Small Businesses Make Big Dent In Unemployment Smaller Firms Look For Employees Who Are Able To Wear Many Hats

Everyone knows that large companies are getting rid of workers - at an alarming rate - but that’s not the whole story. As job openings disappear at the nation’s largest businesses, small businesses are doing more hiring, providing the energy and creativity to keep the economy going.

And that’s why it’s important to think small if you’re job hunting.

There are many definitions of a small business, but I’m limiting it to those enterprises with fewer than 100 employees.

Between 1980 and 1992, there was a 28.1 increase in jobs in small businesses - to 11.4 million. Businesses with more than 100 employees created 6.6 million new jobs in the same period - a 19.3 percent increase.

Stephen Laue, partner in MDR Demographic Applications in Batavia, who tracked down these figures, bases his data on U.S. Census Bureau information.

Though the number of jobs created by small firms may be leveling off - Laue suggests that the growth of self-employed people has reduced the number of employees - he expects the trend to continue.

Now that you know small businesses are hiring, how do you get a job with one of them?

“One of the key differences between large and small businesses is that small companies don’t have a lot of backup, so you have to show that you can perform,” said Ora E. Smith, president and chief executive of Illinois Superconductor Corp., a high-tech company in Mt. Prospect. Started in 1989, it has 60 employees.

“If you make a mistake, it’s obvious who’s responsible,” Smith said. “You can’t hide it. But the other side is that success also is quickly apparent.”

Smith has undergraduate and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a law degree from Harvard Law School. He’s the former corporate director of external technology development for Rockwell International Corp., a $13 billion company based in Seal Beach, Calif., that employs about 72,000.

Smith, who went from big to small business is “excited” about the move.

“We’re doing something no one has ever done before, which is to build useful commercial products using high-temperature superconductor technology,” Smith said. “That means we need self-starters and team players, people who can stuff their egos under the couch and get the job done.”

People likely to get hired in small companies, he said, are those who are “pretty good at two or three things rather than absolutely stellar at one.

Getting a job with a small company isn’t as structured as applying for one at a big firm, warns Deborah T. Owens, president of Career Development Institute, a Washington, D.C., human resource consulting and training firm.

“Small business owners are good at what they do, but they often don’t have a human resources department - the person who does it may have two or three other titles,” said Owens, who does consulting for organizations that are downsizing. She formerly worked in sales and corporate recruiting for a large, international manufacturer.

Owens, who has a degree in economics from Howard University, said it’s often harder to set up an interview. “You have to be more persistent, because the person interviewing you is doing a million other things.”