Welcome everyone to 2016! At ConstructionHunter, we have additional services planned for you to make your engagement with news, development in projects, career opportunities, support, and development, our broad focus for this year.
You will begin to notice very soon an emphasis on providing relevant, personal and career resources to strengthen your confidence in effortlessly identifying real opportunities, and helping you to map out an understanding – with practical suggestions and tools – on how to capitalise on those career opportunities constantly unfolding in this construction and mining industry.
Here’s an example: Recently the Australian Industry of Commerce, who advises big business and the federal government on business and economic trends, identified four key leading commerce growth areas within the Australian market over 2016:
-Health and fitness
-Medical services
-Education
-Construction and Mining
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As a result of this forecasted trend, additional industries that will directly benefit from growth in these streams are likely to be:
-Leisure
-Entertainment
-Personal wellness services ( there are hundreds of niches and sub branches in this stream alone )
-Financial services ( think anything to do with money in purchasing items and assets – this is huge )
-Whitegoods and appliances ( retail and commercial )
-Retail construction services ( domestic renovations, extenstions and refurbishments in the property sector – just to name one of scores of niches in this stream as well )
What does this mean specifically?
Although we have recently seen published accounts of some mining companies ( and construction companies ) announce layoffs and reductions in staff numbers, this will not translate into a general downturn in the mining industry overall.
What this does mean is there will be a reduction in the number of production labour (jobs directly associated with producing and operations) staff numbers in the short term. Traditionally what this stage in a business development cycle suggests is as follows:
1/ Reduction in staff production numbers
2/ Review in operational process efficiency ( to match projected production and maintain profitability )
3/ Recalcuation of labour numbers and specialisations to maximise production from readjusted efficiency standards
4/ Assessment and production of plant and equipment needs to support new production targets
5/ Repositioning and re-hiring / new hiring of production labour to match the calculations for labour need to drive new efficiency and production standards
( Nr 4 is generally determined at Nr 2, but isn’t usually finished until the recalculation for labour is finalised )
What You Must Be Clear On
The mining and construction industries have been aware of this scenario occurring from the Rudd government days, when the then prime minister, Kevin Rudd, was attempting to tell the mining and construction industries what taxes they had to pay – the reason for the angst ( apart from more taxing on revenue ), was the mining and construction commerce leaders knew the industry production would soften over the following 5 years due to:
-the GFC taking its natural toll on commerce
-China ( our largest buyer of commodities in this sector at the time ) eventually slowing down its purchases after maxing out their own ‘soft domestic touchdown’ process so its own economy didn’t get blazed by the GFC
-the US dollar eventually rebounding with a higher interest rate from cash-zero percent at the Fed Reserve ( early signs now )
-the AUS dollar eventually making its climb back from present levels of 0.70 something cents to 0.80-0.85 cents
The industry leaders knew we were going to slow down production, which meant a reduction in revenue. You can understand no business wants to negotiate a new taxation on its revenue when it knows business will decline in the future. In practical terms, this also meant opportunities to reassess plant and equipment needs, and domestic and international market demand, for the commodities we pull out of the ground, especially the base metals, iron ore and coal.
So they knew this period would eventually come. And they also more accurately knew this to be ‘reassessment for production in the short term, for continued sustainable growth in the longer term’.
Simply put that means ‘maintain and grow production labour demand to meet commodity production demand over the longer term’.
In the longer term ( 12 + months ), you can expect new and emerging opportunities for more specific career advancement / repositioning of job / contracting roles within the construction and mining industries.
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Add to this the pipeline of mining and construction projects under a process of approval by the federal government for 2016/2017, and projects requiring construction resources seem healthy.
So take heart and be encouraged there is continuing signs of more life that are here to stay for the longer term.
What does this mean for ConstructionHunter and You?
When you’re aware of the ‘bigger picture trends’ occuring over the coming months, then you’re in a position of strength to respond rather than react. This means you’re on the front foot to know what resouces will help you identify and take advantage of opportunities for your own, and others’, benefit.
For ConstructionHunter, this means 2016 is a perfect year to begin to release to you resources and tools you can use to prepare yourself for the opportunities coming over the next 12 months, and recognize:
-Where they are
-What to do to prepare for them
-Who to connect with to elevate awareness to you
-How to best engage the process to connect with the opportunities
-How to ensure you’re doing the best you can with what you have to succeed
We’re excited about how we’re going to serve you in the coming 12 months, and we’ve got some incredible resources coming your way in the next 30 days to begin to give you the edge in finding and securing new opportunities.
Of course we will still be providing the ongoing updates on new and existing projects that represent good career opportunities for you as well. And we’re adding some additional functionality around this information to make it easier to recognise what the opportunities are for work, and how to access them easier than before.
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Thanks for your continued support, engaging with ConstructionHunter throughout 2015. Its been an ‘evolving’ year, with lots of hard work, long conversations, and an ongoing determined willingness to make ConstructionHunter the leading service advocate for career and stakeholder leadership opportunities in the construction industry.
Welcome on the journey with us in 2016, and here’s to your success!
Tom & Ryan
ConstructionHunter
