Are employment prospects in Adelaide as bad people portray on these forums

[lynney45]

Hi all, i have read many threads of people on 489 visas for South Australia stating that they are unable to find work, are struggling to get by and are asking questions like 'Can we move to another state as we are unable to find work'.

Are employment prospects in Adelaide as bad people portray on these forums?  I have could statistics that the unemployment rate in Adelaide is 6.67% as of the first quarter of 2018: 

https://economy.id.com.au/adelaide/unemployment

An unemployment rate of 6.67% is actually quite impressive in comparison to some other cities.  So i wonder why so many people complain that they are unable to find work?  Perhaps they mean they are unable to find work in their field?  Are jobs plentiful as long as you are willing to do any kind of work?

 

[Marisawright]

It depends what kind of work you're looking for.   All the big corporations have their main offices in Sydney and Melbourne, except for a few who are in Brisbane.  The mining companies are in Perth.   So for people looking for senior management or IT positions, pickings in Adelaide can be slim because the top management and the main IT operations are all elsewhere. 

 

[deryans]

2 hours ago, lynney45 said:

 

Are employment prospects in Adelaide as bad people portray on these forums?   

Are jobs plentiful as long as you are willing to do any kind of work?

 

Infact , prospects are likely to be worse,  a new government was returned this year and they are busy clearing out the 16 years mediocrity of the last administration who have steered SA and Adelaide into an economic corner.  over 5000 public servants to get he chop as a result.

Adelaide is a public sector town,  over 12% of the population is directly employed by the government, and another substantial percentage indirectly, which means over a the decades, the same people, same families and same groups of people attain control of certain functions, barring any newcomers.  

Adelaide has a reputation for nepotism, cronyism and mediocrity,  and being somewhat backward, this is a well earned reputation and it's largely true.

Jobs are certainly not plentiful,  which is a rather general remark to make,  I'd say good jobs with prospects are very scarce, low level jobs with limited  prospects are common, it is also very common for people at good level of experience and competency to take a minor role reporting to someone who's a fraction of their experience in the hope that they'll be rewarded and or promoted - this does not always work : see above

Edited September 6, 2018 by deryans

[Bulya]

On 06/09/2018 at 23:49, deryans said:

Infact , prospects are likely to be worse,  a new government was returned this year and they are busy clearing out the 16 years mediocrity of the last administration who have steered SA and Adelaide into an economic corner.  over 5000 public servants to get he chop as a result.

Adelaide is a public sector town,  over 12% of the population is directly employed by the government, and another substantial percentage indirectly, which means over a the decades, the same people, same families and same groups of people attain control of certain functions, barring any newcomers.  

Adelaide has a reputation for nepotism, cronyism and mediocrity,  and being somewhat backward, this is a well earned reputation and it's largely true.

Jobs are certainly not plentiful,  which is a rather general remark to make,  I'd say good jobs with prospects are very scarce, low level jobs with limited  prospects are common, it is also very common for people at good level of experience and competency to take a minor role reporting to someone who's a fraction of their experience in the hope that they'll be rewarded and or promoted - this does not always work : see above

Ex Croweaters, who abound on the Eastern states, call SA 30:30.  30 mins and 30 years behind the rest of Australia.  

[Jessica Berry]

I could type for hours on this topic! Without knowing your specific circumstances and skill set, the answer is it depends what you do, what you are willing to do, your (and whoever you are coming with) expectations, your commitment to building a new life in Adelaide/Australia, your approach and attitude to starting over and making it work etc, etc, etc.

