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The MedZilla Report March 2008 Employment Outlook for Biotech Pharma...

Unexpected was the word of the month for the March employment picture in the medical field. Employers were motivated to find top candidates in several new states, and in a big way. Texas, Colorado, and Delaware all showed large increases in the number of candidates sourced, with Colorado's numbers jumping upward by almost five percent. There were no correspondingly-large drops, except in Florida, which saw a falloff of 3.3 percent in candidate sourcing. As for what these employers were looking for, research ruled the day while sales saw a dramatic drop -- more than seven percent.

Despite these broad swings in searches made by employers, candidates just weren't looking for new jobs. In the top ten states where people searched for new jobs, the largest change was in California -- just under one percent positive.

Job postings went up 2.7 percent in California, and New York and Connecticut saw posting increases of more than one percent as well. New Jersey saw the greatest decline in job postings -- 2.5 percent -- and besides that state, only Illinois saw a decline of more than one percent. The jobs posted were mostly in IT, product development, and customer support; meanwhile, companies removed postings mostly for managers and operations staff.

What Does It Mean

For the past few months, jobs have become available in health care when other industries faced massive layoffs. "Over the past 12 months, health care has added 363,000 jobs," said Michele Hopps, director of marketing for MedZilla.com. "Employment in health care has remained on an upward trend, rising by 23,000." The fact that vacancies remain in health care indicates that employers continue to have open positions, and that there may not be enough potential employees to fill them.

Meanwhile, small, targeted layoffs are occurring in the health care field, mostly in Pennsylvania. The larger outplacements continue to occur in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology areas, and most of them occur because these companies are forced to end their research endeavors, likely for funding or approval reasons. The biggest job cuts for March came from Wyeth pharmaceutical, which is going through major restructuring and elected to terminate about 1,200 sales representatives in a single week. As Wyeth employs 50,000 people, that is a relatively small number, but not to those who were affected by the cuts.

Where Do You Stand

The first quarter of 2008 showed strong positive trends in employment for the health care fields, and some growth in clinical research as well. However, the past two quarters have been tough for pharmaceutical companies and their employees, with the FDA declining to approve new technologies and medications as well as companies running into roadblocks in their research.

Though pharmaceuticals are one of the most visible fields when it comes to medical employment, biotechnology trends tend to follow those of the pharmaceutical industry. That could indicate trouble for people employed in pharmaceutical sales, one of the most popular fields in the medical arena. The best advice for those in the business is to keep track of trends, both in employment and general financial news; a simple RSS reader and a few news feeds could take care of both and deliver the information directly to the inbox. But for those who have a secure position in sales, now is not the time to change jobs without a good reason; even if sales representatives are unhappy, if their jobs are safe, it is best to sit tight for the time being.

Those in health care, on the other hand, remain in demand. And college students heading into health care -- nurses, caregivers, doctors, lab technicians, and the like -- have a good chance of getting a job once they finish their education.

Regardless of specialty or employment status, the best defense is a good offense, and according to Hopps, that means "spending a little time each day staying on top of job trends and availability, including checking MedZilla.com daily to see what new opportunities have been posted." When a job is eliminated, the person who's already got the information on what's out there is the person most likely to be employed again soon.

About MedZilla.com

Established in mid-1994, MedZilla is the original web site to serve career and hiring needs for professionals and employers in biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, medicine, science and healthcare. The MedZilla jobs database contains about 7,500 open positions. The resume database currently contains over 285,000 resumes with 16,800 less than three months old. These resources have been characterized as the largest, most comprehensive databases of their kind on the web in the industries served.

Medzilla is a Registered Trademark owned by Medzilla Inc. Copyright 2008, MedZilla, Inc. Permission is granted to reproduce and distribute this text in its entirety, and if electronically, with a link to the URL www.medzilla.com. For permission to quote from or reproduce any portion of this message, please contact Michele Hopps, Director of Marketing and Development, MedZilla, Inc. Email: mgroutage(at)medzilla.com.

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