Guest blog
Engineering firms of all sizes frequently report difficulties recruiting suitably skilled staff, especially in niche areas. Sometimes this means struggling to find people with the right experience; other times it might mean not getting any applications at all. Jon Blaze, head of recruitment operations at Jonathan Lee Recruitment, argues companies can take action to minimise the chances of encountering these problems.
1. Make sure you’re ready to recruit
It is vital that an organisation understands the strengths and weaknesses of its talent pool and how this changes over time. Without a process in place to audit the existing knowledge and skills base, a business is in danger of recruiting for the wrong role or being too knee-jerk in its approach. This should always be the first step of the recruitment process before a job specification is even considered.
2. Offer a career path, not a job
When the candidate has the upper hand they want to know about the long term prospects a role offers. In developing the job specification, paint a picture of the prospective career path to capture the attention of candidates and ensure it is a central part of the interview. Even if there is an immediate and urgent need to fill a role, good candidates will be put off by the slightest hint of short term thinking from the employer.
3. Sell your organisation
The interview is a two-way process, particularly when good candidates are in such high demand. Engineering firms need to think about how they are perceived externally and what information they need to share with prospective employees to convince them to join their organisation. Trust candidates by sharing plans for growth and details of innovative projects that showcase the credentials of your organisation. This is especially important for SMEs who do not have the kudos of major brands.
4. Think global
The international nature of the engineering labour market presents an opportunity for UK employers. Those who haven’t already should consider applying for a sponsor licence, which will enable a company to recruit from outside the EEA in circumstances where there are no available candidates.
5. Consider transferable skills
Employers usually want a candidate with sector experience – by its nature the engineering industry has always taken this specialist approach, but there is definitely a crossover between sectors that employers could use to their advantage more frequently. For example, the automotive and FMCG sector share the same fast-paced, customer oriented environment and a highly skilled engineer with an automotive background could offer an adaptable and valuable skill set to an FMCG organisation with some support and training.
6. Invest in tomorrow’s engineers
Unfortunately there is no quick fix to the skills shortage, but if businesses want to reverse the trend of a declining talent pool they have to be prepared to invest in training. Supporting young engineers through their training – either via apprenticeships or university – is essential to ensuring today’s problem doesn’t derail the long term health of the engineering sector.
If UK engineering companies are serious about wanting to compete for the best graduates then they are going to have to start paying wages that are actually competitive in the global marketplace, not just with other engineering companies like themselves but with the likes of the big four accountancy firms, global consultancies and investment banks who also want to hire brainy numerate people.
In my experience many UK engineering SMEs are stuck in a low skill, low productivity, low wage, low profit spiral and struggle to remain competitive, even with a heavy reliance on cheap Eastern European immigrant labour.
They would do much better if they actually invested in R&D in order to produce better products that can command a premium in the marketplace. But by and large UK SMEs seem incapable/unwilling to do this!
A really good way to bring in new skills/capabilities is to work with a University on a Knowledge Transfer Partnership. Not only do we support all sizes of companies, but KTP’s attract funding (50% for large enterprises and 67% for SME’s). In addition to the Associate that will work full time on the project (who must be a recent graduate), through a KTP companies also have support from a relevant academic – or academics, as well as access to technology and equipment and other resources within Universities. It is an ideal way to undertake Research and Development!! KTP’s can be up to 3 years in duration – but they must be projects which are strategic to the company and contain innovation and challenge. If anyone is interested, (I sit in the Institute for Innovation in Sustainable Engineering), you can contact me here: j.edwards@derby.ac.uk
Excellent points. I think offering continued training is critical also. Technology is advancing at an ever increasing rate an today’s engineers must keep up. Its important to hire individuals with the proper skill sets. The ability to communicate effectively is critical, both written and verbal.
The massively skewed gender ratios in engineering workplaces are deeply unhelpful to recruitment too.
One conversation I had with a potential female Chinese PhD I was trying to recruit at a univeristy milkround-type event: “So, if I go work for you am I going to be the only women in a design office full of 50 men?”. Naturally not wanting to answer this question with a direct “yes” or “probably”, I backpedalled, trying to emphasise that my then employer was trying to address this, but it is effectively an industry wide chicken and egg problem and we need some ladies to take that first step. Naturally it was a hard sell. I’m not likely to go into midwifery any time soon either!
You know full well that if that same highly qualified person goes and works in say accountancy or law this problem will not exist to nearly the same extent.
Whether we like it or not it also serves to reinforce the unhelpful and detrimental image of engineering as a profession full of pasty-faced, males with poor communication skills beavering away in cubicles on god-knows-what, which again discourages the best candidates.
Jackie’s comments about KTPs are good; it is about the best that an SME can get in terms of support for research.
Perhaps that is part of the bias against SMEs that they experience – and tends to have (in the past) put them off.
Certainly I have seen (small) SMEs achieve world leading manufacturing capability – but I am not sure that this equates with the first correspondent’s product development; manufacturing processes are earlier down the development chain and not generally viewed as part of business cases for grants (and hence SMEs are discouraged).
All good stuff: but the weakest link is invariably the contribution of HR: and surely all Engineers know that!
A sham-grouping (I can never bring myself to call them a profession) if ever there was one: placing themselves in-between the supply of candidates and the firm: thinking it is their role to make decisions (when its the other Engineers who must do so) dealing with the mechanics of employing professional Engineering staff is almost beyond them, let alone able to assess ability, they are a waste of space. Unfortunately, our society is still ‘governed’ by laws based upon “Master & Servant” -which might have been suitable for an agricultural society (17th, 18th, 19th Century) but is completely irrelevant to the needs of modern industry. Perhaps that is why too much of ‘ours’ is NOT modern!
Mike B
UK employers are going to have to start showing 18-year olds the real tangible benefits associated with doing hard numerate degrees like engineering in terms of increased starting salary.
Otherwise its simply not very compelling choice is it? Engineering degrees are hard! The kids aren’t daft. They know they have choices when they go to university:
1) Do a generic university degree with a reasonable workload, get a good graduate job in sales, marketing HR etc.
2) Do a difficult engineering degree, work a lot harder, ultimately have less spare time/fun whilst at university, spending significant time in a 90+% male environment. Then ultimately get a job with similar pay to as if they had done English, sociology etc.
The end result is that kids are choosing 1, overwhelmingly. Its the easier, safer more fun option and has comparable financial payoff, in the UK at least. Whats the point in working harder for no appreciable benefit?
“They” -the groupings, previously dominated by men! and now, as our Editor rightly says, increasingly female manipulate man’s (woman?s) laws to the benefit of whoever will pay the most: “We” and those we are seeking to encourage to follow in our steps, manipulate Nature’s Laws to the benefit of mankind. If and when I approach those pearly gates (if there are any) I would like to have the latter rather than the former in my pocket (or purse!) to show to the gate-keeper?
hey Ho.
Mike B
Ultimately investing in training to create the engineers of the future is a balance of what you need now to what will you need in three years time, we in manufacturing have a need now so will fill the vacancies from the global pot of contractors. The risk is all the learning leaves once the tax rules kick in ! Investment in people at all levels from apprentices to graduates only works if you give them a career and constant growth of salary and development, slack off either and back to square one
To help in the skill shortage industry needs to start hiring all the older workers that are out there. All the photos accompanying this article (on line version) are typical of an employers vision of “engineering talent” and there was not one grey hair amongst any of the people represented.
Stop discriminating against anyone over 50 and over 60 now – as the retirement age creeps ever nearer to 70 yrs old. There are lots of skilled engineers out there with transferable skills but they are over 50 – start employing them!