Precision Blog - Recruitment and Employment News

Confidence among business professionals has surged, suggesting the recession is at an end, a survey has said.

The Institute of Chartered Accountants’ index of business confidence rose to 4.8 at the end of June, from -28.2 in March, the biggest rise for two years.

However, chief executive Michael Izza warned against “underestimating” the challenges ahead for businesses.

The institute predicts the UK economy will grow by 0.5% in the third quarter.

Its forecast comes after the economy shrank by 0.8% in the second quarter of the year.More than 1,000 chartered accountants were surveyed across England, Wales and Scotland.

“This quarter’s Business Confidence Monitor suggests that the UK recession is at an end,” said Mr Izza.

“While there is no doubt that the UK economy is on its way to recovery, we shouldn’t underestimate the challenges ahead for businesses.”

About 41% of senior professionals were more confident about their business prospects in the next year, but only 6% were much more confident, indicating that some caution remains.

IT was the most optimistic sector, followed by banking, finance and insurance. The institute said the banking sector in particular had shown “a remarkable upturn given the turmoil of the last two years”.

The least confident professions were health and education, as fears of cuts in the public sector grow.

source: www.bbc.co.uk/news

Agencies are the weapon of choice for jobseekers, according to a new survey from HR recruiter HR GO.

The survey shows that 64% of jobseekers preferred to use agencies to find work, while 36% prefer job boards.

Jack Parkinson, HR GO group chairman, says: “There are so many benefits to using an agency to source work and even more so in today’s climate.

“The high level of redundancies businesses have been forced to make has led to an explosion of jobseekers looking for jobs in a candidate-saturated market, which makes it all the more important to seek the help of a professional recruiter to secure that job.”

source: www.Recruiter.co.uk

A manufacturing firm boss who pleaded with customers for work in a bid to safeguard jobs has ended up winning so many orders he had to recruit 15 staff. Dennis Kent, managing director of Carlton Laser Services, in Hamilton, Leicester, faced having to trim his workforce when work dried up because of the downturn. But in the end he took back 15 of the 23 staff he had made redundant earlier in the year, through an agency, after securing a flurry of contracts. Mr Kent said he decided to go to key customers after realising cutting any more skilled workers would have a significant impact on his metal cabinet making business.

He said: “We started eating into our core skills. “This is why I took the action – we were at risk of it really affecting us as a business.”

The business, which employs 53 people, has also moved into new markets, including electrical assembly and stainless steel polishing. It has invested £400,000 in a machine to carry out the new work.The adaptability of Leicestershire manufacturers has been praised by business advisers PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC). PWC’s The Future of Manufacturing report said while they were facing many challenges, regional firms were responding well to the global downturn.

Chris Hibbs, PWC’s UK manufacturing expert, who is based in Castle Donington, said: “There are signs manufacturers in the region are responding positively to the downturn. “This is evident in the lengths regional employers are going to to minimise redundancies and retain vital knowledge and expertise.” The PWC report said companies could do more to reduce their exposure to the downturn, such as focusing more on specialist markets and investing in green technology.

It also called on the Government to provide a longer-term vision for manufacturing, and do more to help with training, innovation and research and development.

Mr Hibbs said the view manufacturing was in terminal decline was overstated, pointing out that industry output reached an historic high in 2007.

Manufacturing makes up about 17% of the Leicestershire economy, compared with 11% for the UK as a whole.  Other county manufacturers are also reporting a more positive outlook. Ben Jones-Fenleigh, commercial director of sheet metal producer Metalfacture, of Wigston, said the company had won £450,000 worth of new orders in recent months.

“We have noticed an upturn in the past few months and have some orders in,” he said.

Robert Flowers, managing director of dishcloth maker Ramon Hygiene Products, in Thurmaston Boulevard, Leicester, said: “Year on year, we are going to be up between 8% and 9%.”

Source: Leicester Mercury Tuesday August 11th 2009.

Scott Lydon, Senior Engineering Consultant commented on the article:

“The Consultancy that’s mentioned in the article is Precision Recruitment, we are sole supplier to both Carlton Laser Services and Metalfacture. We have worked successfully in partnership with both companies to provide a cost effective method of maintaining skill levels within their workforce whilst in these difficult economic conditions.”