[lynney45]

I work as a software tester in the IT industry, i have 9 years experience with several major companies in the UK, and hold a masters in computing and information systems, and professional certifications.  I am committed to building a new life in Australia, so much so that i appreciate that i will most likely need to make sacrifices and take a step back in my career for 2 years until i meet my state sponsorship criteria in Adelaide to apply for PR then i can hopefully get my career back on track in Sydney, Melbourne or Brisbane if PR is approved.  I will be emigrating alone.  My biggest concern is that when i filter for roles in my profession on seek.com.au i see literally around 5 new jobs per month in my profession.  This is very daunting considering Adelaide has a population of 1.2 million.  Due to this i am anticipating to find it difficult to find a job in my profession, so therefore i am willing to take any job as long as it pays the bills in order for me to get through these two years.  Even then however, i am trying to understand how difficult it is to just get any job that merely pays the bills given the negative sentiment i have seen on the forums around employment prospects in Adelaide/South Australia.  I am just trying to gain an understanding so i can prepare for the worst, in case i need to have two years worth of savings prior to migration.

[JetBlast]

I work as a software tester in the IT industry, i have 9 years experience with several major companies in the UK, and hold a masters in computing and information systems, and professional certifications.  I am committed to building a new life in Australia, so much so that i appreciate that i will most likely need to make sacrifices and take a step back in my career for 2 years until i meet my state sponsorship criteria in Adelaide to apply for PR then i can hopefully get my career back on track in Sydney, Melbourne or Brisbane if PR is approved.  I will be emigrating alone.  My biggest concern is that when i filter for roles in my profession on seek.com.au i see literally around 5 new jobs per month in my profession.  This is very daunting considering Adelaide has a population of 1.2 million.  Due to this i am anticipating to find it difficult to find a job in my profession, so therefore i am willing to take any job as long as it pays the bills in order for me to get through these two years.  Even then however, i am trying to understand how difficult it is to just get any job that merely pays the bills given the negative sentiment i have seen on the forums around employment prospects in Adelaide/South Australia.  I am just trying to gain an understanding so i can prepare for the worst, in case i need to have two years worth of savings prior to migration.

I also work in IT. I am a qualified Network Engineer but work as an IT Manager in the day job with some engineering duties.

Looking at seek myself I seem to notice the generic IT jobs seem to be more popular. I guess you need to broaden a little.

I am also migrating to Adelaide alone (hopefully!).

[NicF]

We live in Adelaide.  My OH works in IT and has a tendency to change jobs on a fairly regular basis.  He is also 55.  So far he has not had any issues finding another job when he has had enough of the one he has got.

Edited September 18, 2018 by NicF

[lynney45]

10 minutes ago, JetBlast said:

I also work in IT. I am a qualified Network Engineer but work as an IT Manager in the day job with some engineering duties.

Looking at seek myself I seem to notice the generic IT jobs seem to be more popular. I guess you need to broaden a little.

I am also migrating to Adelaide alone (hopefully!).

Good luck with the move hope you find a role where your experience lies.  I tried broadening the search criteria and i see there are more generic roles, so i will be applying for those too as i don't expect to find a role in my specialism with such low volume of opportunities there.  I am also preparing myself to apply for roles outside of the IT industry altogether just to pay the bills if Adelaide is as difficult to find a job as the sentiment on the forums portrays.  

Is Seek the career site that has the highest volume of IT roles do you know?  I am wondering what the employment prospects are when registering with local recruitment agencies in Adelaide compared to applying directly on Seek?  We probably don't have many other options as it will take time to develop and establish a linkedIn network.

[JetBlast]

I worked in Brisbane on a temporary visa in 2011. I found a job as a deployment lead very quickly on Seek. At the time I had no management experience either. For me on that occasion it worked but I can't really tell you anymore really.

[lynney45]

3 minutes ago, NicF said:

We live in Adelaide.  My OH works in IT and has a tendency to change jobs on a fairly regular basis.  He is also 55.  So far he has not had any issues finding another job when he has had enough of the one he has got.

That's reassuring NicF, it intils me with some hope.  Are you aware of what his specialism/field of expertise is in IT if you don't mind sharing please?  Or is he a bit of an all rounder in different areas?

