If you Google the phrase “Skills Shortage” and you will be presented with page after page of articles about the dearth of necessary talent in various industries from Engineering to Education and Construction to Healthcare.
You might be someone who is struggling to fill a vacant position right now. If so, you’re in good company! The UK employment rate, and the number of vacancies in the UK jobs market is at record levels. The most recent Office For National Statistics ‘Employment and Labour Market Report’ was widely reported this week with an estimated 953,000 job vacancies in May to July 2021.
In addition, the CIPD’s most recent ‘Labour Market Outlook’ tells us that the percentage of employers planning to recruit within the next 3 months continues to rise and currently sits at 69% although 39% of employers also say that they are finding their current vacancies hard to fill.
So, when there is so much competition for talented staff, how frustrating must it be when one of your key members of staff drops their resignation letter on your desk? And with 38% of employees looking to change roles in the next year it could definitely happen.
Less than a quarter of staff list pay as the reason for them leaving their current job. Whereas 44% say that either “Worsening work / life balance” or “Toxic workplace culture” are their biggest issue.
A further study of 14000 people across 9 countries by IBM found that 43% of people placed career advancement opportunities at the top of their list of priorities. And more than a third of employees named continuous learning opportunities (36%) and organisational stability (34%) as key factors in their job satisfaction.
How much are you investing in your management training? Maybe just more regular recognition of your employees’ efforts and achievements would make them feel more invested in the business.
Legendary football manager, Sir Alex Ferguson, once said, “Too many managers talk too much. The two most important words for a player, or for any human being, are “Well done.””
It’s certainly cheaper than increasing wages!
So, rather than compete for the diminishing pool of suitable candidates to replace your key team member who has just left, let’s look to do what we can to make our staff feel valued enough that they don’t want to leave.
So, can you:
- Offer career progression?
- Foster a team culture?
- Offer flexible working?
- Invest in staff training?
- Say, “Well done”?