Robert Half International Professional Employment Report announced the top states to boost job hiring in the first quarter of 2011. The report named Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Arkansas to be the prime states for employment nationwide.

Robert Half International conducted a telephone-based survey and interviewed more than 4,000 executives at major US companies. The report found out that 17% of executives in those states plan to increase the professional-level staff at the beginning of 2011 and only 4% expect to decrease their work force.

The survey also revealed that in general, 10% of executives surveyed will increase the professional occupation jobs, while 5% see it will decline. The hiring will be mostly concentrated in the legal field, with 31% of respondents belonging to that sector saying they plan to increase their work force in the first quarter of 2011. Some 88% of those surveyed reported at least some confidence in growth prospects for their companies, a 2% increase from 86% in the fourth-quarter survey. However, more than half of the total respondents still noted that their companies were having problems finding skilled professionals for their major positions.

Robert Half International is the world’s first and largest specialized staffing firm based in Menlo Park, California. The RHI Professional Employment Report is a study that focuses solely on professional-level hiring of US companies.