Siemens CEO: 'Mismatch' Between U.S. Jobs Available, Skills Needed

The United States might have millions of unemployed workers, but one company is having a hard time finding people that fit.

Eric Spiegel, U.S. regional President and CEO of German engineering conglomerate Siemens, recently told the Financial Times that much of America's employment problem isn't because of a lack of jobs, but because there are too few qualified workers.

Currently, Siemens, whose 15 divisions in industry, energy and healthcare employed around 405,000 U.S. workers last year, has around 3,200 job vacancies, and Spiegel says that filling them has been no easy task.

Even with 13.9 million Americans currently unemployed, the high unemployment rate has not given companies an endless number of candidates. In the manufacturing sector, for example, the number of those employed has gone down but the number of jobs available has risen to 230,000 today from 98,000 in 2009, the Financial Times reports.

By the same token, a recent study by the employment agency Manpower finds that 52 percent of American companies said they are experiencing difficulty finding employees qualified enough to fill mission-critical positions, compared to only 14 percent in 2010.

Statistics like these might point to unemployment being an increasingly structural problem, meaning workers don't have the skills that companies need. This April, President Obama's former Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers Christina Romer said in a speech that "structural unemployment has risen somewhat nationwide, and could rise further if we don’t reduce cyclical unemployment quickly[.]"

Likewise, the President himself recently lent his support to the NAM-Endorsed Manufacturing Skills Certification System, which would provide potential employees with the education and standardized credentials necessary to work manufacturing jobs. With job creation likely to remain a key election issue, Obama put forth the goal to train and credential 500,000 manufacturing employees in the next five years.

As for Siemens, the scarcity of qualified employees has lead it to seek new more proactive ways of finding workers.

“There’s a mismatch between the jobs that are available, at least in our portfolio, and the people that we see out there,” Spiegel told the Financial Times. "In fact, one of the things we've had to do is actually hire recruiters recently because the people aren't available coming over the web or coming in for interviews."

Watch the full interview at the Financial Times.

Comments

[WJG38]

10:44 PM on 06/29/2011

Or the middle management at Siemens are fooling the stock holders into believing that if they could just find qualified employees then they could grow their department.

It is a common practice for a failing department head to post a job that they have absolutely no intention of filling; because the business truthfully doesn't exist in the market to support the new position. But if middle management tells the truth, the job that gets cut is theirs.

Middle Management's final excuse is that they just couldn't find someone qualified for the position. The only way to solve the problem Mr. Spiegal is to require that if a position is posted, it must be filled. And you must have some type of controls for credibility among middle management. I watched many Middle Managers pull this within your competitor's company.

I am among the gullible unemployed that spend 30-40 minutes applying for these "Ghost Positions".

Also watch for a department that has a high turnover rate. I worked for a company that had 3 sales people. But there was only one that ever successfully made quota, the other two positions had a new employee in training every 18 months.

[GloriaY]

10:58 PM on 06/23/2011

So there used to be something known as on the job training. The employee is hired on a probationary period, then after the training period ends successfully, that person is hired premanently. What happened with that arrangement that cannot be brought back here. On the job training appears to be dead in the USA but is alive and well off shore.

[compal]

01:44 AM on 08/20/2011

Well, let me have a guess why it's even harder for Americans to find a position with a European company. Ever heard that the rest of world ditched your cumbersome medieval measurement mode long ago and uses the modern metric system? Maybe that is the reason that many of you can't be employed outside and within America? Why would anyone waste time and money on teaching you what everybody else around the world knows from childhood on? Americans pay dearly for that self inflicted misery in lost sales to metric countries, needless conversions mistakes, including needlessly lost lives in hospitals and surgeries. Add to this dismal litany the waste of precious time teaching that cumbersome anachronism plus some metric to school children and your competitiveness on this globe doesn't look good at all. The irony in all of this is that America can't function properly without the metric system. So why waste time and money on teaching two measurement languages in a world that speaks only one? On the other hand the world probably thanks you for being the odd one out because it makes competing with America childsplay.

[fortressfountain]

02:37 PM on 06/23/2011

Here is your solution big corporations. Close your eyes and pretend the people you are training are friends or relatives of yourselves or pretend they are overseas workers you are paying $5.00 an hour for or pretend they are slaves I mean interns.

