New Zealand a nation of prevalent talent deficits

Technology / news

Not enough experienced candidates to fill NZ jobs in tech, engineering, manufacturing and financial sectors, recruiter says

26th Aug 24, 4:35pm by Juha Saarinen

Source: 123rf.com

New Zealand leads the world in the "most prevalent talent deficit" league for jobs in crucial industries, it would appear. This is according to a new report from recruiters Hayes.

What that means is Aotearoa was ranked number one in the above category, based on the fewest available industry professionals available per role.

Hays said that New Zealand, along with Switzerland, Portugal, Britain and Canada, has between 19% and 23% of its workforce with 0 to 3 years of experience.

That's for jobs in the technology, engineering, banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), and manufacturing sectors.

For the 10 prevalent talent deficit countries, there are only between one to six professionals working in the industry per open role, Hays said.

If you're an experienced working stiff in technology, this might be welcome news as you try to survive in the ill and chill winds of the recession blowing through the bones of the New Zealand labour market currently.

Not having a pipeline of experienced labour is bad news for a country though, but that seems to be how things are done in this part of the world.

Countries like the United States, China, India, Germany and Brazil have the best talent supply, Hays noted. There are no prizes for guessing why that is.

Colombia is up and coming, and is cost competitive too for tech talent with an average salary of US$13,723.

Candidates for tech jobs etc may want to note that Australia is ranked in the fourth spot for skills shortage and talent deficit. Looking across the Tasman for work might literally pay off handsomely, in other words.

Globally, Hays said there are around 57 million people working in technology, with 853,000 jobs advertised. Engineering has 112 million workers, with 877,000 job ads, and the BFSI sector amounts to 46 million people, with 843,000 situations vacant.

In the tech sector, the Top 10 in-demand and emerging jobs are these, Hays said:

Project/Programme Manager
Software Engineer
Systems Engineer (includes embedded systems)
DevOps Engineer
Data Analyst/Scientist
Systems and Solutions Architect
Information Security Specialist
Business Analyst
Cloud System Architect/Specialist
Account/Sales Manager

Hays said it collected data from 31 countries around the world.

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18 Comments

by LBD | 26th Aug 24, 5:48pm 1724651312

No surprises there. Until NZ matches the income and lifestyle that similar proffesionals enjoy offshore, this situation will never improve. I am one, working FIFO, using my skills offshore and earning 2 to 3 times a similar position in NZ would earn. Yes I am an NZ tax resident paying an extrodinary amount of tax in NZ.

by Pa1nter | 26th Aug 24, 7:52pm 1724658727

FIFO is always going to pay a lot more, because it's in places most people don't want to work. You can earn $130k+ cleaning floors on a mine site, but a fraction of that in a city where there's a much larger pool of labour to compete with.

The shortage will be partly related to an imbalance between our education system and what roles industry actually needs.

Any role on an immigration skills shortage list should have free education in NZ.

by streetwise | 27th Aug 24, 12:35am 1724675710

Funny that. Scandinavian countries pay higher taxes than NZ and yet their societies are more cohesive and stable. I was going to say they have less crime than NZ but then our Associate Minister of Justice (Firearms), Nicole McKee, is about to open the door to the sale of automatic weapons so we'll all be able to defend ourselves...this should make criminals think twice and bring our crime rate down to Scandinavian levels.

by nigelh | 27th Aug 24, 7:42am 1724701338

You might want to give Sweden a miss on the crime front.

by K.W. | 27th Aug 24, 12:40pm 1724719237

You still worrying about guns while criminals have figured out that bombs are even better?

In 2023, there were a record-high 149 confirmed explosive attacks in Sweden. The number of preparations and attempts was equally higher than other years as well.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1462427/explosive-attacks-in-sweden/

https://www.politico.eu/article/sweden-new-normal-bomb-attacks-suburbs-…

by kiwi_overseas | 26th Aug 24, 7:24pm 1724657058

ABSURD.

As a qualified professional in one of the NZ shortlisted areas I’m leaving NZ again for a better paid overseas job as there aren’t any jobs in NZ.

The govt crashed the economy hard. Real gdp/capita is falling. It would have been far better getting started on the infrastructure deficit.

by returnedtoNZ | 27th Aug 24, 9:00am 1724706059

Validating this anecdote. My wife is coming back from mat leave. Broad international experience including top tier consulting. Can’t find a job anywhere. If I was a cynic, maybe this recruiter is fishing for a talent DB build. Nice play.

by pacifica | 26th Aug 24, 7:00pm 1724655643

The Hays survey is hilarious as many skilled in tech &engineering know Hays would never find them jobs or be useful recruiters. There are recruitment companies that are fit for purpose and then there is Hayes which is a company of few jobs, with poor conditions and poor pay. If anything many companies are turning back to assessing applications themselves when the experience of the applicants matter & those interested in hiring for a career. NZ is just not a place for skilled workers to start a career or progress through one to senior levels. Even overseas companies are better at hiring kiwis to work remotely in NZ, with better conditions and options, then most NZ companies.

Going through the process of hiring it is hard to see what benefits Hays offers. Even the most well paid roles they offer just are not well advertised e.g. the MS Dynamics ad is a dogs breakfast, with zero useful information in the ad, and if you have to move to Wellington & travel into the CBD daily for it that pay is way too low.

