Industry reflects on ‘toughest year in two decades’

Is SA following the UK, where press reports indicate that recruitment in the British freight industry is recovering? Hiring employees in the freight industry is back on the agenda again, reported International Freighting Weekly (IFW), after a pickup in business over the past couple of months. Recruitment companies operating at a variety of levels told the publication that there had been a recent uplift in enquiries from freight forwarders and logistics companies looking to expand headcounts. For example, Chas Dowton, director at specialist freight recruitment agency First Choice, said: “This has probably been one of the toughest years – certainly worse than after 9/11 – and we’ve gone from a situation in last December, January and February where companies were laying off staff, to having the past three months of continuous improvement.” Larry Woelk, business development director at BiS George Henderson, added that “the feel-good factor was starting to return”. “There’s definitely more of a buzz,” he said, “although it’s also fair to say that the sector takes longer to feel good than bad.” Much of what is written in the article applied to Ribton- Turner Recruitment here in SA, according to Dr Lynn Ribton-Turner. “2009 has been the toughest year that I have experienced in the past 20 years,” she told FTW. “There have been numerous requests during 2009 for sales staff – but operational requirements have been totally flat.” It has been her company’s experience that there are more applicants and less quality staff available. It appears that SA lags behind the recovery in Europe, according to Ribton- Turner. “We entered the recession some months behind them,” she told FTW, “and we have not echoed the experience or our UK counterparts that the market is ‘perkier’ or that there is a ‘feel-good’ factor. “Since we are already moving towards the end of the year we don't expect to find much life in the recruitment market until February/March next year. If there are signs of life earlier we would be delighted.” Feedback from Sabina Botti, marketing manager of Lee Botti & Associates, followed similar lines. “The first three months of the year proved to be tough,” she told FTW, “with many retrenchments taking place, initially at management level and then filtering down throughout the company. “What’s happened is that a lot of companies are really stretched after making redundancies earlier in the year,” Botti said. Both our commentators agree that, as soon as the workload picks up, companies start hiring temporary staff to cover that work until they are ready to hire permanently. But morale within the industry was at an all time low, according to Botti. “We saw positive changes from May,” she said, “with many clients having been through their retrenchments and now needing the extra staff to cope. “However there are presently still major retrenchments taking place in several of the larger companies. “We have, however, noted that there is an abundance of skilled people on the market who are having to be more realistic in terms of salary demands and working conditions - which has proved to be good for the employer.” Botti also noted that the skills shortage of the past was no longer, and employers now had a choice of top talent to choose from. Her expectations are that, although the market is not back at the buoyant stage it once was, Lee Botti & Associates is seeing positive signs – and, more importantly, decisions are being made.