Working in the fast-paced world of wireless telecommunications is like playing a game of musical chairs-everything moves along smoothly until the music stops. In the silence, many are making a mad dash to get their seat in the circle only to find it has been acquired by a bigger kid or is too crowded.
“There has been a lot of merger and acquisition activity and that results in consolidation and the misplacement of a lot of people,” said Bob White, president of executive search firm Pennington Consulting Group, Pennington, N.J.
In an industry where the “only thing that’s constant is change,” job security and loyalty are certainly rare, if not extinct. In the past five months, at least six major telecom companies have slashed their work force, including Alcatel Inc., Nortel Networks, L.M. Ericsson and NEC Corp. A sluggish global economy and the company’s restructuring to focus on different technologies forced Alcatel to announce in March plans to cut 12,000 jobs during the next two years. NEC suffered major losses in its Packard Bell division and announced in February plans to eliminate more than 15,000 jobs during the next three years.
“I saw the beginning of the slowdown in the later stages of the fourth quarter and now the second quarter is starting to reflect the decreased amount of business,” said White. “We’ve lost a client a month as a result of a merger or acquisition. If they’re not being acquired, they’re acquiring.”
Telecom mergers may take months or even years to complete. Given the tumultuous nature of the industry, a merger/acquisition announcement doesn’t necessarily mean jobs will be lost, but it does temporarily suspend people’s ability to look at other opportunities, said John Farish, managing director at executive search firm Russell Reynolds Associates, Atlanta.
A year ago, turnover in the industry was quite high, but lack of growth in formerly hot areas such as paging, as well as rampant consolidation, mean there are “not that many companies left to jump to. Back in 1995, the buildout period was fast and furious,” said White.
Not so anymore. White said about the only sectors in the industry where there still remain a noticeable shortage of qualified people lie in the technical or engineering areas.
“The need for cellular and PCS engineers is still constant. There are still systems to build out, especially outside the United States. Wireless is like a genie that got out of the lamp. Internationally there is so much need for it,” he said.
Demand is especially high for software engineers.
“Today, clearly, there is a much stronger need for software people. They make up the majority of the available positions we have,” said White.
Some companies also are hiring in other areas, like customer service.
The saving grace for many telecom employees is the constant emergence of new technology. Internet-based and Internet-related equipment and services, as well as third-generation technologies, are keeping many afloat.
“A lot of laid-off workers have been picked up by PCS people. PCS has staffed itself with ex-cellular and ex-paging people,” said White.
New technology also breeds new companies.
“Even with the consolidation you have a lot of start-ups,” said Farish.
People with years of experience in, and knowledge about, wireless telecommunications are leaving the corporate world to establish smaller, more-focused organizations, he said.
Where the jobs are
Using the Internet to find a job in wireless telecom continues to gain momentum. Several Web sites are dedicated exclusively to job seekers with information technology and telecommunication backgrounds.
One such site is “www.monster.com.” It combines the resources of telezoo.com-a sales, marketing and information and distribution channel for telecommunications vendors; webtrends.net-the industry’s first comprehensive portal site for Internet professionals; and winntmag.com-the online Windows NT Magazine. The site offers more than 180,000 job opportunities from thousands of companies and contains a database of more than 1.1 million resumes.
“There is no doubt about the fact that they (job Web sites) are very effective. It makes it easier for the candidate because they can do it confidentially. Even a year ago, I never would have thought that we could have gotten the attention out of a Web site that we have,” said White.
Internet job searching is especially effective for those seeking technical and customer service positions, but Farish has not seen a big need for it amongst top-level executives.
“Right now it hasn’t significantly impacted senior level recruiting unless you’re specifically interested in looking for other opportunities … it is a very time-consuming process,” said Farish. Instead, executives still look toward traditional recruiting agencies to help them find new jobs.
Thinking ahead
Mergers, acquisitions and restructuring aside, the future telecommunications job market looks promising. Colleges and universities, such as the University of California at San Diego, now offer courses and certification in technology specific to the industry.
In conjunction with Qualcomm Inc., UCSD Extension has increased the number of classes normally available in its popular Code Division Multiple Access Engineering certificate program.
The program was introduced less than a year ago using curriculum developed by San Diego-based Qualcomm. The school offers three courses, and according to UCSD Extension’s academic director of science and engineering, Dr. Derry Connolly, the public response has been phenomenal.
“With the emergence of CDMA as the likely standard of third-generation wireless telephony, the demand for engineers skilled in the field will certainly increase, especially here in San Diego,” said Connolly.
White said Arch Communications Group Inc. collaborated with the State University of New York in Canton to develop courses as well.
The industry also should be seeing more women in top executive positions. Vici Wayne, managing director of the executive recruiting agency Christian & Timbers in San Francisco, said its firm has seen a 60-percent increase in the number of women moving into high-tech executive positions in the first three months of this year compared with the same time the previous year.
One of the reasons, she said, is because “founders of new tech companies tend to be young, particularly in Web-based businesses, where the best opportunities for women are surfacing. Many of these young leaders grew up with working moms who successfully balanced career and family.”
Overall it seems the employment opportunities in the wireless industry will continue to shift with changing technology and customer demands.
“I think wireless has a very good future. How it accomplishes things remains to been seen. You have all these technologies that I can’t imagine are all going to survive, but depending on which ones do, those areas will continue to be very strong,” said White.
