How do your 2016 Hiring plans stack up against the rest of the country?

Are your 2016 hiring plans proactive or reactive?  The Canadian economy is projected once again to have mixed results in 2016, varying by region and sector with respect to growth. Projecting ahead to the first quarter of 2016 Manpower has released the 2016 Manpower Employment Outlook survey results/ Canadian employers remain cautious and conservative in their hiring plans heading into the new year.

1,900 Canadian employers were asked one question ‘How do you anticipate total employment at your location to change In the three months to the end of March compared to the current quarter?”  On the whole the mood of employers was pretty much what we have come to expect, only a moderate number of employers anticipated hiring in the first quarter of 2016.

Employers Hiring Expectations for Q1, 2016

Data from Across Canada

  • 9% plan staffing increases
  • 7% expect staffing cutbacks
  • 81% expect current staffing levels to remain the same
  • 3% are unsure about their hiring intentions

Regional Breakdown

  • Atlantic Canada the net Employment Outlook is 10%
  • Ontario net Employment Outlook is 8%
  • Western Canada the net Employment Outlook 7%
  • Quebec the net Employment Outlook 5%

Among the best places to find employment in Canada include Mississauga, Brampton and Kitchener in Ontario, Surrey in B.C. and Moncton in NB. The poorest outlooks included Laval and Montenegro in QC, Edmonton, AB and Barrie, Niagara Falls and Fort Erie in Ontario

Breaking down who is hiring.
The hiring intentions look to be driven by medium and large employers as medium employers (50-249 employees) and large employers (250+) expect to increase staffing 14% and 13% respectively. Small employers (10-49) and Micro employers (1-9) plan to stay small at 4% and 3%. 

When we examine hiring data by industry and sector we see that 6 industries are expecting the majority of the gains:

  1. Transportation & Public Utilities: Net Employment Outlook of 15% which is 2% up from Q3 in 2015 and marginally up 3% from last year
  2. Manufacturing – Durables: Net Employment Outlook of 12% which is 5% up from Q3 2015 but 2% down from last year
  3. Construction: Net Employment Outlook of 12% which is 6% up from Q3 2015 and just edging up 2% up from last year
  4. Wholesale & Retail Trade: Net Employment Outlook of 11%, which is a marginal loss of 2% from Q3 2015 and a slight 2% increase from last year
  5. Public Administration: A Net Employment Outlook of 11%, with almost no increase from Q3 2015 at 1% which is1 % down from last year
  6. Services: net Employment Outlook of 10%, an increase of 3% from Q3 2015 and a marginal 1% rise from last year

The remaining 4 sectors expect very modest hiring.

  1. Mining has a Net Employment Outlook of 9%, which is a jump down of 6% down from Q3 2015 and a bigger jump down at 15% from last year
  2. Finance, Insurance & Real Estate: Net Employment Outlook of 7%, which is 1% down from the previous quarter and 9% down from last year
  3. Manufacturing – NonDurables: Net Employment Outlook of 4%, no change from Q3 2015 par and marginally down at 1% from last year
  4. Education: Net Employment Outlook of 3%, down 1% from Q3 2015 and a decrease of 4% from last year

Most Difficult to Find Employees

In additional research from Manpower, the hardest to fill jobs in 2015 were:

  • Ÿ Skilled tradespeople   Ÿ
  • Drivers
  • Technicians     Ÿ
  • Sales Representatives                Ÿ
  • Engineers
  • Accounting and Finance staff   Ÿ
  • Administrative assistants  Ÿ
  • Management/Executives                 Ÿ
  • Teachers

For the past 10 years Skilled Trades, Sales, Engineers and Technicians have consistently remained at the top.

When asked, the organizations indicated that the top 5 factors impacting their difficulty finding people included:

  • 44% said Environmental / Market factors
  • 38% Lack of applicants
  • 37% Lack of technical competencies (hard skills)
  • 26% Organizational factors
  • 18% lack of qualified skilled tradespeople

Effectively Addressing Hiring Needs

Of the organizations Manpower surveys only 1 in 10 employers said they had a strategy to address their current and projected talent shortages.

Understanding your region, industry and hiring needs is an essential ingredient of effective staffing management. Identifying ways to prepare for and fill gaps in both the short and long-term should include building an ongoing talent pool that you can tap into efficiently proactively and not always re-actively.

Today there are more tools than ever that allows you to build a talent pipeline that you can tap into quickly and efficiently. Tools like Canada’s qualify and Magnet or LinkedIn ad opportunities to build ongoing relationships with potential talent, compared to posting jobs on job boards or on your careers page. These tools allow you to find not only permanent staff but also cultivate relationships with temporary or contingent employees as more organizations and people move into the ‘Gig’ economy.

Resources

Qualify:  Includes a ‘Talent Dojo’, the brand-based engagement platform for volume recruiting.

Magnet: Magnet connects people with the jobs they’re interested in and qualified for using powerful job-matching technology.