Despite a downturn, many employers are going to extremes to find good people
The aggressive recruiting tactics that typified the pre-downturn, high-tech boom are becoming increasingly common in other industries and could soon make their return to the high-tech sector, according to experts.
There isn’t a shortage of high-tech workers right now but that will change soon as the economy recovers, said Kevin Dee, CEO of Eagle Professional Resources, an Ottawa-based IT staffing firm.
“We are going to be back where we were 18 months ago, screaming for people,” he said.
A study produced for the Information Technology Association of Canada (ITAC) predicts that by the end of the year employers in Ontario won’t be able to find the IT workers they need to fill positions. With the downturn in the economy, the shortage of workers abated briefly, said Gaylen Duncan, CEO of ITAC. “But it looks like we’ve had a very short respite. The skills shortage will be back with us very soon.”
The study looked at the hiring intentions of Ontario-based employers and found 38,000 new IT jobs will be created this year however 9,900 of those jobs will go unfilled due to the shortage of IT talent. This contrasts sharply with 2001 when there was a surplus of more than 24,000 IT workers in Ontario. Another 34,000 jobs will be created in 2003.
The study also looked at other issues including effects the shortages had on organizational performance. More than 10 per cent of non-high-tech respondents said the shortages caused project delays or customer dissatisfaction.
And while it was the high-tech industry and shortages of IT workers that got most of the attention before the economy slowed down last year, recruiters say shortages continued to be a problem in other sectors.
Employers in the food and drug industries have been hit by a shortage of regulatory and compliance experts, said Marcy Cowan senior partner with Corporate Link.
Before any new drug or medical device goes to market, there is a lengthy process to ensure it meets regulatory standards, but with a proliferation of submissions in recent years the government has put a much greater onus on applicants to make sure they can meet the necessary requirements.
Failure now means lengthy delays, explained Cowan. “If you miss your market by a month, it can mean the failure of a product.” This has led to the greater demand for people who can fill regulatory and compliance positions and they are not easy people to find.
“It has become more of a headhunter-type market,” she said. Clients can use online job boards like Workopolis or Monster, but these sites are flooded with people and it becomes difficult to find the highly specialized talent they need. So they are looking to tap into the resources of professional recruiters to handle specialized searches, said Cowan.
Recruiters do research and form partnerships with professional organizations and schools so that when it comes time to fill a position they can tap directly into the source and avoid the masses of resumes that may come in from a job posted to an online job board, for example.
As a result, employers have to rethink staffing strategies. In some cases, organizations have had to reorganize work in order to generalize some positions, they are also looking outside the country more than in the past and employers are more willing to hire someone and train them to fill a position than they were in the past.
“I had one client that was looking for three to five years’ experience and they had to settle for less than six months,” said Cowan. “They’ve really redefined how they are looking for people.”
In Alberta, shortages are being felt in a lot of different sectors, said Judy Harcourt, president of Edmonton-based Harcourt & Associates. “It’s been very, very busy here, probably busier than ever,” she said.
Because of that, organizations are becoming more creative with efforts to find people. They’ll certainly willing to pay more if that is necessary, but they are also looking for other ways to attract people. “A lot of companies are looking at doing more in perks rather than just increasing salaries. Companies with a lot of young employees with families are introducing more family-friendly programs and practices. Onsite day-care for example is being talked about more than it was in the past.
Vickie Kalles, an executive recruiter with Toronto-based Feldman Gray & Associates Inc, said that a shortage of good executive-level talent has forced a lot of companies to adopt more aggressive hiring practices and become more sophisticated in searches.
Particularly since January, there is a sense of urgency about hiring, she said. “They want quality people but they are in much more of a rush.” The standard 10- or 12-week search is no longer acceptable because companies need that person right away.
The sense of urgency has caused employers to do a better job of knowing exactly what they want and need, she said. Generic requests and “wishy-washy” candidate descriptions are being replaced by clear descriptions with specific skill set requests.
At the same time, she said employers also are more concerned about “fit” than in the past and are putting a greater emphasis on interviews. For example, they’ll accept someone with a little less education or experience if they feel the candidate will be a good fit and stay with the organization.
Turnover costs and employee searches are painful and so organizations are looking to avoid them. This has also lead to an increase in retention bonuses. Kalles said one director received a $40,000-a-year retention bonus. “That was just the retention bonus, there was a performance bonus on top of that.”
There is a larger pool of people out there after the layoffs of the past year, but that actually makes it harder to find good talent, she said. And so when an organization finds somebody they like, they are more willing to bring them on board even if a position isn’t available. Organizations are looking to hire to build up bench strength so they will offer someone they like a contract position or ask them to work on a project, anything to build a connection.
Chris Roach, vice-president, with staffing firm The Employment Solution (TES) in Mississauga, Ont, said that while he noticed a reduction in business for IT and engineering there has been a lot of business with organizations looking frantically for skilled tradespeople. “In the last 18 months, as we went through the downturn, skilled trades kept us on the profitable side.”
In a number of industries — pharmaceutical, automotive, food and beverage for example — organizations are having problems actually keeping their products going out the door because they can’t find millwrights or control technicians, the people that support product lines.
“It is a big problem,” he said. “I could fill twice as many positions than I am right now if I had the people.”
The problem, which is widely expected to get worse before it gets better, is compounded by a general reluctance on the behalf of employers to spend time and resources on apprentices. Consequently, employers are more willing to poach skilled journeymen from other organizations. They want somebody who has completed a four-year apprenticeship program and can start making contributions to the business right away, he said.
It can cost an organization $80,000 or more to train an apprentice and rather than do that they would rather just steal someone from another organization. However, this does little to address long-term shortages. He said the government should get involved in the apprenticeship system and do more to promote and market skilled trades programs.
