Financial industry hires cool off

Singapore - In a bleak economic situation where bank layoffs are escalating, some financial professionals unaffected by the crisis are keeping their options open by being passive jobseekers.

While active jobseekers from affected firms like Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch have signed up with Vawch, an external job referral firm specialising in financial services, the job uncertainty has split unaffected bankers into two segments. Benety Liew, co-founder of the firm, describes them as "the ones who don't like the uncertainty are starting to actively look for jobs" and "those who are uncertain but are keeping their heads down and working really hard".

For this group of unaffected bankers, Liew says, "Unless an opportunity that really interests them comes along, a lot of them are just pretty happy sitting tight where they are."

Likewise, HR personnel are not in a hurry to fill positions as the tightening of belts begin. Vawch's second co-founder, Kartika Prihadi says, "It's not that they don't have the urgency to [fill the position] but they just want to find the perfect candidate."

Looking for cheaper alternative hiring sources is also one way HR tries to minimise costs for the company as utilising job boards or professional head-hunters during a downturn can be expensive. Prihadi says, "For example on Monster [and] Jobsdb, you would have to pay $150 [upfront] at least for a month or few weeks. At e-Financial Careers, it has to be $1,000 for a month."

While the referral process may take longer than recruitment agencies with very large databases to shortlist suitable targets, Liew says companies can effectively make a huge saving in terms of recruitment advertising.

With cost savings at the top of his mind, HR director for NTUC Club, Charlie Goh feels this inexpensive solution would definitely be useful during the crisis. However, he adds, "Everyone is hired on a merit basis, so they will go through the recruitment process also."

As for the quality of candidates from referrals or external sources, Goh says, "I think not bad. We do shortlist them for interviews, if I find them to be suitable."