Thanks

[deryans]

I think 2 years savings is a wise decision, but an expensive drop for what could prove to be a most ineffective use of your funds ?

The step back you speak of is more than 2 years, that's best case scenario and a minimum, 2 years is simply the visa requirement and has nothing to do with career, if you are an accomplished IT professional, you may find that your "step back" is considerably larger than 2 years, then again it might be that you thrive, it's something of a lottery to be fair, but with higher stakes. At least you don't have family, please tell me you're not gambling on adelaide with your family ?

Edited September 21, 2018 by deryans

[NicF]

On 19/09/2018 at 06:42, lynney45 said:

That's reassuring NicF, it intils me with some hope.  Are you aware of what his specialism/field of expertise is in IT if you don't mind sharing please?  Or is he a bit of an all rounder in different areas?

Thanks

He's mostly got experience in development with his main skills in visual basic and SQL, but has done a variety of roles in the past, including DBA work.  More recently he has worked as a development team leader, as a BA and as a kind of technical BA.  He's currently working as a report writer in SQL.

There are IT jobs around, not as many as in Sydney or Melbourne, but there aren't as many people going for them (and if my OH's experience of recruiting is anything to go by the quality of a fair number of candidates isn't that great either).  There is a lot of work in the public sector, but as @deryans will tell you the public sector can be a sole destroying place here, especially if you are used to working in an area that is efficient with modern working practices.  If you are happy to just get your head down and do what you are asked to do and not worry about how badly things are being run it's not too bad.  My OH is in his second job in the public sector and he gets very frustrated by it all.  It doesn't help that where he is the IT project is being run by people with no IT experience.

[Ade_nough]

Hi,
I work in IT and have lived inAdelaide since 2007. My advice to anyone considering Adelaide is to reconsider. The job market is awful, I have many qualifications to my name and worked in senior roles with a large multinational but finding a new job is very hard and takes a long time unless you are looking for junior roles or are happy with low pay. Adelaide’s main industries for jobs are government, universities and aged care, all the big corporates are on the east coast when it comes to IT. If you are used to working in the private sector you will not like any of the above. The other problem with getting a job here is it is very parochial and you will need to network big time. It doesn’t matter what qualifications you have, you need to be in the club. After 12 years here we are now considering a move to Melbourne, don’t get me wrong Adelaide is a lovely city, it’s just very hard to build a career here. I met with a recruiter today for a monthly catch up and he said the IT job market was very quiet and one of his clients is actually moving to Darwin as it was the only way he could progress his career. Says it all.
Cheers and good luck!

[llessur]

On 20/09/2019 at 13:22, Ade_nough said:

Hi,
I work in IT and have lived inAdelaide since 2007. My advice to anyone considering Adelaide is to reconsider. The job market is awful, I have many qualifications to my name and worked in senior roles with a large multinational but finding a new job is very hard and takes a long time unless you are looking for junior roles or are happy with low pay. Adelaide’s main industries for jobs are government, universities and aged care, all the big corporates are on the east coast when it comes to IT. If you are used to working in the private sector you will not like any of the above. The other problem with getting a job here is it is very parochial and you will need to network big time. It doesn’t matter what qualifications you have, you need to be in the club. After 12 years here we are now considering a move to Melbourne, don’t get me wrong Adelaide is a lovely city, it’s just very hard to build a career here. I met with a recruiter today for a monthly catch up and he said the IT job market was very quiet and one of his clients is actually moving to Darwin as it was the only way he could progress his career. Says it all.
Cheers and good luck!

In all fairness your experience relates to IT so stating that 'anyone considering Adelaide should reconsider' is probably a bit strong. Perhaps if you're chasing an IT-related career with a big corporation and wouldn't be happy in an IT role in a school, university, health care provider, the public service or a smaller organisation then Adelaide perhaps wouldn't be your first choice. However, we have lived in Adelaide since 2012 and have had absolutely no problems in finding (non-IT) work. Both my partner and I work in Universities (non-academic roles) with short hours, great employee benefits, good pay and are eternally happy that we don't have to put up with the long commutes, overcrowding and ridiculous house prices of the eastern cities.