[mashtoe]

01:51 PM on 06/23/2011

Go ask your boss for a raise and see if there is a labor shortage! If your company is making a profit and you can't get a raise well above inflation then there IS NO LABOR SHORTAGE! Your manager will be the first to say that pay is based on market rates. And thus the markets for labor are in excess of supply.

Here at Microsoft we keep importing thousands of people on H-1b because managers only let us review H-1b reusmes! We never get to look at publicly available resumes. Only resumes from vendors like InfoSys are allowed. That is how they rig the game. And Obama knows this and he does nothing about it!

[bi1]

01:02 PM on 06/23/2011

Next year it will be another certification,this is crap .If a company wants people that are certified in an certain area ,they need to look at the certifications that are out there all ready.Factory jobs are be coming as complicated as the education system it seems as time goes the system gets more filled up with trash .In the long run at the end of the day there are people out there who can do the job or position already that just do not have that particular certification.If they wanted somebody they can find ,if they were not already looking for excuses. Every job requires some orientation or adjustment regardless of what you bring to the table if your on top or not.

[Heartfire]

12:28 PM on 06/23/2011

Siemens seems to have a major case of purple squirrel syndrome.

[Andy49]

10:16 AM on 06/23/2011

An education system based on false premisses lead us to this point. Not everyone needs college and we have never really addresses the tech school solution. When we do it will quickly turn into the mess I see in NY where it is so damn expensive to go that most can't go. Those who do get screwed by the educational loan business. College and Tech Schools are the victims of a nation that puts profit above the common good.

[AcademicFreedom]

09:29 AM on 06/23/2011

The Siemens dude should know that he has to hire mexican speaking or euboniks speaking people who do not want to do any accumation into the US or business society.

[Motte Bailey]

11:09 AM on 06/23/2011

Um... I have no idea what you said. But I did recognize the words in English.

[bi1]

12:52 PM on 06/23/2011

He said $%^&&(*((())))#$$%&&&**HY&**((((*GG&&&&&&&&&&&&$$$$88@##%I( got it

[TFDNYC]

02:48 PM on 06/23/2011

Sarah Palin, is that you?

[WJG38]

10:47 PM on 06/29/2011

If it had been Sarah Palin, the message would have been loud and clear!

[Downrivers]

09:26 AM on 06/23/2011

BANGALORE, India 2/16/2004 — The German firm Siemens will move most of the 15,000 software programming jobs from its offices in the United States and Western Europe to India, China and Eastern Europe, a company official said Monday.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4277491/ns/business-world_business/t/siemens-plans-huge-jobs-outsourcing/

[WhatWereTheyThinking]

10:44 AM on 06/23/2011

Siemens' statement that American workers are not qualified is a bogus one.

MicroSoft pulled the same stunt in the 90's. This was a way to defend the use of H1B work-visa workers to avoid hiring more-exepnsive American workers. And, where possible, work was outsourced to India and other cheap-labor countries.

So when a company claims it cannot find qualified American workers, it is building its case to oursource or hire green-card holders.

[Downrivers]

11:11 AM on 06/23/2011

Yep...it's a crock. Americans should ask their elected representatives how exactly can a worker compete in the global market with someone who makes $50 a month when the cost of a basic family health insurance policy exceeds $12k. How can an American worker compete with third world countries ad countries like even.......Canada.

[Downrivers]

09:22 AM on 06/23/2011

CEO says 3200 job vacancies countrywide.....their web site lists 1800.

http://www.usa.siemens.com/en/jobs_careers/us_jobs.htm

[SoylentGreenIsPeople]

04:14 AM on 06/23/2011

Many (larger) companies can afford to train people. Actually they do it, but mostly offshore. For the past decade, we've been hearing "we cannot find local talent" (at our terms and age preferences). Now after a decade, there are few young domestic candidates in the sweet spot of 5+ years experience and about 30 years (let's say) of age, and the prevalence of gray hair is mostly kept in check by hair dye (I'm not joking).

