5 tips to recruit quality employees in the current job market

Posted on 25 August 2022 | by Allan Hall

Attracting and retaining suitable talent—

With global labour shortages presenting huge challenges for employers, many of our clients have reported significant difficulties during the past 6-12 months in attracting and retaining suitable employees.

Our team at Allan Hall HR has seen a large increase in requests for support in recruitment during this time and has put together some tips to help you recruit in the current market.

The employment situation in Australia

Whilst the extent of the labour shortage differs across regions and industries, with healthcare, manufacturing and supply chain industries experiencing the greatest impact, it is undeniably currently one of the biggest challenges employers are facing globally.

The Covid-19 pandemic has resulted in the following factors affecting the labour market:

migrants returning to their home countries,
a reduction in available international graduates, and
border closures resulting in fewer working-holiday visas.

Australia is currently experiencing a record low unemployment rate of 3.5% (ABS, July 2022). Due to the labour and skill shortage, wage costs in some sectors, such as IT, are rising between 20% to 50%, with employers having to boost salaries to attract and retain staff.

As a result, the number of jobs advertised has significantly increased. ANZ job ads data for April 2022 revealed that the number of job ads was up 26.3% from a year earlier at 242,536. They were 57.3% higher than the pre-pandemic level in February 2020 and SEEK data shows they remain significantly higher than pre-pandemic levels.

Five things employers can do to attract great candidates

To help you stand out from the crowd and attract and retain quality staff in this current market, our HR team offer the following tips:

1 Focus on your Employee Value Proposition

Distinguish yourself from your competitors and be clear on your selling points to attract new talent. How do you differ from other organisations and what benefits do you offer? What are your points of difference and why would a prospective employee want to work for you? For example, do you offer a hybrid working model / flexibility to work from home? Do you pay over the market rate for the position? Do you have an outstanding culture that current employees value? Does the company provide clear, defined opportunities for career progression?

Ensure you retain a strong focus on your current employees and offer and communicate these aspects to your existing employees to remind them of the key benefits of continuing to work within your organisation.

2 Deploy targeted search strategies

For many roles in the current market, it is now rare to simply advertise and have people apply. It is important to identify where the top talent is currently working and proactively reach out to prospective employees from these organisations with the key selling points from your Employee Value Proposition.

Utilise your network and professional networking tools, such as LinkedIn and other social media platforms.

Encourage existing employees to help you with your search for top talent and consider devising an employee referral program to incentivise this.

3 Understand salary expectations in the current market

Salary benchmarking and reviewing current remuneration ensures your offering is competitive to the current market. Salary benchmarking is a useful tool in attracting new talent and reducing staff turnover.

4 Grow your own talent

Employing graduates or school leavers is a great way to grow talent specific to your business needs. Recent graduates can bring an exciting and fresh perspective to your workplace.

5 Consider engaging recruitment specialists with access to a broad database of potential candidates and targeted sourcing tools

Our Allan Hall HR team have a team of highly skilled recruitment, search and marketing specialists who are supported by our HR consultants, to apply a holistic approach to your HR and recruitment needs. We can assist with recruitment activities across Australia including:

creating an employee value proposition
salary benchmarking
premium and targeted candidate search
employee referral schemes
psychometric testing of potential candidates to help in your hiring decisions and ongoing development of employees
staff retention strategies
structured onboarding support

As per your tax and accounting support at Allan Hall, you only pay for the time spent, together with any direct advertising costs.

Our recruitment team at Allan Hall HR would love to discuss your needs, and how we can best assist your organisation. We are equipped with a range of resources and strategies suited to the current labour market; including a solely dedicated headhunting team, premium-level access to targeted recruitment and social media platforms including LinkedIn, and a targeted graduate recruitment team.

For more information, please get in touch with our friendly team at Allan Hall HR at [email protected] or call 02 8978 3743.

Employers’ Biggest Challenges for 2022

Posted on 3 December 2021 | by Allan Hall

3 Tips for Employers

Attracting and retaining good employees has always been a big challenge for businesses, however we now see it looming as a major obstacle for employers in 2022.

Business is looking to boom, but you will need the right team to be able to take advantage of the opportunities.

Why now?

