John Linton I just finished reading the Saturday AFR which can be summed up as 63 pages of excessive doom and gloom and several hearty laughs on page 64 courtesy of Peter Ruehl - whose column I can recommend to anyone who likes the humour style of Dennis Miller. (My faourite line, among surprisingly many this morning was: "Trying to get the kids to move out of the house is like trying to get the Taliban to withdraw from Pakistan" It also contained some statistics about the increasing use of 'older' workers due to the various demographic changes caused by Australia's low birth rate and, amidst the comedic treatment of the topic, some sensible observations.
The last thing I read before going to bed last night was this item in ITWIRE: http://www.itwire.com/content/view/17025/50/ which had an attention getting headline:
Australian IT jobs ads drop like a stone
not really borne out by the statistics subsequently quoted in the text but, as an indication, interesting to consider. At a time of full employment (which the peope who talk about such things consider under 5% unemployment to be) it would normally seem odd that a 'boom' industry like IT would suddenly reduce hiring and particularly reduce hiring of sales people and managers. It's only one indicator and not a particularly valid one but added to all the bad news spread through the whole of today's AFR it is very depressing.
I'm particularly struck that there should be such a marked reduction in the advertising fr sales personnel in an industry that has always had trouble finding anything like enough competent personnel to promote and sign up new business. Perhaps it means that IT companies are switching to the Exetel model of only using web based marketing?
In dealing with our suppliers we see continuing signs of 'belt tightening' both in termPerhaps it means ths of personnel 'reductions' and in the 'stream lining' of the services being provided. Some of this is beneficial, at least in the short term, with more 'desperation' to win and retain business clearly evident. However I also am seeing worrying signs of 'under provisioning' and dangerous 'skimping' by more than one supplier to Exetel which will have, if they aren't already having, adverse affects on Exetel's customers and therefore on Exetel.
One, more, consequence for Exetel of the continuing flow of bad economic 'news' and 'financial forecasts' is that we have decided not to proceed with our $A3 million investment in buying a CBD office floor and investing in our own data cente. I have no rational reason for bringing this initiative to a halt at the '11th Hour' other than the nagging doubts that this is not the time to use up all the 'spare' money we have to invest in a project that will increase our costs in the short term (while still acknowledging that in the medium term it will reduce costs). I have a feeling that we might need that money for some, completely unknown to me at this stage, emergency or even some sort of opportunity over the coming nine months.
Perhaps this means that Exetel, in its incredibly minor way, is contributing to the generally negative outlook for the Australian economy by cancelling both the DSLAM and Real Estate purchase plans that were around $A8 million in new Australian investment.
I never regarded myself as someone who 'scared easily' so maybe it's just one more indication of increasing age that I seem to be erring so often on the cautious side of decision making over the past year.
I think the time has come to be very, very conservative in planning future business volumes and future business investments though, contrary to the ITWIRE articl we will begin looking for sales personnel over the next few weeks.
Always contradictory information and signals.