Kaizer Community’s HR overhaul: Payroll automation, complian...
"It’s given us confidence in our processes and freed up valuable time"
Hiring employees… How’s it going for you and your business?
With layoffs in the tech industry, rising inflation rates, increased cost of living pressures, recessionary fears, geopolitical instability and more… It’s clear that we’re in uncertain and volatile times.
With so much going on, it’s clear that businesses are facing some big challenges at the moment. So, how can employers improve their hiring processes to better attract good talent? To help you better understand the hiring landscape in Australia and New Zealand, we polled 509 business leaders.
A snapshot of our findings? Hiring costs are increasing — in large due to the rising cost of living, but also because of labour shortages and increased prices of job board postings. SMEs are also struggling in the competition against bigger business for good talent, and have difficulties accessing job boards due to their small budgets – and this is just the tip of the iceberg.
The findings might surprise you or strongly resonate with you. But above all, we hope you gain valuable insights from this report that will help shape your recruitment and retention strategy for the future.
In this report, we cover:
- Number of candidates vs. time to hire;
- The growing cost of hiring;
- New hire turnover and talent shortages;
- The struggle of SMEs against multinational corporations;
- What takes up the most time in the recruitment cycle; and
- Much more.
For a deeper dive into improving the candidate experience, download our comprehensive Candidate Experience Checklist, which is designed to help you nail the candidate experience every single time.
Our Employee Recruitment Process Guide provides valuable insights into recruitment and onboarding, which are crucial parts of the employee lifecycle.
Key findings
The average amount of time taken by hiring leaders to fill a role in Australia and New Zealand.
of hiring leaders agree that small businesses struggle to compete for talent with MNCs.
spent per week on hiring activities.
Increase in job advertising rates over the past year.
Average cost (AUD) to advertise a role in Australia.
Average cost (NZD) to advertise a role in New Zealand.
What does the hiring landscape in Australia and New Zealand look like at the moment?
Australia’s workplace regulations have undergone one of their biggest upheavals in decades this year. From the introduction of the ‘Secure Jobs, Better Pay’ Bill’ to the most substantial increase to the National Minimum Wage Increase in recent history, employers have had to grapple with continual compliance changes whilst trying to attract top talent. It’s certainly been no easy feat.
Over in New Zealand, one of the most pressing challenges businesses face is a talent shortage. As the economy tightens and sectors report huge shortages of staff, there’s a keen worry about how businesses will survive. In fact, 90% of businesses said in a recent survey that they were struggling to find new employees, with many citing the challenges of attracting overseas workers as one of the key drivers. When there’s a talent shortage, hiring processes have to be efficient — it can’t be too long or too arduous, or else businesses risk losing good talent.
What can hiring leaders and employers do to cut hiring costs but still get the talent they need?
We understand that the data from our report can be a lot to digest. Here are a few action points to help.
Invest in an applicant tracking system (ATS)
We can’t stress this enough — having an applicant tracking system is an absolute game changer for your business. If there’s anything we’ve gained from the pandemic, it’s that leveraging technology to improve business processes has never been so important.
An integrated ATS enables you to advertise, hire and onboard staff seamlessly, all from one place. You can post job ads to multiple job sites with a single submission, integrate with popular job boards, track candidates through the pipeline, build a shortlist, and so on. The benefits are out there for you to enjoy — you simply need to take the first step.
Hire globally if you can’t hire locally
If hiring locally ever gets too overwhelming for your business and you just can’t seem to find the talent you need, why not expand your horizons? In today’s flexible working world, the recruitment opportunities are borderless. Employment Hero’s Global Team’s service can help you employ the best talent for your team, based anywhere in the world. Get employment contracts created in compliance with local employment laws, without the need for any recruiters, overseas entities, or compliance risks.
Focus on employee retention
If your employees don’t quit, there wouldn’t be a need to hire — unless you’re expanding business operations of course. Ask for feedback regularly, listen to what your employees want, and create a company culture that brings out the best in your employees.
Our Talent Insights Report for Australia and New Zealand previously revealed that apart from a salary increase, employees are looking for a better reward and recognition program, flexible working options, better learning opportunities, subsidised health insurance, monetary bonuses or rewards, and extra leave days that could be used for birthday celebrations, mental health needs, or volunteering.
For small business owners unsure of when to hire, our Small Business Guide to Hiring New Employees offers detailed guidance to help make informed decisions.
To understand what drives employee satisfaction and retention, check out the Australian Employee Expectations Report. It provides insights into what influences employees to accept or resign from a job.
“To thrive and attract top-notch talent amidst a competitive landscape, establishing a clear mission is paramount. When individuals witness a business passionately pursuing a greater purpose, they are naturally attracted to become part of the journey.”
Rapid recruitment. Swift onboarding. Only with Swag.
Hiring managers managed to reduce their time to hire by
in Q2 2023, using the Swag jobs board.
This means that they were able to onboard new starters
than candidates sourced from other job boards.
Methodology and sample profile
We carried out quantitative research with 509 business leaders in Australia and New Zealand. The length of the survey was 3 minutes on average. Respondents were from different organisation sizes and industries. The survey was conducted with the Glow survey platform, using the Dynata B2B panel from 27th to 30th June 2023.
