  This statistic alone is disheartening, but it only tells part of the story.  If your a reliability engineer or PdM professional who has been looking for a job, think about how many jobs you’ve applied for before you even get to an interview!  Assume its a 5:1 ratio of applications/interview.  In good times that means you applied for 30 openings to find your job; in this economic climate that means you might have to apply for 85 jobs to get one!

That is a lot of time and effort expended to find a job, never mind the time it takes to prepare for each interview and the time allocated to the interview itself.  You can see how finding a job quickly becomes a job.

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Over at msnbc.com there is a new article discussing how bad credit can impact your ability to find a job.  As the post notes, employers are increasingly using credit checks in their hiring decision making process.

Companies are not required to tell you if they’ve run a credit check and whether or not it impacts their decision to offer a job.  Consequently, no solid numbers are available as to how often bad credit impacts a hiring decision.  However, some anectdotal information is available.  According to the post:

“But a recent survey by the Society of Human Resource Management found that many employers use credit checks to screen job candidates. Of the roughly 100 employers who responded, 60 percent said they checked credit histories for some or all job applicants. That’s up from 43 percent in 2004 and just 25 percent in 1998.”

The reasons for the review vary and are obviously utilized higher for senior executives and for positions that have financial responsibility.  That being said, its clear that employers are checking because they want to see how reliable and therefore responsible the potential employee is.  The thinking goes that if you can’t pay your electric bill, how we can trust you to show up on time and do your job?

Credit checks will likely to grow as employers are increasingly requiring more and more data about the people they hire.  What will prove challenging for many is the reality that many otherwise qualified people will lose a job opportunity because they were impacted by the great recession.  With job growth continuing to lag, we may find ourselves in a vicious cycle that feeds on itself.

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Over at CNN/Money, Fortune posted a great column on whether or not it makes sense to become a consultant after a layoff.  Its a fantastic question to ask, given the challenges of finding a permanent job in this economy.

At NextUp Careers, we’ve seen a significant increase in the discussion regarding the use of temporary staff and independent contractors.  While Reliability Engineering and Predictive Maintenance have always had its share of contractors, its becoming increasingly clear that this may no longer be an exception, but may become an expectation.  In discussing the potential for hiring, many of the company’s we have talked to have indicated a strong desire to have a variable workforce available to it.

As an example, one company recently explained to us that for every five reliability engineers they will hire this year, only one of them is likely to be a full-time position.  This is a significant change in their business model and one partly driven by what they saw happen in the past year and a half.  As this video attests, freelancing may become a way of life for more Americans than ever.

As this trend becomes to gain momentum, we anticipate that it will have a significant impact on reliability engineers and predictive maintenance professionals

What do you think?

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Earlier this week, Industry Week published their latest salary survey.  As industry goes, so goes the demand for reliability engineering jobs and predictive maintenance professionals.  The survey, which can be found by clicking here paints a mixed picture of the job market and the potential for salary increases.

Some key findings from the study:

• 22% of respondents indicated that their salary actually dropped last year; another 44% reported that their salary was frozen. In the previous years survey, only 4% said their salaries dropped and only 27% said they were frozen.
• Despite compensation concerns, 25% of respondents reported that they were very satisfied with their job and another 45% reporting that they were satisfied.

According to an expert quoted within the survey, this may indicate that employees are generally happy with the total value proposition provided by their job – benefits, salary, flexibility, career path, etc.  Of course, it may also mean that people are just happy to have an job and that once the economy turns, the march for higher salaries will commence again.

In monitoring the salaries posted for the reliability engineering jobs and predictive maintenance jobs on our board, we have noticed that they have remained pretty consistent from our past reviews.  It appears, at least for the time being that salaries have found an equilibrium.  This isn’t to say that reliability engineering professionals wouldn’t like to earn more, its more a reflection that both employers and employees have, at least for the moment found a common ground for value.

What have you seen for salaries and compensation trends?

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Unique Reliability Engineering & Predictive Maintenance Site Offers Free Trial

 Springfield, MA, February 5, 2010 -  Next Up Careers. has just launched the first career portal and staffing business dedicated to serving the needs of reliability engineers and predictive maintenance professionals.

 Michael Vann, Managing Director of Next Up Careers, LLC has led a two year development effort to build the jobsite and related business capabilities leveraging years of experience in the space.

 “Our team has been working with companies in the reliability and predictive maintenance industry for ten years” Vann said, “and over that time we’ve seen professionals and employers struggle with finding information about career opportunities and the right employment fit. NextUpCareers.com will provide significant value for everyone who uses it, and regardless of the economic environment, we see a tremendous need for a dedicated and trusted career resource.”

 In addition to the NextUpCareers.com employment portal, the company is launching both a permanent recruiting and contract staffing business.

 “Next Up Services will now offer the three legs of the staffing stool”, Vann continued, “With the talent portal, the recruitment service and our newly added temporary staffing division, we now offer full service talent sourcing capabilities for our clients.  We could not be more excited at the value we can now add for employers and employees alike”

 “We have been very happy with the services we have received from Next Up Recruiting Solutions,” says Mike Hogan, President of IVC Technologies,  “and the new website will add tremendous value to our company’s ability to attract talent.”

