June 2010

Looks like job postings matched the temperature trend in Seattle for June.  Postings declined another 13% last month as we head into the summer months.   Job closings rose, thus reducing the overall inventory.    

Microsoft was a big driver of this month's trend.    As it is fiscal end of year this month, there was a noticable absence of job postings, with only 14 versus a high of 40 in February.  In addition, several older postings were closed.   A similar trend happened last year for Microsoft and July then saw a huge increase in openings from Microsoft.     Amazon also continued to be running at about 60% of previous highs.  

On the bright side, a new name showed up with the games startup PopCap posting 5 positions.    And the mobile combo of AT&T, T-Mobile and Clearwire posted a total of 10 jobs between them which is a little higher recent trends.      Aside from a potential Microsoft surge, it's probably safe to assume the job  market will go on vacation for the next 2 months.     Hopefully the temperatures and summer weather don't follow the same trend in Rainy Town. 

Don

About our postings:

Product Management jobs include the titles Product Manager, Product Marketing Manager, and a few Segment or Category Managers.    Jobs could be full time hires or shorter term contract.    Our Seattle “area” ranged from Bellingham down to Tacoma, though only a few postings were really outside the Seattle/Redmond area.