Recruitment

This section looks into recruitment issues in the design industry

How many design jobs have been filled in the past year?

8,733 designers left design businesses in the last year but twice as many were recruited

The design sector appears to be growing. In the past 12 months 17,297 designers were recruited by 8,072 design consultancies and in-house teams. That’s about twice the number of designers who left businesses. In-house teams (49%) were more likely to have recruited than consultancies (41%).

Recruitment was greatest in London, where 52% of businesses recruited at least one designer, and least in Wales and the South West, with only a third (34%) of companies recruiting.

Design businesses in the East were most likely to have kept on their staff, with only 17% losing staff in the past year.

Staff turnover is lowest in digital and multimedia businesses where only 14% of businesses lost employees.

Is the design industry recruiting graduates?

39% of new appointments are made direct from college or university

The most common source of new staff is college or university (39%).

Chart 44

Percentage of new recruits coming straight from college/university by discipline

Discipline	%
Product & industrial	43
Communications	41
Digital & multimedia	38

Are employers satisfied with the quality of graduate recruits?

90% of design businesses who recruited direct from college are either completely or quite satisfied with their new staff

The vast majority of design businesses recruiting direct from college and university were either completely (42%) or quite (48%) satisfied with those they took on.

Does the design industry face recruitment problems or skills shortages?

25% of businesses with design vacancies find these positions hard to fill

According to the National Employers Skills Survey in 2003, there is some evidence that difficulties in filling design vacancies are modest compared to similar occupational groups.

The main reasons design employers found vacancies hard to fill were the low number of applicants with the required skills (61%) and applicants’ lack of work experience (29%).

The main skills that were reported as difficult to obtain were technical and practical skills (45%) and communication skills (42%).

The main consequences of recruitment difficulties were an increase in the workload of other staff (93%) and problems meeting customer service objectives (60%). The primary responses to these difficulties were to expand recruitment channels (68%), increase advertising and recruitment spend (53%) and to redefine existing jobs (53%).

Chart 45

proportion of businesses with hard to fill vacancies

Business type	%
Designers	25
Architects, surveyors, etc	55
Draughtpersons etc	51
Engineering professionals	46
Business/statistics professionals	29
ICT professionals	27
Artistic & literary	27
Media associated professionals	20
IT service delivery	19

 Source: National Employee Skills Survey 2003 (England only)