Hays, the international recruiter, has said that 45% of those working in the public sector are either facing redundancy or looking for alternative employment.
The recruiter’s Public Services Survey 2011 has discovered that over 80% of employers think the current lack of job security is deterring people, including umbrella company contractors looking for a new contract, looking for a job in the public sector. Slightly over 50% blame changes to benefits and 39% say scrutiny over pay is putting people off.
Furthermore, the study shows that 60% of both employers and workers think early retirement and voluntary redundancy schemes are causing an exodus of top talent.
Andy Robling, Hay’s public services director, said frontline services will more than likely be affected as large swathes of the public sector workforce depart. Demand for services such as education and healthcare are increasing and yet employers need to drive cost savings.
A lot of public sector employees now feel demotivated and undervalued and the sector needs to address this problem quickly, he concluded.
Despite the fact that many public sector employees are unhappy in their present role, a lot of them believe they will need to upskill if they are to find employment elsewhere. More than a quarter of the respondents to a recent Badenoch & Clark survey think they will need to upskill slightly and 13.4% say significant retraining will be required if they are to move to the private sector.
Although public sector budgets are being slashed, organisations are still recruiting IT specialists. In April there was a 5.98% increase in the number of public sector IT vacancies compared to the previous month.
However, to put this in context, IT spend had been at its absolute minimum for several months and now that the new financial year’s budgets have been released, critical projects are being prioritised.
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