There isn’t a shortage of high-tech workers right now but that will change soon as the economy recovers, said Kevin Dee, CEO of Eagle Professional Resources, an Ottawa-based IT staffing firm.
“We are going to be back where we were 18 months ago, screaming for people,” he said.
A study produced for the Information Technology Association of Canada (ITAC) predicts that by the end of the year employers in Ontario won’t be able to find the IT workers they need to fill positions. With the downturn in the economy, the shortage of workers abated briefly, said Gaylen Duncan, CEO of ITAC. “But it looks like we’ve had a very short respite. The skills shortage will be back with us very soon.”
The study looked at the hiring intentions of Ontario-based employers and found 38,000 new IT jobs will be created this year however 9,900 of those jobs will go unfilled due to the shortage of IT talent. This contrasts sharply with 2001 when there was a surplus of more than 24,000 IT workers in Ontario. Another 34,000 jobs will be created in 2003.
The study also looked at other issues including effects the shortages had on organizational performance. More than 10 per cent of non-high-tech respondents said the shortages caused project delays or customer dissatisfaction.
And while it was the high-tech industry and shortages of IT workers that got most of the attention before the economy slowed down last year, recruiters say shortages continued to be a problem in other sectors.
Employers in the food and drug industries have been hit by a shortage of regulatory and compliance experts, said Marcy Cowan senior partner with Corporate Link.
Before any new drug or medical device goes to market, there is a lengthy process to ensure it meets regulatory standards, but with a proliferation of submissions in recent years the government has put a much greater onus on applicants to make sure they can meet the necessary requirements.
Failure now means lengthy delays, explained Cowan. “If you miss your market by a month, it can mean the failure of a product.” This has led to the greater demand for people who can fill regulatory and compliance positions and they are not easy people to find.
“It has become more of a headhunter-type market,” she said. Clients can use online job boards like Workopolis or Monster, but these sites are flooded with people and it becomes difficult to find the highly specialized talent they need. So they are looking to tap into the resources of professional recruiters to handle specialized searches, said Cowan.
Recruiters do research and form partnerships with professional organizations and schools so that when it comes time to fill a position they can tap directly into the source and avoid the masses of resumes that may come in from a job posted to an online job board, for example.
As a result, employers have to rethink staffing strategies. In some cases, organizations have had to reorganize work in order to generalize some positions, they are also looking outside the country more than in the past and employers are more willing to hire someone and train them to fill a position than they were in the past.
“I had one client that was looking for three to five years’ experience and they had to settle for less than six months,” said Cowan. “They’ve really redefined how they are looking for people.”
In Alberta, shortages are being felt in a lot of different sectors, said Judy Harcourt, president of Edmonton-based Harcourt & Associates. “It’s been very, very busy here, probably busier than ever,” she said.
Because of that, organizations are becoming more creative with efforts to find people. They’ll certainly willing to pay more if that is necessary, but they are also looking for other ways to attract people. “A lot of companies are looking at doing more in perks rather than just increasing salaries. Companies with a lot of young employees with families are introducing more family-friendly programs and practices. Onsite day-care for example is being talked about more than it was in the past.
Vickie Kalles, an executive recruiter with Toronto-based Feldman Gray & Associates Inc, said that a shortage of good executive-level talent has forced a lot of companies to adopt more aggressive hiring practices and become more sophisticated in searches.
Particularly since January, there is a sense of urgency about hiring, she said. “They want quality people but they are in much more of a rush.” The standard 10- or 12-week search is no longer acceptable because companies need that person right away.
The sense of urgency has caused employers to do a better job of knowing exactly what they want and need, she said. Generic requests and “wishy-washy” candidate descriptions are being replaced by clear descriptions with specific skill set requests.
At the same time, she said employers also are more concerned about “fit” than in the past and are putting a greater emphasis on interviews. For example, they’ll accept someone with a little less education or experience if they feel the candidate will be a good fit and stay with the organization.
Turnover costs and employee searches are painful and so organizations are looking to avoid them. This has also lead to an increase in retention bonuses. Kalles said one director received a $40,000-a-year retention bonus. “That was just the retention bonus, there was a performance bonus on top of that.”
There is a larger pool of people out there after the layoffs of the past year, but that actually makes it harder to find good talent, she said. And so when an organization finds somebody they like, they are more willing to bring them on board even if a position isn’t available. Organizations are looking to hire to build up bench strength so they will offer someone they like a contract position or ask them to work on a project, anything to build a connection.
Chris Roach, vice-president, with staffing firm The Employment Solution (TES) in Mississauga, Ont, said that while he noticed a reduction in business for IT and engineering there has been a lot of business with organizations looking frantically for skilled tradespeople. “In the last 18 months, as we went through the downturn, skilled trades kept us on the profitable side.”
In a number of industries — pharmaceutical, automotive, food and beverage for example — organizations are having problems actually keeping their products going out the door because they can’t find millwrights or control technicians, the people that support product lines.
“It is a big problem,” he said. “I could fill twice as many positions than I am right now if I had the people.”
The problem, which is widely expected to get worse before it gets better, is compounded by a general reluctance on the behalf of employers to spend time and resources on apprentices. Consequently, employers are more willing to poach skilled journeymen from other organizations. They want somebody who has completed a four-year apprenticeship program and can start making contributions to the business right away, he said.
It can cost an organization $80,000 or more to train an apprentice and rather than do that they would rather just steal someone from another organization. However, this does little to address long-term shortages. He said the government should get involved in the apprenticeship system and do more to promote and market skilled trades programs.
