The CIPD’s annual
Resourcing and Talent Planning survey confirms that despite relatively high unemployment levels, the war for talent has risen threefold from 20% in 2009 to 62% in 2013, as employers are struggling to find enough skilled and experienced people to fill posts.
The CIPD’s annual Resourcing and Talent Planning survey examines organisations’ resourcing and talent planning strategies and practices and the key challenges and issues they face. The 2013 survey report is based on 462 respondent organisations from the UK.
“For 17 years our annual Resourcing and Talent Planning survey has provided HR professionals and their organisations with benchmarking data on recruitment costs, resourcing and talent management practice, employee turnover rates and recruitment practices,” says Ksenia Zheltoukhova, a Research Associate with the CIPD. “Year on year we observe a fiercer war for talent, seeing the number of organisations reporting competition for well-qualified employees triple since 2009. Professional and technical skills were the hardest ones to find this year, with further difficulties in filling senior management roles.”
As a result, she adds, “Employers seek to diversify their resourcing strategies, with an increase in spend on social and professional networking sites, commercial job boards and apprenticeships. Creative approach to recruitment is already evident in the positive trends in employing younger workers. With nearly three-quarters of organisations having made efforts to improve their employer brand over the last year to attract and retain sought-after talent.”
The Findings
The survey highlights a number of findings.
The number and nature of vacancies
- The median number of permanent vacancies in small to medium-sized organisations has changed very little over the last few years.
- The median number of permanent vacancies in large, private sector organisations has increased notably in comparison with the previous two to three years, although it remains below pre-recession figures.
- The median number of permanent vacancies in large, public sector organisations has also increased over the last two years, despite falls in total public sector employment in this period.
- The median number of short-term vacancies in the public sector was twice as high as in the private sector for all organisation size categories. The ratio of short-term vacancies to permanent vacancies was also much higher in the public sector.
The proportion reporting greater competition for well-qualified talent has increased from 20% in 2009 to 62%.
Attracting and selecting candidates
- More than two-thirds of organisations conduct recruitment activity in-house, while just over a quarter combine in-house and outsourcing approaches.
- As in previous years, the most effective methods for attracting candidates were through corporate websites and recruitment agencies.
- There has been a marked increase this year in the proportion of organisations citing professional networking (such as LinkedIn) among their most effective methods for attracting candidates. Commercial job boards and apprenticeships are also more commonly among organisations’ most effective methods compared with previous years.
- Organisations were more likely to have increased recruitment spend on social and professional networking sites, commercial job boards and apprenticeships and more likely to have decreased spend on national newspaper advertisements and specialist journals/trade press.
- Nearly three-quarters of organisations had made efforts to improve their employer brand over the last year. The most popular way of doing this was running an employee survey.
- Interviews remain the most common selection method, with competency-based interviews being the most popular across all sectors. All organisations continue to conduct interviews face-to-face but increasing numbers also use telephone interviews (56%) and nearly a third also use video or Skype interviews.
- The vast majority of organisations report that most candidates provide accurate CVs, behave with sincerity, and arrive promptly for interviews. They were less positive about the way candidates communicated with the potential employers and candidates’ salary expectations.
The use of social media
- Over half of organisations make use of social media in resourcing, although just 19% have a dedicated social media strategy. Nearly three-fifths of those who don’t use social media in resourcing believe it would benefit them to do so.
- Just over two-fifths of those who use social media report that someone in their resourcing team has been trained in its use while a quarter have a role dedicated to social media.
- Social media is most commonly used for attracting candidates (86%) and brand building (74%). Only a minority (6%) use social media for screening candidates (previewing online profiles).
- More than four-fifths report that using social media has increased the strength of their employer brand and increased their potential selection pool. Nearly three-quarters report that using social media has reduced their resourcing costs.
Recruitment difficulties
- While three-fifths of organisations that had vacancies experienced recruitment difficulties in the last year, this was an improvement (across all sectors) compared with the previous year.
- Managers and professionals/specialists and technical positions were the most difficult vacancies to fill, followed by senior managers/directors.
- As in previous years, the main reason for recruitment difficulties was a lack of necessary specialist or technical skills. Looking for more pay than could be offered was another common problem across sectors, while lack of relevant sector/industry experience was a particular issue for manufacturing and production organisations.
- Despite high unemployment, one in six reported that an absence of applicants caused, or contributed to, their recruitment difficulties.
- In little change from last year, one-third of organisations across all sectors report that they have lost potential recruits due to the length of their recruitment process. However, nearly three-fifths of organisations with more than 5,000 employees faced this concern.
Employing younger workers
- A third of organisations have adapted their recruitment processes to become more accessible to younger candidates, most commonly through schemes to train and develop young people, linking with education institutions and/or greater use of online recruitment and social media.
- Overall a quarter of organisations operate a structured graduate recruitment programme, although this was considerably more common in larger organisations.
- Nearly half of organisations offer apprenticeships (a small increase on last year) and a further 14% plan to introduce them in the next 12 months. At least 31% offer intern schemes and 18% sponsor students through university.
- Just 13% of respondents believe that schools/colleges/universities equip young people with the skills their organisation needs to a great or very great extent. Over a quarter believe that schools/colleges/universities are poor at equipping young people with the skills they need. Manufacturing and production organisations are most likely to report that the education system does not fulfil their skills needs.
Resourcing and talent management in turbulent times
- Half of the public sector and over a third of other organisations surveyed report that the economic climate has had a negative impact on their organisations’ resourcing budgets for 2013–14. Only a minority report their budgets have increased. However, a smaller proportion of organisations overall report a decrease in their resourcing budgets compared with previous years.
- Talent management budgets have not been as adversely affected as resourcing budgets. While a fifth of those with talent management spend report it had decreased over the past 12 months, a similar proportion reported it had increased. Again the public sector was most likely to report decreases.
- Two-thirds report they have noticed an increase in the number of unsuitable applicants, a small reduction on the last few years. The proportion reporting greater competition for well-qualified talent has increased from 20% in 2009 to 62%.
Diversity
- In little change from previous years, nearly three-fifths of organisations have a diversity strategy, rising to four-fifths of public sector organisations.
- The most common methods used to address diversity issues were monitoring recruitment and/or staffing information to obtain data on gender, ethnicity, disability, age and so on, and training interviewers to understand what diversity is about and the impact of stereotypes.
- The public sector still leads the way with diversity practices, although the not-for-profit sector is not far behind. The private sector is less likely to have a formal diversity policy; moreover, those private sector organisations that had one used fewer methods on average to address diversity.
Employee retention
- Retaining employees has become an increasing challenge over the last few years. Just one-fifth of respondents reported they had no retention difficulties in the previous year (2013: 22%; 2012: 34%; 2011: 42%; 2010: 45%; 2009: 31%).
- Managers and professionals/specialists were most difficult to retain as in previous years, particularly in the public sector, where the proportion reporting difficulties for this staff category has increased dramatically (2013: 60%; 2012: 40%; 2011: 25%).
- The proportion of organisations reporting that retaining senior managers/ directors was difficult has increased compared with previous years (2013: 15%; 2012: 10%; 2011: 7%; 2010: 9%).
- Most organisations have taken one or more steps to address staff retention in 2012, although one in five reports that no specific retention initiatives were undertaken. Our findings suggest that the focus on retention fell in the immediate aftermath of the financial crisis, but has been creeping back up in the last few years.
- The most common actions to address retention include: improving the induction process, improving line managers’ people skills and increasing learning and development opportunities.
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