Adelaide tends to gets a lot of bad press on these forums and, whilst that's obviously not the case with you as you live here, a lot of the negativity seems to come from people who either lived in or visited Adelaide (or had a friend of a friend of a friend who did) 10 or more years ago, had a mediocre time and then have bashed it ever since. I've said it before on this forum that Adelaide has changed immeasurably in the last 7-8 years in terms of vibrancy and attitude - it is finally embracing the smaller boutique city that it actually is rather than trying to play catch up with the larger cities.

I would highly recommend Adelaide to anyone who wants an easy, relaxed lifestyle, free from many of the problems than blight the larger cities. We have great weather, lovely beaches, endless parklands, a vibrant city centre, next to no traffic, decent public transport, realistic house prices and two of the world's best wine regions right on our doorstep. It's a great place to bring up a family but now the city centre has sorted itself out I'd also be more than happy living my younger days here too.

Thanks to my wife being from Adelaide originally, we have a large group of friends, all aged 30-40 and from a wide variety of educational backgrounds - I don't know of anyone who has had significant trouble finding a job in their chosen field in Adelaide.

It's also a bit of a fallacy that no major organisations have a presence in Adelaide - many do, although not their head offices. Origin, Suncorp, Boeing, BHP, ANZ, Westpac, Bendigo Bank, Ernst & Young, JLL and Santos a just a few off the top of my head that have a sizable workforce in Adelaide.

If you're chasing a specific career or you want to further your career by moving through a large number of organisations in a relatively short period of time then you might decide to move elsewhere from a strategic perspective - but that's the same for any city in any country. If you wanted an IT career with a big corporation in the UK you'd move to London, or another major city. You'd be unlikely to move to Littlehampton - although the latter would offer an arguably much better lifestyle for many people.

People shouldn't write Adelaide off just because it isn't Sydney or Melbourne. The lifestyle advantages Adelaide offers exist precisely because it isn't Sydney or Melbourne.

Edited September 25, 2019 by llessur

[JRC]

20 hours ago, llessur said:

In all fairness your experience relates to IT so stating that 'anyone considering Adelaide should reconsider' is probably a bit strong. Perhaps if you're chasing an IT-related career with a big corporation and wouldn't be happy in an IT role in a school, university, health care provider, the public service or a smaller organisation then Adelaide perhaps wouldn't be your first choice. However, we have lived in Adelaide since 2012 and have had absolutely no problems in finding (non-IT) work. Both my partner and I work in Universities (non-academic roles) with short hours, great employee benefits, good pay and are eternally happy that we don't have to put up with the long commutes, overcrowding and ridiculous house prices of the eastern cities.

Adelaide tends to gets a lot of bad press on these forums and, whilst that's obviously not the case with you as you live here, a lot of the negativity seems to come from people who either lived in or visited Adelaide (or had a friend of a friend of a friend who did) 10 or more years ago, had a mediocre time and then have bashed it ever since. I've said it before on this forum that Adelaide has changed immeasurably in the last 7-8 years in terms of vibrancy and attitude - it is finally embracing the smaller boutique city that it actually is rather than trying to play catch up with the larger cities.

I would highly recommend Adelaide to anyone who wants an easy, relaxed lifestyle, free from many of the problems than blight the larger cities. We have great weather, lovely beaches, endless parklands, a vibrant city centre, next to no traffic, decent public transport, realistic house prices and two of the world's best wine regions right on our doorstep. It's a great place to bring up a family but now the city centre has sorted itself out I'd also be more than happy living my younger days here too.

Thanks to my wife being from Adelaide originally, we have a large group of friends, all aged 30-40 and from a wide variety of educational backgrounds - I don't know of anyone who has had significant trouble finding a job in their chosen field in Adelaide.

