Australia's skills shortage escalates over 20%

Releasing its 2011 expert migration survey, KPMG says the labour shortage worsened by 10% over the past year. & it is not the booming natural resources sector that is feeling the pinch a foreign workers are also being sought in the areas of accounting, finance, IT, planning & owner. There is even a national crisis in Executive Cooks!

Reinforcement of the warnings they have been issuing comes from accounting firm KPMG which expects the retirement of kid boomers over the next decade to present labour challenges to small & medium-sized businesses in Australia.

The survey also found that 28% of respondents were feeling the effects of the departure of kid boomers from the workforce, & 42% expect the generation's retirement to deliver a "moderate to significant" impact over the next years. This year the first of the kid boomers are set to retire.

The document, based on 300 Australian businesses, conducted through July & August, shows that 61% of respondents have reported skills shortages over the year, up from 51% the earlier year. An overall growth in skills gaps of over 20%

Furthermore, 89% of respondents said they were training Australian employees to meet future skill needs, with 78.5% finding it more effective to train & retrain existing local employees than recruit expert offshore workers under the 457 visa program owing to the time delays associated with going this route.

But it is not all doom & gloom: KPMG says an "encouraging" 69% of respondents had some kind of strategy in pace for dealing with skills, & 57% reported planning for generational change.

The document notes that smaller companies those with up to $20 million in revenue are less likely than larger companies to be more reliant on offshore skills, with 12% tipping an increased reliance on expert migration recruitment australia over the next years, versus 33% for companies with revenue between $201 & $400 million.

While stressing that demand for foreign labour will be contingent on global economic conditions, Australia is already battling with other Western countries for foreign labour.

There is a worldwide shortage of talent in positive sectors & failure to think internationally may leave Australian CEO's with egg on their face, as competition intensifies , in the light of increased international mobility in labour markets.

For international recruitment agencies,able to access talent, will place them in the simplest, most rewarding markets, & Australian bureaucracy does not lend itself to rapid job offers in a competitive international arena.