Power Breakfast: Ryla to add 1,400 jobs in Kennesaw, non-compete deals, OSHA, Mountain Dew, Buffett

There’s good news on the jobs front.

Ryla, one of Georgia’s biggest call-center operations, announced Monday the hiring of 1,400 seasonal and full-time employees in Kennesaw, AJC staffer Dan Chapman reports. Average salary: $10 an hour.

About 1,000 of the jobs will last only three months. Supervisors will be hired for 100 or so positions, said company spokeswoman Karen Clay.

With an unemployment rate of 10 percent in Georgia, call-center jobs – once regarded as low-pay, high-pressure telemarketers – have grown in volume, popularity and sophistication since the recession started nearly three years ago, Chapman writes.

The 1,400 hires won’t make cold calls, the company says.

Most of the new employees will help a repeat client (Clay wouldn’t divulge the company) enroll its employees in a health-care plan, Chapman reports. The remaining 400 hires will do federal government work for a third-party contractor.

Also in the AJC:

• Ballot amendment targets non-compete agreements
• Barnes and Deal to make final push
• Synovus in red for ninth straight quarter
• OSHA cites metal firm in worker’s death
• Five developers to meet with DOT about transit hub
• Mountain Dew becomes No. 3 soft drink in U.S., passing Diet Coke

In other media:

• Buffett taps leading candidate for next investment chief at Berkshire
• Divide on federal deficit likely to grow after election
• Hugo Chavez orders expropriation of Owens-Illinois
• Nissan introduces luxury hybrid that doubles mileage

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