[mashtoe]

03:59 AM on 06/23/2011

This is how corporate communism works. You run crying to the government with "I can't find people" then before ANYONE asks the logical next question "how MUCH MONEY are you offering?" the government quickly starts throwing out H-1B and B-1 and tons of other work visas flooding the US labor market. And this federal interference and regulation of the job market is why wages are flat and will not rise. We aren't forcing the corporations to raise pay and bring people into the market naturally. The executive class are a bunch of welfare queens who feel entitled to cheap labor.

[Motte Bailey]

11:12 AM on 06/23/2011

That issue was sort of my question too - how much money are they offering, and (as another posted mentioned) why aren't they offering training to create those people and get their loyalty? I fear the answer is as you noted - they don't want to pay first world wages, and they have no interest in developing talent, only exploiting it.

[Kat Posing]

01:38 PM on 06/23/2011

I'm working full time, but below my abilities, so have been looking to move. The only call's i'm getting are for short term contracts of about 6 months, in other states and for half of what I was making as a manager, and less than what I make in a mid-range position now. Why move to have more responsibilities, a longer commute, more hours working a salaried position for less pay? Plus they want you to come in already an expert at everything and ready to run and are unwilling to train.

My son recently graduated from high school, and there are no vocational training programs out there anymore, so he's wondering around applying at McD and Wal-mart. We will never improve the job market without training, the willing to hire experienced workers at a decent wage and reducing the number of foreign workers and off-shoring.

[jeffrey678]

03:55 AM on 06/23/2011

Companies don't want to train new workers because they will use that skill to seek higher wages.

[WhatWereTheyThinking]

10:49 AM on 06/23/2011

One solution to this is to get a written commitment from the trainee that they will stay with the company for a specified length of time based on the amount of training received.

The US military does this with tuition reimbursement for officers.

[mashtoe]

12:31 PM on 06/23/2011

So indentured servitude is your answer. Nice. When I started my career as a software engineer corporations would train new hires for free. And they gave raises to keep people. That is how markets works. We are not a communist nation who exist for the pleasure of corporations. Well, maybe that is what we have become. I hear more and more people talking like communist Chinese. The communist say that they must do what corporations want because the corporation is part of the state and you must do what the state needs done. I hear Americans saying the exact same BS.

[albertmarquet]

11:54 AM on 06/23/2011

Using one or two training classes to get a better paying job is very very difficult. What you sugguest is rare.

[any mouse]

03:40 AM on 06/23/2011

I looked at some of those jobs on the Siemens web site and most of the requirements are extremely ridiculous.

I doubt if there is a human alive that can meet the requirements.

Come on, did those jobs really REQUIRE a PhD? I doubt it.

As I pointed out to a job seeker the other day, there are a lot of lazy and greedy managers these days that think they should be able to get a PhD for $8/hr since there are so many unemployed.

It is time for employers to get real.

There are millions of TRAINABLE people in the US with good basic skill that can fill most of the open jobs with a little help.

BUT ...

Companies are more willing to leave positions open for over half a year than look at the people with skills that are "good enough."

[Cherie Lyon]

01:00 AM on 06/23/2011

Come on, folks. We, working folks, and we, business folks, HAVE TO WORK TOGETHER or we ALL lose.
Some compromises have to be made on BOTH SIDES so that we don't all sink together. Am I the only one here who thinks this is sensible?! That means Big business has to recognize that they need to offer a living wage - and CEO's should be willing to give up a little so that they get solid support from the bottom tiers - the VALUABLE people (i.e. assets) that provide them with their salaries.
The working folks have to recognize that now is not the time to ask for big raises, but for LIVING WAGES.
NOTE: I'm just throwing out an idea that can keep our boat from sinking.

[mashtoe]

04:01 AM on 06/23/2011

You are insane. The only way wages ever rise is when there is a critical shortage. And right now the US government is issuing work visas. Work visas are large part of why wages are not rising. Profits are sky high. Productivity is up. So we are creating the wealth. But by flooding the market with labor the US government suppresses wages.

[OldTulsan]

11:42 AM on 06/23/2011

Greenspan said Americans are paid too much and that opening up immigration to foreign skilled workers is "driving more income equality"...

http://republicbroadcasting.org/?p=190
The Lazy Man's Guide To The Economic Crisis | Republic Broadcasting Network

Greenspan is no longer in power but those ideas linger on.