What jobs are you/your employer struggling to recruit to?

[wanttoworkbut]

Just that really. There's a million comments saying getting jobs is difficult at the moment, but there must be some shortages somewhere, or at least where there are fewer good candidates. I am looking in the north, but any region of the UK welcome.

What sort of things do they support you with?

Really? This is my line of work at the moment and just don’t apply as they usually ask for chartered status which I’m not. I do have over 18 years experience though?

Are you in Bath? Def that situation here

The PP who cite youngsters getting jobs or bolstering their cv via connections is the way forward. I run a small business and I don't want the responsibility of formally employing anyone (already employ a cleaner and gardener cash in hand). However I have given a bit of work experience and brilliant references to two female relatives. Both of them went on to get admin type jobs. Totally different name so no obvious connection that we are related. I just cite my website address. You just have to be prepared to game the system and bend the rules a bit.

BTW I got onto a uni psychology course without even O level maths by simply blagging it. Back in those days no one asked for certificates or checked up. You just ticked a box and that was it.

You can't really "blag it" today though as some of the online application processes insist on you uploading your exam certificates etc and they also do online checks against numerous databases etc.

Can you see any flaws with this approach?

@Badbadbunny 's post about universities made me think we should turn the new universities back into polys again.

Currently trying to recruit for
clinical psychologists
OTs
OT assistants
HCAs

on acute inpatient.

It is if you expect the person to have a degree, and the tens of thousands of pounds worth of debt that comes with that.

This is part of the problem imo. Employers should either pay for the training/qualifications themselves, or offer a salary that adequately compensates the person for the training/qualifications they have acquired.

32k is barely a liveable salary for a single person these days. Especially in Bristol where the code of housing is so expensive.

Massively agree that uni needs to be more targeted to employment. And why not more two year courses?! With work placement.
I posted previously about my 23 year DD and her search for something decent in banking/accounting. She is actually working. In a High street bank in our town. 9-5 in the bank. Can walk to work. Started on NMW plus a tiny bit. Has completed all their specialist training in record time and now on £29k. Works very hard. But retail banking has few prospects for progression.
She’s competing against people with degrees that got much poorer A level results than her but degree is used as first barrier for most jobs she could probably pick up quickly.
I had three DC in 3 years (she is a twin) and am single parent earning just above threshold where I have to contribute full support. Eldest went to uni and got a graduate job on £30k and the twins deferred places while trying to decide if the debt was worth it. They knew I would struggle to contribute so worked while they thought about it. Both kept deferring while looking for an alternative.
Luckily her twin eventually got an apprenticeship after months of trying and working and was kept on and now has great prospects.
She sees her eldest sibling paying back loans after a uni course that was delivered all remotely during Covid. And her twin doing better and earning more with the apprenticeship route.
I do think she has to be a bit creative and take any job with prospects where she can prove herself. All these shortage occupations seem though to need an investment by the individual to get their training and we can’t really afford that whilst also seeing that most degrees don’t seem worth it.
Fair enough that she can’t compete with those who have their degree. But frustrating that bright young people are finding it so hard to get anything decent. She could have my job if I didn’t have to work to 67!

Estates Surveyors - I interviewed for a council recently who had been trying to recruit for 5 years! Day rate for a reasonably experienced surveyor is £750, unqualified estates surveyors around the £500 on interim basis is what they are having to pay to fill the vacancies!

If you have ten years experience you can apply for final assessment to become chartered. I’m at 9 years and will apply for final assessment next year.

Massively agree that uni needs to be more targeted to employment. And why not more two year courses?! With work placement.

That's the sort of thing the polytechnics used to do. University was about academic challenge, studying for love of the subject.

Then along came Blair and Brown.

There's been a few OT references...one of the things I might consider, if I could get an apprenticeship. I can't afford a two year masters degree though.

Oh thank you - didn’t realise I could do that!

