Don't worry, your favorite West Orange County news site hasn't transformed into a job search board. But, we have come across some information which might be useful. There is an online job search site which besides linking up employers with employees, also produces an interesting report on job data. Not that there is a lack of such data, but this approach is a bit different and the findings are encouraging.

The company, CareerCast.com, out of Carlsbad, Calif. and Richardson , Texas, has been conducting online surveys of managerial job postings since the beginning of 2007. They have compiled the number of job postings by region, job category, and major city every month ever since. They take all the job posting data at the beginning of each month and compile it into an index which then can be used for comparative purposes.

The job index, dubbed the JobSerf Employment Index, was assembled into a monthly base index for each month in 2007 which is set at 100. Thus, if the current number is higher than 100, it means there are more job postings then in the same month in 2007. Conversely, if the current number is less than 100, it means there are less job postings. This approach, of course, does not consider how many applicants might be chasing those jobs. So it certainly does not mean that a number greater than 100 necessarily equates to easy street for job seekers.

It should however, create a useful matrix for comparative purposes. For example, in the July 2009 report, the West region had the largest increase of any region. The index went from 55.9 in May to 75.0, a gain of 19.1 points. This does not mean the job market in the West is in great shape, but it does suggest that the employment situation is better than it was a month ago. Although the West still lags behind the Northeast at 87.5 (18.9
point gain), the Southwest at 88.1 (18.7 point gain), and Southeast at 80.3 (15.9 point gain), these regions are in better shape then the Midwest at 72.4 (11.5 point gain) which is still losing ground in comparison.

"While all regions saw a rise in hiring, cities with the lowest hiring levels are concentrated in the Midwest, Southwest and Florida," says Jay Martin, JobSerf's chairman. "Although the Index is still 22 points lower than it was a year ago, the gap is slowly closing. We are encouraged at both the direction and magnitude of July's gain. It shows the positive recovery, which started in the late spring, is still continuing."

The index also presents information on 20 major cities across the nation and the Los Angeles area does not look very good. The best city for white collar jobs is the nation's capital. Riverside is at the bottom of the list and LA is ranked 8 from the bottom. Riverside and Los Angeles were the only Southern California cities in the bottom 8. The only California city in the top 8 was San Francisco.

What do they mean by white collar jobs? According to the company, "Within a typical company in the US, there are four major career levels each with a base title in the corporate hierarchy. The four levels are: C-Level, Vice President, Director and Manager. The most senior, called the C-Level, is also referred to as CXO or the C-Suite. This includes titles such as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and Chief Information Officer (CIO). In the last decade there have been many additions, including more obscure titles such as Chief Safety Officer and Chief Procurement Officer. Many of these positions are Executive or Senior Vice President titles which have taken on the additional connotation of ‘Chief' to signify that they are the person at the highest level in the company in their respective function. However for the Index, CEO, CFO, COO, CIO and CTO are the ones we include in our counts."

The company reported "the number of online job openings in July for C-level, VP, Director and Managerial candidates improved for the third month in a row with the largest monthly gain since January 2008. Job listings in July were up 17.8 points, following a rise of 3.8 points in June and 15.2 points in May. The number of executive and management-level job openings posted online had an index value of 78.2 in July, 60.4 in June 2009, 56.6 in May 2009, and 41.4 in April 2009. Although unemployment may continue to rise in the short-term, white-collar candidates are seeing more opportunities than since the beginning of the downturn last fall."