The positive news about the Scottish economy continues today with the latest figures from Manpower, the global recruitment company. It reports that employment prospect in Scotland are “firmly in positive territory”. Its employment survey for the UK asked over 2000 employers about their intentions – whether they planned to hire or fire in the coming economic quarter. This shows “sustained optimism in the UK jobs market” with the National Seasonally Adjusted Net Employment Outlook for the country up 6% on the previous quarter.
Demand for call centre staff
While Scotland’s figure at 4% is less than the national average, the survey reports that “the improving picture in Scotland means that the outlook in the region is catching up with the national outlook, driven by increases in headcount in manufacturing and production companies.”
According to Operations Manager, Amanda White, “we have noticed a definite increase in prospects this quarter and our manufacturing companies have really led the way as the production for a number of local products, from oatcakes to soap to haggis. The other strong area this quarter is call centre recruitment, where we are seeing several of the larger companies advertising new roles. However, our clients are still struggling to fill sales roles in the region, particularly fuelled sales jobs, and good-quality salespeople are in demand for both permanent and temporary roles.”
Mark Carney
Governor of the Bank of England
Looking south of the border, there is clear evidence of job creation in regions which had previously been thought of as “desolate”. Both the north-east and north-west of England are seeing significant growth in employment, especially in the utility sectors. It’s enough to persuade James Hick, UK managing director of ManpowerGroup Solutions, to claim that “the jobs market has suddenly become the hottest economic indicator in time thanks to the forward guidance issued by Mark Carney, the new governor of the Bank of England.
“Our survey shows that it can take a while before we get to a situation where 750,000 new jobs are created, which will trigger a review of interest rates. But it also reveals that 2013 has been a game changing year for the UK jobs market in a number of key sectors.” He points out that employers in both finance and business services are showing the most confident signs of hiring, but he added that it had also been a transformative year for the High Street.
“It’s incredible to think,” he said, “that at the turn of the year we had a series of big names like Comet, Blockbuster and HMV collapsing into administration and yet amazingly employers in the retail sector have reported the most optimistic year since 2007.”