That really surprises me re actuaries... can I ask why? I would have thought it was massively oversubscribed. Is it one of those where there's an oversupply of newbies and a shortage of highly experienced? I'd actually really like to retrain as an actuary but I have an Arts degree so not sure if I'd be laughed at!

Also really surprised to hear that there's a shortage of surveyors!

This is what I earn. I have a first class degree and got my job partly off the back of it. I also live in a city that is more expensive than Bristol. It's definitely not a liveable salary.

Things like probation officer, any kind of healthcare support role etc simply don't pay enough for hazard/workload/working conditions. Being paid minimum wage to deal with violent and aggressive people and/or bodily fluids all day is really not alright. I've done it myself and I can't say I'd do it again.

I suspect the shortage, and the same with actuaries also mentioned here, is not due to lack of people wanting to go into these fields. It’s likely due to a shortage of training places in order to become fully qualified.
In many of these professions it’s very difficult right now to get that 1st job, and without that we simply aren’t going to have the fully qualified and experienced people. It seems to me we’ve got into a place where most employers are looking for someone already fully qualified and experienced

Very high drop out rates as it's hard to study for professional exams alongside full time work. And after 3 years (or 4) at Uni, graduates are fatigued and another 3/4 years of professional exams is a very hard task.

I really struggled 40 years ago to do my accountancy exams alongside full time work, as I actually wanted to get on with life, rather than continuing to spend evenings and weekends studying/revising for 16 exams over 4 years!

My son is a graduate actuary working for one of the UK's biggest insurance/pension firms. They take on lots of graduates/interns for their various professions, i.e. actuary, accountant, HR, marketing, etc., but the drop out rate is huge. That's with something like 30 paid study days on top of something like 35 holiday days, study materials/course/exams all paid for, and a starting salary of around £35k (same for graduates and 1 year interns). He's been there 3 years and seen the intakes twice a year in his small department - they come and go again as they really struggle despite all the help they're given. He's half way through his exams and really struggles with motivation to study/revise after a 9 hour working day. Most of his department are actually "failed" actuarial graduates, they started on the graduate scheme, took a few exams, failed a few, and simply couldn't carry on, so they stayed on at lower/junior levels, so not working up through the ranks to the highest actuarial level doing the real actuarial work.

Another factor is the few who get through it and qualify virtually all emigrate within a year or so as they are in such high demand all over the World. The lure of much higher salaries, lower taxes, better living standards is just too much to resist. DS never really considered moving abroad, but he's been to so many "leaving do's" of his co-workers emigrating, that it's really put it to the front of his mind and is a hot topic of conversation among his work colleagues, i.e. discussing the best countries to move to etc.

As I've said upthread, we should be making better use of the 3 years at Uni, i.e. doing the professional exams rather than generic degrees to speed up the training process for those wanting to go into professions. 3 years at Uni plus say 1/2 alongside work is a lot more attractive than 3 years at Uni then coming out, starting again, and doing 3/4/5 years alongside work.

Two areas I can think of: agricultural labourers to work in the fields picking fruit & veg, which is a well-known problem round these parts; and the other one is for expert HGV drivers trained in the transport of flammable gas canisters and other such highly dangerous goods.

I think there is a shortage across types of surveyors - there are only really two main universities that produce Estates/Rural Surveyors (think cheerful Charlie on Clarksons Farm), there probably isn’t the same shortage in building surveyors.

It’s not easy. I earn 29k and have a degree, single and live alone

@MidnightMeltdown

It is if you expect the person to have a degree, and the tens of thousands of pounds worth of debt that comes with that. This is part of the problem imo. Employers should either pay for the training/qualifications themselves, or offer a salary that adequately compensates the person for the training/qualifications they have acquired.

Trouble is that the gradate has say £50k of debt, but their degree is probably not very relevant to the job, in most cases, so it's often a case of starting again, with the employer then having to pay. It would be far better for more degrees to be more relevant/linked to professions so that the graduate could "hit the ground running" with a level of knowledge and ability and more useful to the employer from day one, rather than literally no better than a sixth form leaver 3 years younger with no student debt.