A third of UK employees believe that employers look badly on jobseekers that have been made redundant, but 35% of employers are actively targeting redundant workers from rival firms, according to research from Jobsite.

The research also shows that 12% believe the myth that employers take a “last-in, first-out” approach to redundancy.

But over a third (35%) of HR managers are looking to hiring to get them through the downturn and enjoy rapid recovery as the economy improves and 53% are also still engaging in general recruitment.
Keith Potts, chief executive of Jobsite.co.uk, says: “Job losses are dominating the headlines, but not all companies are shedding staff or freezing recruitment.  It’s easy to see how job hunting myths can come to fruition when candidates are under increased stress.

“However, our research shows that in this difficult time, many businesses need talented, committed employees more than ever. We would recommend candidates who are unhappy in their current roles look before they leap – researching their perspective employers thoroughly.  At the same time we would also encourage people to have the confidence to follow their career aspirations. Even in a downturn, there are excellent opportunities out there.”

Source: Recruiter.co.uk

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Precision Recruitment, the Leicestershire Business Awards finalist, is urging local businesses to think about their swine flu procedures now. Should significant numbers of a work force become ill, contingency planning to involve temporary workers will be essential to maintain production. To date, over 5,000 cases of swine flu have been recorded in our area.  If this current growth is sustained, the NHS estimates that up to 30% of the population will experience symptoms of this virus with a possible peak in late September.

Phil Walker, Director of Precision commented:

“Businesses are only just starting to show signs of recovery from the recession.  Unless they plan for the swine flu pandemic, their recovery could be seriously affected. Obviously you can’t cover all positions with temporary workers, but roles such as production and administration staff can be protected in this way. Due to the current economic climate, Precision has a pool of eager and experienced staff ready to fill such positions on a temporary basis.”

 Precision has put together a 4 Point plan to assist its clients through the coming months.

Precision’s 4 Point swine flu plan:

1. Prevention: Remind staff that good hygiene can prevent the transmission of the swine flu virus by keeping the office, shop floor and general work areas clean. This means wiping down computers, telephones, desks, worktops, door handles and surfaces more frequently and using tissues when sneezing placing these straight in a bin.
2. Symptoms: Encourage staff to inform you immediately if they are showing any symptoms or if any of their close relatives (spouses, children) have the virus. Immediately send any affected staff home to prevent the spread of the virus to the rest of your employees. Clean the work area and keep the remainder of your staff well informed.
3. Identify: Recognise the staff absolutely essential to your business.  For example, areas of production could bottleneck if a key worker is absent for a week. On the office and sales side of the business is the phone going to be answered quickly and professionally when a prospective new customer calls.
4. Solution: Liaise with your Precision consultant to establish details of the temporary staff you may need. We at Precision are trained to take detailed and thorough specifications of staff requirements. Should you have a number of staff off sick with swine flu, your consultant can then respond immediately offering you suitable temporary staff.

Phil Walker also commented:

“Our swine flu contingency plan is currently being rolled out across our client base. Our consultants are liaising with clients to talk through how we will assist them if a number of their staff are taken ill. For some of our engineering clients, half the shop floor staff absent could mean orders that cannot be fulfilled, resulting in loss of business. This is something they simply cannot afford to do. We will provide them with immediate temporary cover to get the orders out and keep their customers satisfied.”

At Precision our procedures and plans are in place. We use state of the art technology so if our consultants can’t get into the office for whatever reason, with a flick of a switch they can work from home and continue to service our clients.”

Ben Jones-Fenleigh, Director of well-established sheet metal company Metalfacture comments “Having a back up plan in place with Precision has enabled us to identify areas of production that would suffer if any of our staff were to become ill or be unable to make it in. With accurate planning of our workload and staffing skill level Precision has put together a fail safe plan to ensure that we keep on top of our healthy order book and keep our clients happy.”

This press release was published in the Leicester Mercury in the Business News section on Wednesday 5th August 2009.