More
than 85 per cent of firms in the UK plan to actively recruit during the second
quarter of 2002, a rise of 2 per cent on the last quarter, according to
research published today by recruitment specialist Reed.
More
than 900 organisations across Britain were surveyed for the Reed Recruitment
Index with a third recruiting to grow, half recruiting to retain staff numbers,
and only nine per cent planning to downsize.
The
Reed Recruitment Index shows a slightly more optimistic response from UK
organisations compared to its predictions for the previous quarter made at the
end of last year.
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The
index shows that experienced sales staff are now in the most demand, with 18
per cent of organisations struggling to recruit them, closely followed in
second-place by admin and secretarial staff.
Technical
and engineering staff, in most demand last quarter, are now in third place.
More than 15 per cent of employers express concerns with shortages of
accounting and finance and call centre staff. Demand for IT professionals
remains high, with 8 per cent of firms facing problems recruiting these staff,
but this figure has halved since this time last year.