IT skills gap set to soar; how to handle June 2014’s Labour Market Statistics

With UK output finally back above its pre-crisis levels, the market place is decidedly more confident. This will hopefully set the tone for a productive few months for UK jobseekers and recruiters.

For the meantime however, we must continue to endure the current ‘vacancy vacuum’, which represents a mammoth hurdle. The plummet of permanent candidate availability has been a prominent theme over the last quarter, prompting our latest blog series addressing sustainable solutions to attract and retain talent without increasing salaries.

In a more recent development, the latest ‘Recruitment Trends’ from APSCo unveil spectacular growth rates for both permanent and contract jobs across a range of sectors and, for the first time in over a year, the start of a steady and long awaited rebound in the IT sector.

Similarly, the latest KPMG/Market Technology Survey revealed that it sustained a quarter of robust growth from April to June 2014, with the expansion of business activity rising at its fastest pace since the onset of the financial crisis in 2007. Tudor Aw, Head of Technology at KPMG, stated that ‘the UK technology sector is firing on all cylinders with sustained growth outstripping the wider economy’.

In their latest report, Spring Technologies depicted a significant increase in senior IT vacancies over the last quarter, a sure sign that businesses are beginning to invest heavily in IT projects again. The second quarter saw the permanent market grow by 8% more vacancies than prior year, and the contract market saw a 30% increase in vacancies than prior year.

However, these statistics are a tell-tale sign of a potential skills gap pitfall. Research reveals that technology companies are not only expecting an upturn in year-ahead expectations for business activity, but they are also planning to ‘loosen the purse strings’ with more than 4 in 10 (43%) also declaring an intention to hire more staff. Our telling contract/permanent market statistics show the industry attempting to ‘plug gaps’ with contract placements whilst continuing its search for appropriate permanent candidates.

Over 30% of employers are not expecting to get the ‘suitably qualified’ applicants they need for their technical or IT projects (IET survey, April 2014), and so the ‘IT skills gap is set to soar’. As the demand for IT continues to increase, it is imperative that employers develop an innovative attraction and retention strategy to source the best candidates.

Sustainable Solutions Series Edition #1: Talent Pipelining

How do you prepare for candidate winter?

In response to the recent Labour Market Statistics, this series will offer examples of the ways recruiters and employers can thrive during periods of low candidate availability. Here we will explore the long-term value of talent pipelining.

Talent pipelining is the gathering of candidates to grow one’s talent pool in abundant times in order to prepare for future scarcity. By sourcing talent leads and maintaining relationships with them, they can be quickly and efficiently aligned with the right role when it arises. Rather than waiting for a vacancy to appear, recruiters can proactively search for appropriate talent to draw from when roles present themselves.

The benefits of talent pipelining include:

• Quick responses to vacancies and reduced time-to-fill. Wait until you have a role to fill, and you’re already too late
• When an appropriate role arrives, you the recruiter are already top-of-mind for the candidate, reducing the risk of a salary battle against the competition
• Reduced stress during lean times
• Extra time to build a rapport with candidates, which earns you the right to escalate your consultant/candidate relationship to the next level when necessary
• Over time, the candidate gets a chance to see what options are available to them, meaning their expectations are more realistic
• As candidates become more scarce, the speed with which the interview process is carried out becomes very important; the sooner a shortlist can be given to a client the sooner the best candidates can be offered a role
• Regular candidate conversations in the pipeline provide consultants and clients with valuable market knowledge

Thanks to the current ‘vacancy vacuum’, recruiters are having to draw from a fast-dwindling talent pool in order to stay afloat. Of course, this cannot continue. By, for instance, keeping a running dialogue with previously interested candidates, sharing leads with colleagues and intelligently organising your candidates into applicable prospective roles, hiring managers and their teams can make it very easy to identify candidates and respond with swift professionalism.

Many recruiters currently use very ad-hoc, manual means of pipelining, keeping physical folders, endless Excel spreadsheets or keeping separate files on their hard drive. This pedestrian approach has obvious limitations, as it cannot effectively keep talent leads and candidate information fresh.

As a hiring manager, you need to be on-board with the value of this process. Take a little time to measure how long it takes to identify, analyse and engage a new candidate and to establish and maintain a relationship with them. The benefits of saving yourself and your recruitment team that time will become blindingly apparent. Nurture your talent pipeline, and save your time and your tempers.

In the next edition of Sustainable Solutions, we explore the lasting value of candidate experience, demonstrating how to nurture the journey candidates go on from looking for work to settling in at their new job.

The Myth of Talent Management: do organisations really know how to manage talent?

Wednesday 24th September 2014

London 

The term ‘Talent Management’ has been used extensively around the board room since McKinsey coined the expression ‘the war for talent’ in the 90’s. However, there continues to be considerable debate within organisations about what constitutes talent, how it should be managed and its importance in driving development and change. It is now widely recognised that having the wrong people or too few people within an organisation, is costly and exposes them to increased risk.

To discuss the issues surrounding talent management and dispel or prove the myth, Chris Bleakley, Head of Resourcing & Talent at Aldermore Bank will be leading our round table dinner. Chris has specialised in the development and implementation of total resourcing solutions, and over the years made talent attraction and selection strategies a key focus.

Considering talent management from a commercial, academic and emotional perspective the debate will focus on the following areas:

• How often does the resignation of a key employee highlight weakness in an organisations succession planning? 
• Do we properly differentiate between ‘the skill’ and ‘the will’? 
• Is the concept of talent development within a single organisation an anathema to a 21st Century workforce? 
• Is talent management about the external market as much of the internal?  

If you would be interested in attending this event please contact caroline.beer@thehrworld.co.uk

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