The Norwich-New London region saw a gain of 1,100 jobs in October — the second straight month of quadruple-digit employment gains in an area that has not experienced such positive job growth over back-to-back months since the Great Recession started taking a toll on the local economy six years ago.

John Beauregard, executive director of the Eastern Connecticut Workforce Investment Board that operates four Department of Labor jobs centers in the region, said he would feel more comfortable in predicting a rosy employment picture for Norwich-New London if gains continue for another few months — at even a minimal level.

But he added that indicators showing workers in the region increasingly being hired for jobs outside of southeastern Connecticut are a possible harbinger of better times ahead. His views were seconded last month in a report by a leading statewide economist.

“I think the fundamentals are there for this to be sustained,” Beauregard said in a phone interview Thursday.

The state as a whole also appears to be gaining momentum of the jobs front as well, according to the state Department of Labor jobs report released Thursday. Connecticut saw a gain of 3,600 positions in October, and now has gained back nearly 74 percent of the jobs lost statewide during the recession.

The unemployment rate of 6.4 percent for October was unchanged from September’s rate but is still at a nearly six-year low.

“These numbers are another sign of progress,” Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said in a statement. “With more than 70,000 private sector jobs created since January of 2011, we are experiencing one of the best periods of growth in decades.”

But Don Klepper-Smith, a leading statewide economist and director of research for New Haven-based DataCore Partners, pointed out that this year’s jobs increase percentage is well below Connecticut’s long-term growth rate of 1.2 percent. And the state’s jobs recovery is also well behind national figures showing a full recovery of lost employment plus another 15 percent gain.

“The good news is that we’re in positive territory, but not by much,” Klepper-Smith said in a note to clients Thursday. “We can say that Connecticut’s job performance thus far in 2014 has been ‘underwhelming.’”

Klepper-Smith added that at the current rate Connecticut won’t see a full jobs recovery for another two-plus years, whereas the country as a whole reached the same plateau last spring.

Despite the past two months of positive jobs trends in southeastern Connecticut, the region in October had only 100 more positions than during the same month last year. But Beauregard, the local labor-market expert, said anecdotal information indicates that local manufacturers are leading the way toward a recovery, thanks in part to federal grants delivered by the workforce board to incentivize hiring here.

The region was hurt when large labor cuts at Pfizer and the local casinos led to a negative multiplier effect, dragging even more jobs down as people were laid off. Now, he said, the opposite may be true, with positive multipliers picking up steam and leading to gains elsewhere in the economy as a few jobs are added here and there — even if local people initially have to seek work outside the region.

“The sword cuts both ways,” Beauregard said. “We’re seeing there’s a multiplier effect when jobs are added back, too.”

l.howard@theday.com

Twitter: @KingstonLeeHow