Up to 40% of Irish-based employers plan to hire staff in coming quarter

Some 40 per cent of employers in Ireland plan to take on new staff in the coming quarter, a survey by recruitment firm ManpowerGroup has revealed.

However, the same survey found that 81 per cent of businesses here are reporting difficulties finding the staff they need with a record-low unemployment rate of 3.8 per cent making it challenging for employers to source candidates.

“With added pressure from rising interest rates and a 4.6 per cent fall in GDP (gross domestic product) knocking business confidence the hiring market remains balanced between growth optimism and macroeconomic limitation factors,” ManpowerGroup’s latest employment outlook report said.

The company’s survey, which is based on responses from 410 employers across Ireland, found the most popular staffing choice was to keep workforces steady with 45 per cent “indicating a static workforce projection for the quarter”.

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A minority of 12 per cent anticipate making redundancies to their workforce.

“Irish employers are battling to fill vacancies in the face of increasing economic pressures and full employment in the economy,” said John Galvin, ManpowerGroup’s managing director said.

“Businesses are determined to keep hiring, but ongoing talent shortages and low unemployment are making it difficult to find skilled candidates. Meanwhile, employers are having to weather the economic shocks of high interest rates and a 4.6 per cent fall in GDP in the last quarter,” he said.

The information technology sector reports the lowest hiring intention, with an additional 6 per cent of businesses planning to hire in the third quarter, down 26 percentage points on last quarter and down 32 percentage points year-on-year.

This is followed by the consumer goods and services sector (+6 per cent), industrials and materials (+18 per cent) and financials and real estate sector (+19 per cent).

“The larger tech firms that were driving Ireland’s high employment outlook a year ago are now not hiring in large volumes, which has had a cascading effect on the rest of the tech market in Ireland,” Mr Galvin said.

The survey indicated hiring managers in all nine sectors of the economy anticipate an increase in staffing levels in the third quarter. Since the second quarter of 2023, hiring environments have strengthened in five of nine sectors, and weakened in four sectors, ManPowerGroup said.

Ireland’s most competitive sector is energy and utilities, which had the strongest employment outlook of 60, rising by 33 percentage points since the second quarter of 2023.

In a separate survey by recruitment firm Barden, it was found that demand for accountants with up to five years experience has risen by 20 per cent in the past 12 months... Barden also found that businesses were increasingly emphasising people skills as well as accountancy skills when hiring.

“It has been widely reported in recent months that greater attention needs to be devoted to the development of softer skills, the sorts of skills that early career professionals have not had the opportunity to develop as effectively during Covid. We are seeing this on the ground, and increasingly it is these core skills that differentiate who is promoted and hired and who is not,” Elaine Brady, Barden Leinster’s managing partner, said.