Despite recession and mass unemployment European enterprises still have significant difficulties in finding qualified employees for certain key roles. But it is not the often quoted IT experts, but engineers and sales staff, who are at present the hardest to find. This is one of the findings of new research published by StepStone, Europeís leader in online recruitment. The research covers over 1,600 HR Managers across seven European countries and was carried out in conjunction with the market research organisation easyquest in early 2004.
Just under 30 per cent of the HR Managers report that positions for qualified engineers are the most difficult to fill. These are followed by sales specialists, chosen by approximately 20 per cent of respondents. IT professionals are ranked third with 17 per cent of responses.
The difficulties of filling certain specialist roles are similar across all the countries surveyed, with the exception of Italy and Norway. Here sales staff emerge as the biggest challenge, ahead of engineers and IT specialists.
Candidates for marketing and advertising positions, as well as for HR, are significantly easier to source. On average, only four per cent of the organisations surveyed have difficulty in meeting their needs in each of these areas.
The survey, entitled Current trends in the job seeker’s market, covered 1635 HR Managers across various company sizes and business sectors in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Germany, Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands.
Engineers and sales staff are the hardest to find employees
new research published by StepStone