 The content rich site is already loaded with valuable information and job postings that the Reliability and PdM talent community will find appealing and helpful in advancing their careers.

 For employers, as part of the launch, NextUpCareers is offering FREE postings for the first thirty days. 

 About Next Up Careers, LLC:

Next Up Careers, LLC is the premiere staffing resource focused solely on providing comprehensive career information, employment opportunities and both permanent and contract job placement services to companies and professionals dedicated to the maintenance industries. 

Contact:  Kristin Thornton at kthornton@nextupcareers.com or (413) 543-2944

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NextUp Careers, the first career site dedicated to reliability engineering, PdM and industrial maintenance is preparing to launch.  To maximize the value we provide the industry, we are looking for industry professionals who are interested in sharing their advice, experience and knowledge with the community.

Within our site we have a section entitled career and employment advice that will feature experts on topics such as human resources, legal issues, generational issues, etc.  To provide a real world flavor of practical knowledge we are looking for professionals just like you to write on non-technical topics such as leadership and management, communication, work/life balance and career management.

Each contributor will be featured on the main advice page and have their own page within our site.  Each page provides the writer the opportunity to provide a bio, their logo (if applicable0 contact information and other relevant information they want to share with the community.

This is a great way to promote yourself and your business while also sharing your knowledge, wisdom and advice with the overall reliability & PdM community.  If you are interested in becoming a contributor, please contact Michael Vann at mvann@nextupcareers.com

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Afarin Bellisario from Principal Transtrategy Inc. reports on Industry Week that the 21^st Century will be the age of glassy metals. These glassy metals are being referred to as “miracle metals.” Amorphous metal alloys (glassy metals) have several unusual properties such as: the highest strengths of any known metallic material; exceptional magnetism; wear/corrosion resistance; and a large ability to store elastic energy. The ease of manufacturing these metals is what is so extraordinary. They soften gradually when heated and don’t shrink during solidification like other metals. This allows for shaping and molding into very intricate designs. The article entitled, Miracle Metal: How Glassy Metals Will Define Manufacturing in the 21^st Century, also discusses the wide range of applications of glassy metals. A few of those applications are aerospace structures, gold clubs, and medical devices.

With the possibility of glassy metals transforming the manufacturing industry, reliability engineers and predictive maintenance professionals should pay extra attention to the applications of these metals. With glassy metals being used more frequently in manufacturing settings, people in the reliability and predictive maintenance industries should also know the properties of glassy metals, for they react differently than steel. This goes back to the importance of continuous learning, you will never know everything about your field, so you have to roll with the punches and learn and adapt to new technologies or methods with in the reliability and predictive maintenance fields.

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The article entitled, Expatriate Hiring Stalls, by Jonathan Katz, reports that the number one reason for hiring outside the United States is operations functions. Forty-five percent of the 99 respondents to the survey, across various industries, said they are keeping their foreign workforce levels the same despite the economic downfall. Another 35% of the respondents say they will decrease their number of expatriates. The manufacturing industry is the largest industry response group (accounting for 29% of the respondents) in the survey. So if manufacturing companies are sending work overseas, what does that mean for reliability engineers and predictive maintenance professionals? It means that there will be less manufacturing in the country, and therefore less potential work for people in reliability and predictive maintenance. The more manufacturing jobs that are sent overseas, the less of a need there will be for predictive maintenance professionals and reliability engineers in the United States.

People in the reliability industry and predictive maintenance industry should pay close attention to the number of expatriates being used in the manufacturing industry. The survey done by Sibson Consulting shows that organizations expected to increase their use of expatriates is 25%; 54% are not expecting any change; while 21% are expecting to decrease their number of expatriates

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Mark Galley’s article, 3 Steps and 3 Tools that Organize and Improve your Problem Solving Capability, posted on Reliability Web, lists our the three steps to problem solving and some tools for predictive maintenance professionals and reliability engineers to improve their ways.  The three investigation steps to approaching a problem are:

1. What’s the Problem?
2. Why did it happen?
3. What should be done?

These are the three basic steps/questions that every reliability engineer and predictive maintenance professional ask themselves when they are faced with a problem. Step one is where the problem becomes defined, step two is the analysis of the problem, and step three is the brainstorming of solutions. To effectively solve problems, Mark says it is important for predictive maintenance professionals and reliability engineers to organize the investigation. He provides tools to do this:

1. Capture the Timeline – keep a log in chronological order of occurrences (date, time, description), this will help with the “why questions”. It will not give cause-and-effect – therefore a cause-effect-analysis will need to be done to correspond with the timeline.
2. Use Diagrams, Drawing, and Photos – visual tools can provide everyone with a common view of the issue and usually provide more contextual detail.
3. Review the Process – identify the processes that were in place before the failure occurred, this is important in order to prevent the incident from occurring again.

The three questions and tools should be implemented while the investigation process is underway. People in the predictive maintenance and reliability fields should refine their organizational skills, because by following these steps and documenting the investigation consistently will make for a quicker, clearer, more organized, and more effective investigation.

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