Year-end Hiring Inertia? No signs of it yet!
The prevailing wisdom is that around this time of year, important books have been closed, critical decisions have already been made or deferred to the New Year, key people are already on holiday or planning their prolonged winter hiatus and hiring activity, in solidarity with the weather, is at a freeze.
Little could be further from the truth this holiday season in booming Middle East economies, particularly around the GCC, where hiring managers are recruiting aggressively and appetite for talent is at fever pitch. With newly released regional macro-economic indicators all pointing in favor of sustained growth, consumer confidence levels robust and expectations for increased job creation next year high (please see Bayt.com October Consumer Confidence Index Survey), regional corporations are busy recruiting for the growth ahead. Talent crunches in several key sectors have made recruiters even more vigilant than usual at this time of year and recently released statistics on cost increases and salary hikes across the region have augmented this vigilance as staff engagement and retention challenges are heightened against a backdrop of escalating costs. The Bayt.com Executive Search team have attested that there has been no dip in hiring activity or deferment of hiring decisions this year-end and the current on-line jobs posted on www.bayt.com, the Middle East’s #1 job site are at record highs.
Interesting Workplace Statistics
Once again, a recent poll run by Bayt.com, the Middle East’s #1 job site, which received 3,376 votes in November 2007, showed that `opportunities for growth and advancement’ by far outweighed `higher pay’ as an incentive to join a new job. 41.5% of respondents voted that opportunities for growth and advancement were more important to them as a motivator to join a new job than `higher pay’ which received 29.5% of the vote, `a better company’ which received 11.8% of the vote, `a more interesting job description’ and `a better position’ which both received 7.1% of the vote, and `flexible hours’ which only received 3% of the vote. Clearly immediate pay considerations are secondary to career development potential for today’s professionals and interestingly company quality considerations are more important than position considerations probably also lending support to the theory that professionals are taking a longer-term perspective to their career development.
In a related poll, where we asked respondents what the most important aspect they look for in a job is, the overwhelming majority (59%) cited `opportunities for growth and development’ far exceeding `well defined roles and responsibilities’, `friendly team’, `pleasant environment’, `cordial and professional boss’ and `proximity to home’ as deciding factors. Interestingly, `friendly team’ at 8.8% received exactly double the votes of `cordial and professional boss’ at 4.4%. A third poll asking employees what their favorite part of the work day was, saw `working on important projects’ receiving 52.5% of the votes followed by `meeting with clients’ at 16.7%, `meeting with team’ at 14.4%. `meeting with boss’ at 4.1% and `the daily repetitive tasks’ scoring the lowest popularity at 3.7%.
