Occupations With Declining Employment

The recent buyouts at General Motors, Delphi Corporation or Ford caught some people off guard. (Read about Surviving a Layoff in the Auto Industry)

Of course they say hindsight is 20/20 so many people are now looking backwards and realizing that the writing has been on the wall for a long time.

What lessons can we all learn from this latest round of buyouts in the automotive industry?

1. We must be constantly scanning the internal and external company environment to see what is happening in our industry.
2. Look not only at your company, but at other companies in your industry.
3. Pay attention to what is happening with your company's vendors and customers as well.
4. Read national and regional reports on growing or declining occupations.

One such sign of future trends is the Bureau of Labor Statistics' list of the top 50 Occupations with Declining Employment. These are the occupations that are projected to have the largest decline in employment in the US during the 2006-2016 time period.

Many times we don't pay attention to this kind of informaton because we want to stay positive and sometimes fear the alternatives we might be forced to explore. It is important that we all take responsibility for our own careers and own career choices and start looking at some options.

If you are in one of these declining occupations it is a good time to:

- dust off your resume and brush up on interview preparation
- consider changing careers
- pick up new responsibilities at work
- learn new skills in a different area at work
- go back to school and sign up for a vocational program
- become a go-to expert in your field or your company
- relocate to another state where your skills may be more in demand

The Top 10 declining occupations from the list are listed below. You may not recognize most of these jobs, but you sure will recognize some of those in the Top 50 list. ACINET will not only tell you what these jobs are, but will give you specific details for job projections in your specific state.

1 Photographic processing machine operators
2 File clerks
3 Wood model makers
4 Wood Patternmakers
5 Telephone operators
6 Photographic process workers
7 Shoe machine operators and tenders
8 Textile knitting and weaving machine setters, operators, and tenders
9 Coil winders, tapers, and finishers
10 Forging machine setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic