The past 12 months has been a turbulent period for recruitment on the London job market with a harsh austerity budget being unveiled by the new coalition government, and shockwaves from the eurozone crisis affecting decision making domestically and abroad.
The outlook for the remainder of 2012 and 2013 remains cautious. The European Commission has lowered its growth forecast and austerity is still the keyword in the economic strategy of the British government.
The impact that these past austerity measures and economic instability have had on salaries has meant that yet again salaries in 2012 are comparable with salaries in 2010, with a small number of exceptions.
The retail, consumer and digital/ technology areas were the main drivers of recruitment whilst the financial services and social sectors still remaining stagnant.
There is mixed sentiment from the healthcare, travel, media and b2b sectors, with about half our clients expressing a positive outlook for the rest of 2012. The other half have a more pessimistic view as they are affected by cuts in spend and streamlining processes from their customers.
Nearly all of our clients have worked hard on talent retention and we have seen the number of counter offers increase in the second quarter this year . In addition some of the larger firms have focused on controlling their staff turnover and worked hard to build good solid career paths.
In addition the impact of AWR (Agency workers Directive) is still unclear as many firms are still confused about how this will impact their business and have not set up robust enough systems to ensure that they are on top of things.
Manuela Boyce : Director
