Engineering, sales skills most sought-after by employers

Posted: 05 March 2012 1033 hrs

SINGAPORE: Engineering and sales skills are the most sought-after according to employers surveyed by global specialist recruiting group, Hays,

Of the 900 employers surveyed for the Hays Salary Guide released on Monday, 24 per cent said they have recently found it difficult to recruit engineering staff at the junior to mid-management level.

Nineteen per cent faced difficulty at the senior management level.

Twenty-two per cent of employers said they have found it difficult to recruit sales candidates at junior to mid and senior management levels.

Employers also report difficulty when recruiting technical skills at the junior to mid-management level (17 per cent), IT skills at the junior to mid-management level (16 per cent) and accountancy and finance skills at the senior management (15 per cent) and junior to mid management level (14 per cent).

"Skills shortages have been a recognised business challenge for some time, but our findings put the spotlight on exactly which skills employers are finding most difficult to source," said Mr Chris Mead, Regional Director of Hays in South East Asia.

"Despite the global economic environment, Asia remains resilient and 95 per cent of the employers we surveyed said skills shortages have the potential to hamper the effective operation of their business or department. This means that finding a way to bridge this skills gap will be critical in the months and years ahead."

According to Hays, one way to do this is to consider flexible staffing solutions.

This is a strategy employers are turning to, with one in two reporting that they have utilised a flexible staffing approach in the last 12 months.

Of these, the most common approach was temporary or contract staff, which was utilised by 69 per cent of employers.

This was followed by the employment of part-time staff (utilised by 37 per cent), casual staff (utilised by 25 per cent) and job sharing (utilised by 11 per cent).

Another strategy is overseas skills.

According to the survey, 66 per cent of employers said they would consider employing or sponsoring a qualified overseas candidate in skill-short areas.

Some are also attempting to overcome the skills shortage by counter-offering staff when they resign.

Sixty-six per cent said they sometimes counter-offer staff and seven per cent always counter-offer staff when they resign.

The 2012 Hays Salary Guide reveals salary and recruiting trends for 1,000 roles across Singapore.

- CNA/fa