59 pct of Greek employers troubled by talent shortage

In its annual international talent shortage report for 2016, ManpowerGroup said that 59 pct of employers had difficulty in covering vacant job positions. The percentage was unchanged for the second successive year and 10 percentage points higher than a global average rate of 49 pct. Lack of technical skills (29 pct), necessary experience (27 pct), personal skills (12 pct), seeking higher-paid jobs (11 pct) and lack of available candidates (11 pct) were the main reasons for not covering vacant job positions in the country.

On a global level, 40 pct of employers had difficulties in finding workers with necessary skills, up 2.0 percentage points from 2015 and the highest recorded since 2007, evidence that a lack of talent is not abating.

Greece ranks eighth in the world ranking after Japan, Taiwan, Romania, Hong Kong and Turkey, down one place from 2015. Seventy pct of Greek employers believed that the most important strategy to battle talent shortage was to offer training and development programs to existing personnel, while 47 pct of employers said their strategy was to search for talent beyond “traditional tanks” and 42 pct said their strategy was adopting alternative hiring strategies.