Sunnyvale Survey Forecasts High Tech Job Growth
SUNNYVALE (KCBS) - Silicon Valley employers are bullish about hiring next year despite economic challenges around the globe.
More than half of the 50 high tech companies polled in the latest survey by NOVA Workforce Services said they expect to increase staffing in 2012. NOVA is a federally-funded job training and employment agency administered by the City of Sunnyvale.
Recent hiring trends suggest "a bidding war for recent Stanford engineers or MIT engineers because they've got the latest skills in technology," said NOVA director Kris Stadelman.
KCBS' Mike Colgan Reports:
The NOVA survey forecasts employment for highly skilled technology workers will grow 5 percent within a year, and 9 percent over two years.
Employers already seem to be showing more inclination to hire, said Any Ruff, who's been out of work for 7 months. His days of sending out resumes and getting no response seem to be over.
"I had a second interview at a company today and a preliminary screening interview with another and then an in-person, a second interview yesterday," he said.
The NOVA survey found thousands of middle and lower-tier workers still facing layoffs and cutbacks. By contrast, software engineers and other top talent can pretty much write their own ticket, Stadelman said.
"Not only is there a bidding war for the top graduates at the top schools, but a lot of these companies spend a lot of their time recruiting from each other," she said.
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