Quick, I need a bookkeeper
Cape Business invited a panel of four experts to analyze what’s hot and what’s not. David Augustinho, executive director of the Cape & Islands Workforce Investment Board; Al Roy, director of business services for Career Opportunities, the Cape’s one-stop career center; Joan Rezendez, director of outreach and media relations for Career Opportunities; and Elizabeth Harris, president of The Executive Suite, a human resources company and recruiter.Here are excerpts from their discussion.
What is your overall assessment of the Cape’s job picture?
Augustinho: I want to get funding to inventory a group of older workers’ skills and talents, not just their former occupations. I know we can make connections that are not apparent. At the same time, we need to educate employers as to the availability of mature workers and their attractiveness.
Rezendez: The reality is that the mature worker is younger than ever and is insulted when they are invited to become a member of the AARP at the age of 50. In their eyes, retirement in the conventional sense is not even a consideration.
What are the hot jobs?
Harris: From my experience, the jobs most in demand are bookkeeping and accounting. I have CPAs and CFOs coming out my ears, but you can’t find people with clerical bookkeeping skills. I have 10 openings for bookkeepers. But 50 percent of the candidates who come in and say they are bookkeepers can’t reconcile a bank account and don’t know a debit from a credit.
Augustinho: One way to deal with the shortfall of bookkeepers is to have one good professional serve multiple small businesses that alone, could not afford that salary. Employers may be able to target stay-at-home moms who could earn $35,000 to $60,000 a year.
Harris: That is a good idea. Little companies don’t need 40-hour-a-week bookkeepers. They may need 12 hours on Monday and Wednesday. It’s also a place where mature workers fit in.
Augustinho: We also are training 40 individuals for administrative health careers, which are in great demand. These people will become physicians’ secretaries and schedulers, ward secretaries and medical billers. They can make reasonably good pay and it represents a well-articulated career path with advancement possibilities.
Rezendez: I like home care, and I don’t mean home-health aides. I see a huge growth for companion programs and any kind of care that will keep people in their home and out of nursing homes or assisted-living facilities. These will be jobs serving seniors who are basically healthy and want to remain in their homes, but are unable to do everything for themselves. I see little businesses cropping up everywhere to serve this demographic.
Augustinho: On Cape Cod, our hospitals represent only 23 percent of the health-care workforce, compared with 43 percent across the rest of Massachusetts. In contrast, home health care represents only 5 percent of the industry’s workforce in Massachusetts, but 12 percent on Cape Cod.
Roy: I like the health-care ladder also. But I also believe it is necessary for both prospective employee and employer to envision growth opportunities. Many jobs are not being filled because one or both sides don’t appreciate the future potential of the first position. They only see entry-level chances and don’t explore opportunities to become managers and move into administrative offices. That is a challenge for us to give them information about advancement. The first impression need not be last impression. You may start off at the bottom, but if you have transferable skills, the growth potential can be unlimited. The key is to get through the door.
Augustinho: I like insurance. There is a strong need for customer service representatives. They can be paid $30,000 to $40,000 and it is a great entry-level position that most people can learn. It is a good solid profession; you never see layoffs. Every agency is looking for customer service representatives, but they want people with experience and most don’t want to train them. Across the entire area of finance, insurance and real estate, I see real potential for the Cape. We have few back-office jobs, but that would be a great business here.
Roy: It is cheaper to put these administrative back offices on the Cape than elsewhere because our wages are less. Banks should put their back offices here because wages are 25 percent to 30 percent less than Boston. Big operations centers would do very well on the Cape.
Augustinho: One of strongest occupational areas will be landscaping. The industry feeds right into the second-home market. They have extensive disposable income, and they want their homes to look nice. They don’t want to do maintenance themselves. It should be a dynamic occupation for the next 20 years. I would counsel people to work for a landscaper, learn how to do the job well, and then get your own vehicle and capital.
What jobs are waning?
Augustinho: The jobs that have lost the most traction are in state and federal government. Between the third quarters of 2001 and 2004, state government on Cape Cod shed 20 percent of its jobs, due primarily to the budget crisis. The federal government dropped another 3 percent of its jobs. Only local government saw an increase during that time. Another down area is miscellaneous retailing, which lost 13 percent of its jobs during the same three-year period. This is not department store or clothing retailing, or building supplies. It is associated more with the tourism trade.
Roy: Some technology is growing, but the area involving the Internet, software, the aspects of the once-ballyhooed Silicon Sandbar, has lost jobs. Manufacturing, of course, is down not only on Cape Cod, but across Massachusetts and the Northeast. The issue facing the Cape is more about successfully matching worker to job. The key is to realize an employer may not find a direct match. But they can get a good handle on the skills of candidates and look beyond the job description. They need to look at soft skills as well as hard skills. They have to see what skills and education are transferable. How does this skill fit into my current needs? Very seldom will you find that direct match. If you hit 10 percent, you had a damn good day.
Harris: The hardest thing to articulate to a client, not the candidate, is that they must put energy into thinking outside the box when considering a candidate’s qualifications.
Augustinho: Then, after that it is a matter of training, training, training.
Roy: On the job seeker’s side, I recommend they do not stereotype a job or an
industry group. The important question for both job seeker and employer to ask is: "What opportunities can develop from the initial job?"
Harris: Just as we regularly change the oil in our car for good maintenance, we need to give the same kind of "tune-up and maintenance" to what the job really needs, and to what the candidate has to offer, so that we don’t miss those great gems that are sometimes just beneath the surface.
