Green Shoots of Recovery?

Maybe the jobs market really is beginning to look up. I'm at least finding more appropriate contracts to apply for this month.

I'm waiting for the result of an interview I had yesterday, and expect to hear today if I have been selected for interview for a second role.

Both opportunities are roles I would relish.

Having said that, I'm not easing up on my search for an assignment; competition is too tough out there to take anything for granted.

When I'm not job hunting I'm now busy working on the Stakeholder Management section of the APM's next edition of the Body of Knowledge (BoK), so at least I'm keeping my brain ticking over.

Association for Project Management

Another good day with the APM last Friday - a feedback session for all those involved in the work we've been doing lately.

Everyone was very positive and things are moving forward at a good pace.

I'm hoping to be involved with the rewrite of the Body of Knowledge, and I should hear about that next month.

I enjoy my work with the APM; everyone is so professional and committed. I'm really looking forward to our project going public towards the end of this year.

Stuttering Job Market

I'm seeing some improvements in the job market for interims.

The financial services sector has been busy for some time and now other areas of the economy are waking up to the fact that they cannot stagnate because times are hard.

I expect to see some areas of the public sector become more buoyant as the extent of Government intentions becomes clearer, whilst other areas, of course, will retrench.

One area that will come on strong will be online gaming

PWC recently forecast that annual gambling revenue will top US$155 billion by 2012 and a survey conducted by TNS and Gamesindustry.com estimated that there are 13.3 million Britons playing on various games portals, spending £280m on online games and £170m on mobile games last year.

I believe that more and more of that will be generated by online gaming as governments, strapped for cash, realise that, by softening their stance to online gambling they can generate massive new tax revenues.

This will inevitably benefit interims and freelancers as companies scale up their development operations. Bring on those better times!

The threat of a hung parliament

I think that the threat of a hung parliament is making the private sector as cautious as the public sector.
the public sector will kick off very few initiatives when there is so much uncertainty about who will form the next government. The private sector minds less so, but when the UK runs the risk of a hung parliament, and therefore an ineffectual government, even the private sector becomes nervous.
A hung parliament will be dreadful because it normally leads to another election about six months later, which means uncertainty for the whole of the country until 2011!

Currently, the only exceptions to the trend seem to be banking - particularly investment banking - and the NHS. The banking sector needs to regroup after the huge number of redundancies a year ago, and the NHS seems to be in a permanent state of flux so no surprise there.

The only frustrating thing for an interim like me is that, in the current buyers' market, the banks can be extremely precise about what experience they require, and the NHS totters along trying to introduce change but insisting on interims with extensive NHS experience. If you want change, you need a new broom!