Every year end Thorpe Molloy Recruitment launches its annual salary review, summarizing recruitment trends of the past year and predicting the state of the job market in the 12 months to come across its specialisms. Despite the current austerity and remuneration freezes, we have continued the tradition in the belief that our guide is more valuable than ever, offering clarity for those in a position to hire and managing expectations for candidates in the highly competitive job market.
In short, both contractor cuts and permanent staff redundancies have increased and cascaded down the supply chain throughout 2015, with Oil & Gas UK reporting that employment supported by the sector in the UK contracted by 15% since the start of 2014. The downturn has almost terminated new investment in the mature North Sea basin and accelerated early decommission decision making.
Job losses were inevitable against a history of reactive over-hiring and spiraling costs, but the extent and speed of the reductions has been sobering, and our consultants have handled many a difficult conversation with shell-shocked individuals grappling with the lack of job opportunities. There may be more of this to come as further consolidation and opportunities for M&A activity lead to more job losses.
But there comes a point when slashing jobs and freezing recruitment actually hinders recovery. The KPMG and Rigzone report “When One Crisis Meets Another : Focusing On Talent For The Long Term” calls for talent recruitment to be prioritised, citing an aging workforce, lack of internal candidates and a lack of defined strategies for talent management as very significant barriers to future success.
Only time will tell if the Industry Behaviours Charter will drive collaboration and greater efficiency, but there is optimism that investing co-operatively in R&D will lead to technological advancements which improve the economic viability of North Sea reserves and turn the north east of Scotland into a decommissioning global centre of excellence.
Despite high candidate availability, permanent salaries are generally holding steady. It is candidate expectations which have adjusted, with “flexibility” and “resilience” essential attributes for now and most probably all of 2016.
To access Thorpe Molloy Recruitment’s review by specialist area please visit www.thorpemolloy.com/salaryguide.