Half of finance leaders predict struggles with hiring staff in the new year, with risk, compliance and governance professionals being in particularly high demand
Half of UK senior finance professionals expect their business to have more difficulties attracting and retaining key talent in 2016 than they did this year.
In a study published today by specialist accountancy and finance recruiter Savant Recruitment, over 80 per cent of those interviewed said they thought they would struggle to recruit risk, compliance and governance specialists next year, who will be in particularly hot demand thanks to increasing risks around cyber crime and incoming regulations for the banking sector.
Of those surveyed, 55 per cent also thought they would have problems filling accountancy and financial management roles.
As for other skills finance leaders thought it would be important to recruit for next year, 49 per cent said they wanted employees with commercial understanding. Meanwhile, 43 per cent said they wanted more workers with management and leadership capabilities, 40 per cent wanted staff with risk management skills and 38 per cent saw a need for hires with data analytics talents.
“Working smart, mitigating risk, adopting new technologies and understanding or using data to make commercial decisions will be important factors for success, so it’s not surprising that key skills in leadership, commercial understanding, risk management and data analytics are high up on the much-needed skills list,” said Mark Sheldon, managing director at Savant Recruitment. “As candidates become scarcer the specialist recruitment market will be under even greater pressure and firms will be looking to recruiters for their expertise to help in finding and securing the key talent they so desperately need.”