Two leading indicators of future job market expansion — a monthly forecast of executive job creation and a separate reading on recruiter confidence — remain decidedly strong in the face of a variety of cautions about the continued growth of the broader economy.

In April, 38 percent of 192 executive recruiters who participated in an ExecuNet survey reported they expect companies to leverage the economic climate over the next six months by adding new executive-level jobs, the highest number since the monthly index was created in May 2009. An equal number forecasted that companies will "trade up" with new hires for existing management jobs. Another 17 percent indicated that companies would elect not to add new management jobs, while five percent anticipated employers would choose simply to avoid filling current management-level vacancies. Only two percent of executive recruiters expect companies to further eliminate executive jobs.

ExecuNet's Executive Job Creation Index is based on a monthly survey of executive search firms and reflects responding executive recruiters' expectations of how companies are managing their executive talent needs. The Executive Job Creation Index compares the number of companies expected to add executive positions over the next six months versus those planning to downsize their management teams or delay filling vacant management roles. In April, that figure reached 32 points (as represented in the preceding chart), representing the 16^th consecutive month the index has held in positive territory.

"We're encouraged to see that executive recruiters remain so optimistic about corporate hiring plans, especially because our indices are forward-looking indicators on where the executive job market is going in the next six months," says ExecuNet President and Chief Economist Mark Anderson. "Their view that nearly 40 percent of companies will be adding new management jobs during that time signals that a real shift is underway and that business growth and leadership reinvestment is the focus for most employers."

Joseph Daniel McCool
Joseph Daniel McCool is senior contributing editor with ExecuNet and principal of management recruiting/succession advisory firm The McCool Group. He is also the author of Deciding Who Leads: How Executive Recruiters Drive, Direct & Disrupt the Global Search for Leadership Talent, recognized widely as "one of the best business books of 2008," and its Brazilian Portuguese translation, Escolhendo Líderes, published in June 2010.

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