Employment Expectations At Highest Levels Since GFC

Employment Expectations At Highest Levels Since GFC

Hudson Report reveals employment tide beginning to turn as re-build gathers pace in Canterbury

New Zealand – 26 Sept 2013 – Hiring expectations have peaked to their highest level since third quarter 2008, with 33.7% of employers intending to increase headcount, according to the latest Hudson Report: Employment Trends released today[1].

This result is up 3.2pp compared to the previous quarter and is largely being driven by rising expectations in the South Island where 52.6% of employers intend to hire next quarter (up 12.3pp).

“The Canterbury rebuild is taking shape as activity starts to shift from planning and design into delivery mode. This is creating a more positive economic environment and stronger hiring intentions,” said Roman Rogers, Executive General Manager, Hudson New Zealand.

There is particularly strong demand in Construction/Property/Engineering for project managers, civil engineers, surveyors, estimators and contract managers needed to support delivery programmes.

“Nationally there is an underlying confidence with household consumption and the manufacturing outlook up, although growth is likely to remain incremental in nature. Employers who have missed out on opportunities due to limited resources in lean times are now more confident and want to have the right capability to pursue future opportunities and growth plans,” he added.

Overall, more than half (57.0%) of employers intend to keep their staffing levels steady next quarter. Medium and large organisations have increased hiring expectations with more than a third of employers in each segment seeking to hire more people next quarter.

Nationwide, the Construction/Property/Engineering sector has the highest positive hiring intentions (51.2%), followed by Government (41.9%), Manufacturing (31.9%) and Financial Services/Insurance (30.2%).

In Government, demand is high in Canterbury for roles in supporting the rebuild activity. In Wellington, hiring demand is coming from increased activity among ministries to achieve efficiencies and goals ahead of the 2014 election, as well as a number of integration-related roles attached to super ministries. Demand continues to be high for ICT and policy/operational roles.

By profession, the recruitment outlook is strongest for Information, Communications & Technology (39.4%), followed by Financial Services (31.0%), Human Resources (26.8%), Office Support (22.8%), and Accounting & Finance (19.7%).

Information, Communications & Technology continues to perform strongly and there is particularly high demand for testers, project administrators and co-ordinators and schedulers which indicates that many IT projects are in the implementation and completion phases.

The Report also looked into how organisations are supporting people as they transition into new leadership roles. The research found that while 72.2% of New Zealand organisations provide targeted support to leaders transitioning to new roles, 85.3% thought more could be done to support transitioning leaders.

Types of support currently provided to transitioning leaders includes internal development programmes (92.9%), formal training/courses (51.4%), coaching (40.0%), profiling and mentoring (37.1%), external development programmes (31.4%) and career planning (24.3%).

“Transitioning people effectively, particularly leaders, is critical to success. Poor leadership often lowers team performance, productivity, engagement and increases turnover so the impact is significant,” said Rogers.

Common issues that can derail new leaders include: focusing too heavily on details, reacting negatively to criticism, intimidating others, jumping to hasty conclusions and micromanaging direct reports.

To minimise business risk around transitioning new leaders, Hudson recommends using strong assessment techniques and professional support and development, including:

• one-on-one support to identify and address personal styles that can be detrimental to effective leadership, and to help build leadership capability

• corporate inductions to help transitioning leaders better understand systems and processes and how to navigate their way around the organisation

• appointing a sponsor to assist with introduction to the organisation and building relationships

• proactively identifying future leaders and building their leadership skills and knowledge before they transition to a new role

- ENDS -

[1] Hudson surveyed 1,035 New Zealand employers about their hiring intentions October to December 2013

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