Demand for specialists continues to rise
Demand for specialists has continued to rise. This is according to the latest specialist index of the personnel service provider Hays. The growth in Switzerland is virtually unique internationally. This applies across all the academic professions covered, it continues.
The Hays Fachkräfte Index (FKI) is based on a quarterly evaluation by index Internet und Mediaforschung GmbH for Hays. It includes job advertisements from the busiest online job exchanges, daily newspapers, and the XING business network. The index has been established in Switzerland since 2011 and was relaunched this year. In addition to the individual sector evaluations, it now offers an overarching index for overall demand twice a year. The reference value is the first quarter of 2015. On average, demand in Switzerland has since doubled in the areas covered. This strong growth is unique internationally. In the current year, for example, the index in Germany fell from 154 in Q1 to 149 in Q2, while in Switzerland it rose from 181 to 197.
Implementation of the mass immigration initiative shows effects
One reason for the increased shortage of skilled workers could be that vacancies in this country are no longer so easy to fill following the adoption of the mass immigration initiative. Although the popular initiative was only implemented in a weakened form, the psychological barrier to moving to Switzerland from abroad rose. At the same time, earning and promotion opportunities in Switzerland's neighboring countries have become much better, and the Swiss franc has lost value against the euro. A move to Switzerland is therefore less worthwhile today from a financial perspective than it was a few years ago.
Shortage of skilled workers in almost all industries
The often cited shortage of skilled workers can be quantified and visualized in the FKI. In the engineering sector, the index rose from 186 points previously to 192 points in Q2. In absolute figures, this means that 4429 engineers were sought in Switzerland in the second quarter of 2018. This includes 931 development engineers (e.g. for drive technology, automation, electrical engineering, hardware, mechanical engineering and mechatronics) and 939 electrical engineers. The effects of digitalization are reflected here.
In the FKI, the term finance refers to academic employees in corporate and bank accounting, but not to the banking sector as such. Demand has also risen in this skill segment, almost doubling over the three-year period. Digitalization has apparently not yet made itself felt in this segment in the form of major job cuts.
Specialists for IT and life science particularly in demand
IT specialization is the most sought-after professional group. In Q2 2018, 18,715 open graduate positions were registered. Here, the demand for database developers and security specialists has increased the most in the last three years (factor 2.7), reflecting the importance of the currently particularly topical issues of big data and security.
There has also been a doubling of demand in the life science sector over the last three years. This index is the smallest in absolute terms. The qualifications of chemists and life scientists are also newly reported, with the latter seeing a 323 percent growth in demand since 2015.
Hays recorded the demand for qualified employees in Sales & Marketing for Switzerland for the first time. Analogous to the development of the overall index, the demand for specialists has almost doubled here as well. Due to digitalization and new sales channels, the number of online marketing managers sought has even almost tripled since 2015.
More information: www.hays.ch
