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Dealing with the aches and pains of an embattled economy

Imagine for a moment that you are participating in a group exercise.  Now imagine that you, part of a group of people, are standing at a wall.  The purpose of this exercise is to, one-by-one, get each person over the wall.  With numerous people working collectively to hoist each individual person over the wall, this feat is one that is easily surmounted.  The weight of each individual is dispersed as everyone in the group participates in supporting the weight of the person climbing the wall.  Now imagine what happens when everyone has made it over the wall, or rather, disappeared, leaving just handful of you (two or three) to do the legwork of several people.  If you read enough employment-related news touching on the health labor market and recent hiring trends, you will discover this is precisely the situation in which many American workers currently find themselves, and, as one CNN article reports, it is beginning to take its toll.

The article reports that after numerous months of steady positive productivity numbers the Department of Labor recently reported that productivity in the nonfarm business sector, more or less, fell of a cliff in the second quarter.  The reason?  Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight, commented in the CNN article that “a lot of U.S. companies have reached the limit of how much they can slash their workforce and work existing employees to the bone,” adding, “At some point, even weak spending growth will require businesses to hire more people to meet demand.”  As I mentioned in my last post, eventually, employers will again have to begin adding new employees to their payrolls, especially as current employees reach a critical threshold with regard to productivity and workloads.

One suggestion?  If, after months of increased responsibility and an overflowing workload, you feel like you are being worked to the bone, mention this fact, as carefully as possible, in your next review.  While such may not lead to the hiring of multiple new employees to assist you, it will let your supervisors know that, perhaps, there is enough work (and in turn, capital) to justify hiring a new employee or two.

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