Execs pessimistic about economic growth: survey

Executives around the world have grown more pessimistic about their nations' economies over the past three months and expect the conditions to get worse over the rest of the year, says a survey.

According to McKinsey & Company's June Economic Conditions Snapshot, executives' expectations for their national economies have declined since March and some respondents expect worsening conditions over the rest of 2011.

Globally, executives are less positive about economic conditions in their countries than they were three months ago and the drops are most noticeable among executives in North America, and in developed countries of Asia, the report said.

The report said that the earthquake and Tsunami that hit Japan in March was to an extent responsible for the decline in optimism.

However, pessimism about economic conditions has not spread to executives' expectations for their companies.

"On the whole, expectations for hiring, profit, and customer demand remain positive and stable compared with three and six months ago," the report said.

The report further noted that even as hiring expectations were "tepid" globally, nearly half of respondents in China, India, and other developing markets�say their companies have had job openings they couldn't fill for six months or more.

The factors responsible for this include lack of qualified applicants, insufficient experience or too few applicants, high wage expectations and insufficient educational qualifications.

Sixty-nine% of all respondents say there are some positions like managers and technical employees for which it is particularly difficult to find qualified applicants.


While, executives in developed economies most often cite insufficient experience or too few applicants, those in emerging economies cite high wage expectations and insufficient educational qualifications more often than their counterparts elsewhere, the survey said.

Interestingly, despite ongoing upheaval in North Africa and West Asia, executives are less concerned about geopolitical instability as a barrier to growth than they were three months ago, the report said.