High unemployment numbers haven’t made it any easier to recruit the right workers, a new report has claimed.
Although some 2.46 million people are out of work in the UK, employers are complaining that vacancies are still difficult to fill.
The research has come from recruitment agency, Manpower, which surveyed over 2,000 firms.
According to the study, one in six of responding businesses said that they had experienced problems in securing the right employees this year. The last time recruitment difficulties reached a similar proportion was 2007.
The main area in which posts appear to be proving hardest to fill is engineering.
Other broader positions where employers are struggling to unearth appropriate job candidates include management, sales representatives, technicians and IT.
Most employers blame a lack of training and skills among applicants. So much so that almost a half of UK employers look outside their local region in order to dip into wider pools of labour talent.
Mark Cahill, managing director at Manpower, said: “Britain is facing a serious talent shortage in certain sectors at a time when unemployment is actually rising. Part of the reason we continue to see the same professions feature in the list every year is that the jobs have structurally changed, as have the skills required, but training in these professions has yet to catch up.
“The recession, and now this slow recovery, has made the talent mismatch in the UK even more stark. Many organisations that have previously cut their headcounts are now finding that they need to increase their workforce in an increasingly talent-hungry market. Though the UK suffers less than other countries, there is no doubt that globally we are heading towards an employability crisis.”