As we come out of nearly two years of unprecedented business disruption and uncertainty due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, a number of factors have combined to produce an extraordinary set of circumstances, including:

business confidence has surged as we come out of lockdown and economic activity is rebounding quickly
the Reserve Bank has increased its forecast GDP growth for 2022, to 5.5%
recruitment activity is now nearly 50% above pre-pandemic levels and job advertisements are now at historical highs
at the same time, unemployment is historically low, and there are now serious and persistent shortages of skilled labour across the country, with trades and technical areas particularly in short supply
with easing concerns over COVID-19, a number of employees are taking the opportunity to re-evaluate their careers and how they want to work in the future, and it has been predicted that this trend will develop further next year as the economy takes off. This phenomenon has now come to be known as, “the Great Resignation”.

As you wind down from 2021 and before the new year gets into full swing, we recommend that you get ahead of the game by following these three tips for employers.

3 tips to attract and retain good employees in 2022

Tip 1: Conduct an employee satisfaction/engagement survey

Take the time to understand how satisfied your employees are with their work and how engaged they are with your business. Employees who are satisfied and engaged, rarely leave, even when offered more money. Consider undertaking an employee survey to help you better understand your employees’ thoughts and feelings and identify any “imminent flight risks”.

Tip 2: Review your employee remuneration, benefits and rewards

With surging economic activity, a booming recruitment market, and skilled labour in short supply, there is likely to be pressure on increasing wages and salaries, particularly as they have remained flat for a number of years. Many employers are also looking at new and different benefits and rewards to make their offer more attractive than their competitors. It is suggested that all employers take the opportunity now to review salaries, wages, benefits and rewards to ensure you remain competitive and well-positioned to retain your valued staff.

Tip 3: Proactively source quality talent

Spend some time forecasting your labour requirements for 2022 and determine if you are likely to need additional skilled staff. The tightening labour market over recent months has seen the number of applicants per job advertised, decline steadily, and clients report that quality candidates are becoming increasingly hard to find. This means that if you are in the market for staff in 2022, you will most likely need to be more creative in how you find the “right” people for your business, and you should consider seeking professional assistance to proactively source the highest quality talent.

Our highly skilled and experienced team at Allan Hall HR have assisted our clients in all these areas, such as engagement surveys, salary reviews and quality sourcing and recruiting of talent.

Please contact us if you would like to discuss your current business situation and people needs. We would be excited to help you prepare for the year ahead with the right team in place to seize all the opportunities coming your way!

Contact Allan Hall Human Resources in Brookvale

JobMaker Hiring Credit Scheme

Posted on 29 March 2021 | by Allan Hall

Wondering if you can afford to take on any new employees in the aftermath of COVID19?

The JobMaker Hiring Credit Scheme is a payment-based program offered by the Government to incentivise employers to hire job seekers aged under 35 during the COVID-19 recovery.

Eligible employers can access the JobMaker Hiring Credit for each eligible employee they hire between 7 October 2020 and 6 October 2021.

The JobMaker Hiring Credit enables eligible employers to:

claim $200 per week for hiring each additional eligible employee aged 16-29 year old
claim $100 per week for hiring each additional eligible employee aged 30-35 years old
make a claim quarterly in arrears for up to 12 months after the eligible employee starts work

Similar to JobKeeper, to make a claim, eligible employers need to register for the scheme and report employees’ payroll information to the ATO.

The first claim period closes on 30 April 2021 so it is important to check if your business and employees are eligible and register now.

Are you an eligible employer?

You are eligible to receive the JobMaker Hiring Credit if you:

Have an Australian Business Number (ABN)
Are up to date with tax lodgement obligations
Are registered for Pay As You Go (PAYG) withholding
Satisfy the reporting requirements through up-to-date Single Touch Payroll (STP)
Have registered for the scheme and are claiming in respect of an eligible employee
Satisfy the payroll and headcount increase conditions of the JobMaker Hiring Credit Scheme
Have not claimed JobKeeper payments for a fortnight that started during the JobMaker period

What is an eligible employee?

Is aged 16–35 years
Needs to increase your total employee headcount and payroll
Has received the JobSeeker Payment, Youth Allowance (Other) or Parenting Payment for at least one of the previous three months at the time of hiring
Is employed or is paid for a minimum of 20 hours a week

For more information visit https://www.ato.gov.au/General/JobMaker-Hiring-Credit/

If you would like assistance with registration, please contact your Allan Hall Business Advisor.

Need help with recruiting eligible employees for your business?

Offering a fresh approach to your recruitment needs while delivering value for money, why not consider utilising our highly skilled recruitment team at Allan Hall Human Resources to assist you with sourcing eligible employees? We can help you find people fast who will thrive and help your business to grow.