RECRUITMENT SURVEY APRIL 2007 TO APRIL 2008

Recruitment survey reveals ambitious Travel Consultants!

‘Improved shift hours, training and internal recruitment has improved staff retention’ – says Julia Feuell New Frontiers MD.

New Frontiers have collated the results of 238 questionnaires received from candidates, who were placed into various roles in the travel industry from April 2007 to April 2008. 94 companies also responded to the satisfaction questionnaire, which also track trends in travel recruitment as well as gives New Frontiers feedback about their service.

Candidates

How long do people take to find a job?

• 18% quickly found a job within one week (25 % in 2006-2007)
• 46% found a job within four weeks (38% in 2006-2007)
• 25% took twelve weeks to find their perfect job (19% in 2006-2007)

Why do people leave jobs?

The answers below are the ‘strong’ reasons people chose for leaving jobs. They could also answer ‘partial, slight or not at all’. Candidates could pick more than one answer.

• 51% lack career prospects (66% in 2006-2007)
• 36% more money (37% in 2006-2007)
• 26% change of circumstances (34% in 2006-2007)
• 16% poor or little training (22% in 2006-2007)
• 12% shift hours (21% in 2006-2007)
• 16% redundancy (17% in 2006-2007)
• 7% personality clash (8% in 2006-2007)

How do people find jobs?

• 51% sent less than 5 CVs to find a job. (50% in 2006–2007).
• Most people registered with three agencies to find a job and attended on average just two interviews before being offered a job. This was the same for 2006 – 2007 survey.

Companies

How long does it take to fill a vacancy?

• 7% found the perfect person in just one week (9% in 2006-2007)
• 49% filled their vacancy in 2-4 weeks (49% in 2006-2007)
• 28% within 12 weeks (29% in 2006-2007)

Why are companies recruiting?

• 53% of jobs were filled due to resignation (46% in 2006-2007)
• 43% due to expansion and new business (51% in 2006-2007)
• 4% due to promotion (3% in2006-2007)

How do companies find staff?

• 82% hold just one-to-one interviews (74% in 2006-2007)
• 16% have more than one person interviewing (25% in 2006-2007)
• New Frontiers sent an average of two people before filling a job
• 23% of companies looked internally to fill jobs (24% in 2006-2007)
• 14% advertised (13% in 2006-2007)
• 62% used an agency (63% in 2006-2006) Companies used on average three agencies to fill their jobs
• 20% of companies using New Frontiers did so as a result of recommendation (21% in 2006-2007)

Recruitment survey reveals ambitious travel consultants!

51% of candidates cited their strongest reason for leaving a company was due to ‘lack of career prospects’. Whilst this reason was given as more of a reason to leave in 2006/07 (66%), it still remains the significant reason for leaving a company. Money comes as the second reason at 36% with little change in 2006/7 at 37%. Lack of training as a reason for leaving decreased from 22% in 2006/07 to 16%, suggesting that more companies have addressed training issues. Less people are leaving due to changes in circumstances, which often can be relocation. Shift hours have decreased by nearly 50% as a reason to leave a company from 21% in 2006/07 to 12% in 2007/08.

Although there has been much reported in the trade press about pay and conditions, the reality is that people still do not feel they can progress their careers in travel. Many companies stipulate a graduate level of education, but can travel companies contain their ambitions? Could companies introduce career development plans for these people? Or is it just that people think the ‘grass is greener’ with other companies and their prospects will be better. Maybe they’ll be better appreciated elsewhere?

By comparison, 43% of companies recruited due to expansion and new business with 53% recruiting due to resignation. This surge in recruitment meant that 20% of the vacancies New Frontiers registered in 2007 were completely brand new job descriptions – mainly from the technology travel companies and particularly new marketing roles.

Business travel took a steep increase in business in 2003 and this appears to be continuing to the extent that there is now a shortage of skills for experienced Business Travel Consultants. Many companies during 2007 decided to train travel agents and online reservations agents to plug the skills gap. New Frontiers even visited Poland to recruit Business Travel Consultants for one client although this was not very successful due to Poland’s travel people having outdated corporate skills.

49% of companies recruited staff within 2-4 weeks with 28% taking up to 12 weeks to find a member of staff. The numbers of companies using recruitment agencies has stabilised from 63% to 62% to find staff as well as other methods such as advertising (14%) and internal recruitment which also stabilised from 24% in 2006/07 to 23%. Internal recruitment indicates that many companies are carefully looking at their own internal resources to fill vacancies and should, in time, help alleviate the chief reason for leaving, which is ‘career prospects’. The increase in internal recruitment may also account for the fall in the reason for leaving being ‘career prospects’ from 66% in 2006/07 to 51%.

A high majority of travel companies at 82% used one to one interviews to find a member of staff, although a decreasing proportion are using group and assessment day interview methods.

The assessment day method for recruiting reservations staff has the biggest success rate in early staff retention. Methods such as testing, role plays and work experience evaluation allow the candidate to see exactly what sort of role they would be undertaking and for the company to see how well the person would perform in the role. However these are very time consuming and costly to run. Some companies have preferred to run work experience of half a day to a day to finally assess the candidate instead.

The demand for temporary workers in the travel industry continues to outweigh supply. Many temps are working on average two months for assignments and many are working for the same company for up to and over one year. Temps now chose flexible working as an alternative to traditional career paths. The number of New Frontiers skilled and experienced temporary workforce coming from their recruitment partners in Australia and New Zealand for UK working holidays has significantly decreased due to working visa restrictions. Tax laws have also restricted temps taking advantage of setting up as limited companies. Nonetheless, many UK people are now enjoying the freedom and relative security temporary work now brings as contract employment is now at an all time high as employers cope with lengthy maternity and paternity absence.

If you would like further information about this survey or would like to contact New Frontiers for temporary or permanent recruitment services, please call 0845 202 2222.