It's also a bit of a fallacy that no major organisations have a presence in Adelaide - many do, although not their head offices. Origin, Suncorp, Boeing, BHP, ANZ, Westpac, Bendigo Bank, Ernst & Young, JLL and Santos a just a few off the top of my head that have a sizable workforce in Adelaide.

If you're chasing a specific career or you want to further your career by moving through a large number of organisations in a relatively short period of time then you might decide to move elsewhere from a strategic perspective - but that's the same for any city in any country. If you wanted an IT career with a big corporation in the UK you'd move to London, or another major city. You'd be unlikely to move to Littlehampton - although the latter would offer an arguably much better lifestyle for many people.

People shouldn't write Adelaide off just because it isn't Sydney or Melbourne. The lifestyle advantages Adelaide offers exist precisely because it isn't Sydney or Melbourne.

Always good to hear your positive views on Adelaide. I couldn’t imagine living or working in a big bustling city which is why we have chosen South Australia. 

[llessur]

5 hours ago, JRC said:

Always good to hear your positive views on Adelaide. I couldn’t imagine living or working in a big bustling city which is why we have chosen South Australia. 

Happy to provide them. I think there's a similar situation here as with product reviews on the internet - people who've bought something and had no problems with it are unlikely to jump online and tell everyone how great it is. The few people who have problems though are the ones most likely to shout about it publicly.

Best of luck with your move!

[llessur]

Some positive news on the SA employment situation:

Quote

SA jobless rate drops from 7.3 to 6.3 per cent, shaking off title of having the nation’s highest unemployment rate

SA no longer has the highest unemployment in the nation, with our volatile jobless rate dropping a full percentage point.

South Australia has shaken off the embarrassing title of having the nation’s highest unemployment, amid a massive drop in the jobless rate from 7.3 to 6.3 per cent.

Latest Australian Bureau of Statistics figures, released on Thursday morning, show SA’s rate is still 1.1 per cent higher than the Australia-wide seasonally-adjusted unemployment figure.

The more stable trend figure puts SA’s unemployment rate at 6.5 per cent.

The latest seasonally-adjusted figures, which have become increasingly volatile in recent years, are for September. SA had Australia’s highest unemployment the two months prior.

Queensland has overtaken SA on both measures to have the country’s highest unemployment.

It comes amid a recent trend of both an increase in SA jobs and people seeking work, which combined to push the overall unemployment up over the past year.

The total number of people now employed in SA is 855,400, a new record high.

That marks a rise of 400 new jobs in the past month, and nearly 15,000 since the state election in March last year where the Liberal Party claimed power after 16 years of Labor rule.

When Premier Steven Marshall came to power, the SA unemployment rate was 5.8 per cent.

The jobless rate reached 7.8 per cent under the former Labor government in July 2015.

Earlier this week, a report from Deloitte Access Economics found SA was in the middle of a “people power” boom as both the number of people in work and looking for it surged.

“There’s been much focus on a recent lift in SA’s unemployment rate,” the report stated.

“But it’s better seen as the gap between two good-news trends — a rising number of jobs, and a rising willingness to work.
“Overall job growth remains pretty solid, but it has been overtaken by more willingness among those aged 55 and over to stay in work.

“Although that combination has seen unemployment lift, it’s better understood as the fastest increase in the state’s workforce since the mid-1980s. In a state that’s long been in search of a surge in people power, one has been occurring under its nose.”

The report warned that failing to generate enough jobs creates a “rising risk that youth will leave”.

ABS figures show a recent slowdown in the number of South Australians fleeing across the border. The number spiked in 2016 to 7212, but declined to 5151 last year.

From: https://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/sa-jobless-rate-drops-from-73-to-63-per-cent-shaking-off-title-of-having-the-nations-highest-unemployment-rate/news-story/b84976153dabb48c07c7ed135bf119eb