Stress, tears, selling up
The human side of job cuts
A once-thriving Wellington public service worker says work is now so hard to find he fears he will have to sell his home and move away with his family.
With a partner, teenager and mortgaged house, the family has got to the point where they are selling appliances and furniture as their financial situation becomes increasingly desperate.
The senior communications adviser, who wished to remain anonymous to not further damage his job prospects, is pinning his family’s hopes on a recent job interview.
“If I don’t get this job, then we need to sell our house; that’s the end of our money.”
Now in his 40s, he has worked permanently, and more recently on contract, for various government departments, including Maritime NZ, Ministry of Education and Te Whatu Ora. He has built up an impressive resumé with great references.
“There was absolutely no issue finding work when a contract was coming to an end ... I would land a job within a week.”
Since the change of government, however, he’s found contracts for these types of roles have dried up.
“The job market just hasn’t materialised. There was nothing for ages, it was just freaky, and when jobs did return, they didn’t return in great numbers.”
He was looking for anything, not just communications work.
“I’ve been applying for any job. I’ve changed my Seek search to ‘jobs in Wellington’ trying to figure out what I could sidestep into that would still cover our mortgage.”
Every day brings the news of more jobs on the chopping block as ministries look to meet the Government’s cost-saving targets. Public sector insiders warn that the spectre of staff cuts is starting to take its toll on the mental health on Government employees.
The scale of current public service cuts has been called “exceptional”, at a level unseen for 40 years, by Victoria University emeritus professor of public policy Jonathan Boston.
The Wellington job market has taken a 180-degree turn and some of those left in the cold are on the brink of leaving.
Job advertisement levels are an important indicator of the health of the labour market and Wellington’s dropped 38% year-on-year to March, according to recruitment website Seek.
Nationally, the number of job ads on Seek declined by 27% over the same period.
Seek country manager Rob Clark said public sector roles such as “healthcare and medical” and “education and training” saw notable decline in March, whereas “human resources and recruitment” roles were up 15% from February.
Compared to other centres, Wellington saw the biggest drop in job ads compared with a year earlier.
Auckland’s vacancies were down 27%, as were Canterbury’s.
The region holding up best was Hawke’s Bay, which saw only a 7% decline in job ads.
NZIER’s Quarterly Survey of Business Opinion released this week also showed a dramatic reduction in employers looking for workers. The number of people employed across New Zealand fell a net 11% and hiring intentions for the coming quarter dropped from 21% to 2%.
Robert Walters recruitment Wellington senior director Bridget Clarke said they had recently seen “a massive reduction in the amount of roles” that they were recruiting for, and application numbers had “skyrocketed“.
Clarke said the agency had experienced a 45% surge in the number of people applying for roles in Wellington compared to the same time last year. “Our clients, who have advertised job openings, have been inundated with applications.”
She said there were more applicants than available positions, and for those looking to hire, it was a good time “to secure top talent”.
Clarke said the tightening of the Wellington
“Skilled people are a highly prized commodity, every organisation always needs them – and the demand will return.”
Ben Pearson Beyond Recruitment
market appeared to be sending skilled workers to other places such as Auckland and Australia. “We know our community are looking further afield, hence the spike in applications for our Auckland office, and also across the ditch.
“Across our eight Australian branches, they’re seeing an increase in applications, or queries looking to move across.”
A senior Wellington-based public servant, who did not wish to be named, said there was a “massive amount of uncertainty and unease” as many government agencies moved to cut costs.
“A lot of that is around the length of time it’s taking to get these processes under way. Because agencies have responded at different speeds, you have some people who have already left an organisation having taken voluntary redundancy, but you have many [departments] where the change proposal hasn’t even been issued yet.
“People are looking over their shoulders at other Government departments and fearing the worst for themselves.”
He said some of the “best people” were leaving with voluntary redundancies and this would affect the future performance of those departments. The stress in some agencies was so great that it was taking a toll on people’s mental health.
“Without being over-dramatic, one of the major concerns here is the mental health of not only those whose roles are being disestablished, but the mental health of the workforce that remains. “Every day, in our particular organisation, there is somebody in tears. That is the level of stress.”
He said the Government would have to start rehiring at some stage. “Because they’re rolling out a big work programme and someone has to do that work.”
Ben Pearson, of Beyond Recruitment, said they had seen a shift from a skills shortage market to a situation where they were mainly selecting the best applicant from a large pool for a limited number of roles. “We’ve been operating in a very skills-scarce market for two or three years ... it’s probably changed almost 180 degrees where we are getting much a higher rate of application for jobs.”
He said they were also seeing a “big swing” towards more fixed-term contracts on offer.
Pearson said it was important to remember that the staffing cuts were a phase and they expected the market to rebound later in the year.
“Skilled people are a highly prized commodity, every organisation always needs them, and the demand will return.”