Can’t Hire, Can’t Find a Job?

The perspective of the employment landscape has shifted enormously, in particular, over the past 2-3 years. However, increasingly, there seems to be a disconnect between the job seeker and hiring organisations and even for more straightforward roles in the banking space.

It seems as though Financial Institutions, in particular, are struggling to hire, yet there are plenty of candidates who are also struggling to find a role. This got me thinking about some of the dynamics in this disjointed landscape:

Nationality over Skillset

In many respects, the hiring landscape in each individual country has become increasingly less open to foreign talent/expertise. In many ways, this has forced organisations to look more creatively at local candidate populations to fill roles, but more often than not it means that technical / niche roles can be open for months, despite there being strong non-local candidates available in the market.

An example would be India where we have a strong presence; yet haven’t as yet managed to place a non-Indian into the market there, despite strong interest in relocating there from expat candidates based in other locations. Singapore, HK, the UK and the US all also markets that have become more challenging for non-local staff.

Highly Specific Requirements

Increasingly roles in all areas in onshore locations have become highly specific – and therefore generally harder to fill! Highly technical skillsets are increasingly sought after and hiring managers/banks are less willing to deviate from the brief, which often closes the door to candidates who could potentially develop into the role over time.

Whilst the consensus over time is that soft skills will become increasingly important in the age of Machine Learning / Robotics, banks seem to be prioritising hard technical skills over personality for many of the roles we are recruiting for.

Less Focus on Learning & Development

Some interesting feedback we are getting from candidates in the banks is that there seems to be a significantly decreased focus on Learning & Development. If you are working in a bank in a location that isn’t strategically critical for the organisation, opportunities for development and promotion are likely to have reduced.

This permeates into the hiring process and as per the above, hiring managers are increasingly reluctant to ‘take a chance’ on someone, particularly if that hire isn’t going to be supported by a robust training programme.

Network over Job Boards

The speed of finding a new role is often driven by the strength of your reputation as well as the strength of your network. Yet many job seekers we speak to rely heavily on job boards to look for opportunities, without realising that direct applications will rarely hit the desk of the hiring manager.

If you don’t have a network, try to find a recruiter who does, particularly one who is prepared to go out to bat and pro-actively look for opportunities for you.

Hiring Indecision

When it comes to hiring indecision, the market seems to have diverged. For 2019 in particular, perhaps driven by uncertainty around the Trade situation and/or overall revenue performance, some firms are taking weeks and often months, to run and conclude a hiring process.

Often during that process the captive candidate audience will find other jobs / lose interest / run out of money and go home etc. Many unemployed candidates we speak to are often stuck in limbo, interviewing for roles but not hearing back or in some cases waiting on offers from firms that are taking weeks to get approved.

There are a handful of firms though who are prioritising and fast-tracking hiring processes, in some cases with a 4 hour turnaround time from interview to offer, which does seem to be setting a new bar in terms of process and we expect that time to hire for many firms will have to shorten if they want to be in the race to hire strong talent.

Stigma Around Unemployment

Whilst, unfortunately, redundancies have become more widespread since 2008, there still seems to be a certain stigma attached to hiring candidates who are out of work.

Maybe it boils down to the human psyche of wanting the unattainable, but often firms want to try to hire the golden goose from a competitor, as opposed to considering solid immediately available candidates. However, in Singapore, MOM has driven out some excellent training initiatives to help unemployed professionals to re-skill in certain areas, which should increase candidates market value and employability.

Summary

The mantra I’ve always had in recruitment is that there is a job out there for everyone, regardless of market conditions. More often than not, there has to be a degree of realism from both candidates and hiring managers on what types of roles are available and what kind of talent is available in the marketplace, to avoid spending months looking for the unattainable.

Job seeking outside of your home country will continue to be tough, however, as organisations increasingly look to localise and that needs to be factored into expectations on how long it might take to find a new opportunity.

This article is authored by Sam Belcher.  His core experience lies in recruiting across Finance, Audit, Risk and Compliance in both the financial services and commercial sectors in Asia. Got any questions? Reach out to sam@theedgepartnership.com.

The Edge is an Asia focused recruitment business with offices in Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur and India.