The senior construction engineering roles are likewise uninformative and appears very short term or cautionary tales from the outset.

And those were the only ones that had dedicated salary mentioned upfront at a reasonable rates.

I spat my coffee out laughing at the ad for Hays recruitment consultant https://www.seek.co.nz/job/77909411?type=standout&ref=search-standalone…

Looking at their recruitment ads it is clear NZ is in dire straights with very few jobs around in the market and we have a pipeline of 1000s of hopefuls looking for jobs being added to the mix every year. No wonder in engineering (civil, consultancy & tech) the going rule was leave NZ or you will have to leave the industry to find decent work & career growth. That rule existed more then 10 years ago, and is more true today. Any graduates are just better off leaving NZ straight away. There is no work for them in the industry in NZ (probability, number of graduates per year far exceed the number jobs available). Those who are not at levels to own and manage their own company would also find it easier to get good stable work overseas, stable enough to have a family or own a dog.

by streetwise | 27th Aug 24, 12:21am 1724674862

Yes, all the 'smart' brains are going into recruiting and human resources jobs. In those jobs you'll really bring home the bacon.

by MikeM | 27th Aug 24, 6:45am 1724697902

Have any of these employers thought about investing more into training instead of always wanting turn-key employees.

If they can't find the right skills in the marketplace then they need to get off their backsides and create the right skills with the talented people already in house.

How about training the semi skilled staff such as admin to become high skilled. It's much easier to fill admin roles than it is software designers.

There are many more education and training options for employers nowadays which doesn't involve full-time, on campus, study.

by refactornz | 27th Aug 24, 2:47pm 1724726870

1. Why should they, when NZ has a tradition of people leaving overseas in their 20s and 30s?

2. Many do provide training but (until recently) that hasn't kept up with demand.

3. This article already feels out of date. The labour market has changed very quickly and there's now an excess of skilled people looking for work.

by Sam B | 27th Aug 24, 9:52am 1724709141

As far as I can see, exactly those experienced professionals listed are struggling to find work in NZ.

I suspect the problem here is that the HR/hiring industry is completely cooked, unable to distinguish their own arse from their elbow, and chronically rejecting qualified people for spurious reasons while complaining 'they're just not out there'.

Keep in mind that HR professionals generally don't understand anything much about the industry they're hiring for, they're generic. If they're given a list of requirements, they take everything literally. They're unlikely to realise, for example, that "I've been using Typescript for the last few years" means essentially the same thing as "I'm a Java dev." The best CVs are unlikely to even make it past the automated screening.

My message to employers: please, please do your own hiring, and have candidates interviewed by the people they'll be directly reporting to - people who actually understand the nuts and bolts of the work.

by MikeM | 27th Aug 24, 10:25am 1724711156

Well said.

by refactornz | 27th Aug 24, 2:50pm 1724727046

They're unlikely to realise, for example, that "I've been using Typescript for the last few years" means essentially the same thing as "I'm a Java dev."

Sam B - Typescript dev is not similar to Java dev. It seems you meant Javascript.

by Geoffm | 28th Aug 24, 9:20pm 1724836856

This is not new, but made worse by computer sorting of applications. You have to play buzzword bingo with the right keywords to get past the first screening. My recommendation to anyone job hunting , especially if you have rare skills, is make a short list of those you want to work for, and knock on doors. If you have been around a while, you probably know some one there and can get the real word on working for the company, not HR fluff.

by pacifica | 29th Aug 24, 2:25pm 1724898347

Yes now the trick is to spam the buzzwords into white space at near 0pt font so the AI picks up on it but the CV does not look like a mess filled with hundreds of buzzwords. When it finally reaches a human who reads the CV more then 4 stages along it still looks ok and the usual shortlist of top recruiter buzzwords can be visible. Note the shortlist is not real tech buzzwords. So when making the shortlist think of what someone who reads the women's weekly, the property mags, or can barely stay aware of the number of drinks they had at the sports bar thinks are buzzwords for hiring for tech; a low bar of fashionable gibberish that when stringed together makes "synergy".

by @tony | 27th Aug 24, 6:11pm 1724739091

Utter Crap.

I know a lot of very expereinced IT professionals that have either quit IT (and why not as its a hard game) or cannot find work in NZ and are leaving.

Add to that that the "dash" for the cloud (for various unproven reasons as it's not cost/maintenance) has resulted in a need for "cloud with everyhting" and as such "programmers" now need to know programming/cloud/deployment (including typescript)/security/"modern" UI frameworks/etc. ... and not knowing any part of this truly MASSIVE "stack" now means the "recruitment" "experts" say you are not skilled...

Recuritment agents are getting worse and worse and the "newer" (cheaper) agents dont have a clue about "older" tech (the hard stuff the big boys actually use for running banks etc.).

Worse; the trend is to get "consultancies" to do the work using their "expert" overseas "pool" of programmers (betwwn them all they can cover the massive stack)... but you can guess how that works out ... need I say more...

AUS pays better, and the jobs that are advertised, actually do exist, unlike a lot of ghost adverts in NZ.

Go to OZ!

by pacifica | 29th Aug 24, 2:29pm 1724898586

Better yet the US will offer American style health insurance for the whole family with preexisting conditions considered. If you want better job standards work for a company in a country that wins legal cases for them more often. Rather then the she'll be right after you die from cancer caused by work exposure or the effective pay under minimum wage in NZ & Aus still.