Talent wars hot up as skills shortage worsens

Companies are facing the worst shortage of quality managerial and technical staff in recent years, according to the latest Recruitment Confidence Index (RCI).

The RCI is a quarterly survey of public and private sector employers produced by the Cranfield School of Management. It measures expected changes in recruitment activity and business conditions.

The survey shows that 82% of organisations anticipate trouble in finding quality people to fill vacancies. Recruitment difficulties are at their greatest since the RCI was started in 1999. Engineering and computing have historically struggled the most.

Dr Emma Parry, research fellow at Cranfield School of Management, said: "Employment levels have increased in the past eight years. Organisations have been recruiting more and more, but fewer high quality people have been coming into the workforce."

Employers are responding by planning to spend more on recruitment in an effort to attract suitable candidates. 39% of respondents expect to increase their recruitment expenditure over the next six months. However, Dr Parry emphasised that employers should be more strategic about talent management rather than simply spending more on recruitment. She said: "Too often we see organisations just throwing more money at the problem rather than assessing which recruitment methods are effective."

Another RCI report published earlier this year found that less than half of UK businesses have talent development programmes. While 60% of those surveyed said managing and retaining talent is essential to a business’s bottom line, only 41% of organisations do so.