Market Picking Up??

[Green Mango]

9 contractors kicked out last week thinks definately looking dicey ...

[cykophysh39]

I'm looking at some bench time coming up.
But don't really want to as I want money to keep topping up the investments.

Have carpet bombed job serve and have not had one single call this week.

Starting to panic a little bit, have until the end of the month to find something, hopefully something turns up.

[deckster]

I thought some of you may be interested in a few stats that sum up my experience of the market over the past few months. A bit of background - I have been contracting in the OSS / CRM / Java / Oracle arena for 10 years and until last October have not spent more than 2 (unplanned) weeks out of contract. My last contract finished September 31st last year. Since then I have applied for well over 100 jobs, mainly through Jobserve but quite a few calls have come from Jobsite. Monster was a waste of time.

Of those applications, roughly 30% resulted in my CV being fowarded to the client, which converted to 14 interviews. 8 of those moved forward to the final decision phase. After final interview, 2 roles were withdrawn due to project or budgetary problems. Just this week, after nearly 7 months, finally an interview converted to a job offer. This job came through an old work colleague who contacted me via Linkedin, and far as I know has not been advertised on the job boards.

I had one interview before I left my contract in September. October and November were washouts, no interviews at all. 5 interviews in December, 1 in January, and then 7 in February and March. So in that sense yes things are picking up I guess.

On rates - I have been on £500+/day since 2001. The highest rate I was put forward for was £450/day and recently roles have been going for around £350/day.

Interviews were split 50/50 for contract and perm roles which roughly correlates with the ratio of contract/perm applications. The job I have now taken is permie, and ignoring any benefits the basic salary is higher than an IR35-clear contract at the rates I have been interviewing for over the last couple of months.

Doom and gloom? Well, certainly it's a market unlike any I've experienced before although I was lucky enough to be on a decent long-term contract during the last downswing. Rates have taken a real battering and certainly for the positions I've been applying for (senior technical architect level) it is not at all clear that there is a fiscal advantage to contracting any more. The job boards are full of nonsense jobs and those that are genuine have a real danger of being pulled at the last moment. Old colleagues and contacts are more important now than ever.

Am I sad to be leaving contracting? Right now, not at all. Whilst I'm not exactly jumping for joy at the thought of permie politics and performance appraisals, they now seem a reasonable price to pay to be free of uncertain payment terms, agency instability (I had two go bust in one year owing me over £30k), tax hassles and the like. Maybe I'll be back, maybe not.

So to all of you out there still looking, or about to be benched - best of luck, it's terrible out there and I'm very glad I'm no longer in the club

[Jubber]

An excellent honest post - thank you.

[Grinder]

That is a good analysis of your situation deckster, except there are only 30 days in September.

Since Jan 1st I have applied for far more than 100 positions (probably 500) and had 5 interviews. 3 unsuccessful (2 were a mismatch for my capabilities, in the other case I was just a stooge they already had someone lined up), 2 still waiting for feedback. All 5 were in the last month.

Spoke to a pimp yesterday who reiterated the annual trend for April boost due to majority of companies starting their accounting year April 1st. Get ready to stand back - we don't know how big this will get!

[DocP]

Poor

I've have a similar view. I believe that rates in the market now are at around the levels they were 10 years ago.

There are very few real jobs around. This is week 3 of bench time and the contract market isn't functioning normally.

I'm getting lots of calls from Agents trying to fish for leads. Some are even admiting that they have almost nothing on their books. I'm expecting lots of them to go to the wall very soon.

On the bright side, the market can't get any worse. Downturns don't last forever and there are still one or two things out there.

[PM-Junkie]

I've have a similar view. I believe that rates in the market now are at around the levels they were 10 years ago.

There are very few real jobs around. This is week 3 of bench time and the contract market isn't functioning normally.

I'm getting lots of calls from Agents trying to fish for leads. Some are even admiting that they have almost nothing on their books. I'm expecting lots of them to go to the wall very soon.

On the bright side, the market can't get any worse. Downturns don't last forever and there are still one or two things out there.

...and even more on the bright side, there is the view that with all the contractors either packing up and going permie, or upping sticks and moving abroad (I have two friends who have done that) - when the market does bounce back those contractors who are still in (in, not on!!) the game will be gold dust, and will cost.

[moorfield]

That is a good analysis of your situation deckster,

Good post deckster I think your comments are spot on, and you are not alone!

I trust you'll be asking the mods to shut down your account now?

[Crusoe101]

Guys, its The start of April

New budgets..... course the market has picked up a bit!!!

[Brussels Slumdog]

Guys, its The start of April

New budgets..... course the market has picked up a bit!!!

Take the contract at £350 a day then when the market returns to normal
then give notice like everybody else and apply for the £500 day job.

When the market picks up there is going to be a storm. Do you thing that all the contractors who have extended or accepted lower rates are going to stick around £150 day short?