The construction division of CGC Recruitment consists of a team of specialist and experienced consultants who service our clients’ needs. With years of experience behind us, we understand the pressures on this already challenging sector, which includes resourcing, recruitment, and retention issues.
To support you with these matters, we’ve provided some recruitment insights below. This includes highlighting the challenges you might be experiencing and opportunities to achieve positive personal, professional, and commercial growth.
As the employer or manager, it’s important to understand the preferences of workers and ensure you’re doing the following:
Motivating your staff: A successful manager must have a strong grasp on how to keep their employees motivated via recognition and rewards. A high level of motivation results in a higher level of productivity.
Setting clear career paths: Ensure you’re providing avenues to fulfil individual career goals, while also achieving the company’s mission. Providing in-house training and announcing job openings internally before going external, will express your loyalty to your current staff. It also illustrates your confidence in their abilities.
Rewarding staff for a job well done: Organise public recognition via structured reward programs, like ‘Employee of the Month’ or ‘Employee of the Quarter’, and annual end-of-year gatherings that involve awards or gifts. You can also treat hard-working staff to a meal or a drink after a rough day in icy cold or sweltering heat conditions.
Read about other strategies to retain your top tier staff here. We also offer a Career Planning Template which will help improve career planning within your organisation or team.
Challenge 2 - Managing your way through the COVID-19 pandemic
Yes, the COVID-19 pandemic has dealt a huge blow to Australia’s economy and industries, including construction.
Although the industry was designated as an essential service and exempt from lockdown restrictions, many construction projects were affected due to limitations on labour availability at worksites, social distancing restrictions, and supply chain disruptions.
Solution
According to the recent Construction in Australia report, we’re seeing the construction industry recovery strengthening in 2021. Thankfully, the industry is supported by the government’s focus on infrastructure investment to restore the pandemic-hit economy.
In June 2020, the government announced that 15 infrastructure projects (including the Sydney Metro West) worth $72 billion will be fast-tracked, supporting over 60,000 direct and indirect jobs. In addition, the federal, state and territory governments have reached an agreement to cut approval time for infrastructure projects by half.
Another positive development includes significant government spending and investment being allocated towards residential, health, and educational infrastructure projects.
At CGC Recruitment, our Construction team also recognises the following challenges and job opportunities:
Offices becoming redundant as more staff work from home - Despite the change of working conditions, company investment into office fitouts and refurbishments has been on the increase. It appears that while the majority of staff are at home, organisations are using the opportunity to undergo refurbishments. Having a workspace is still required for team meetings, so there’s a push to improve collaborative spaces, enhance technology to support virtual meetings, and create quiet rooms for individual concentrated work. Local councils and government have also been investing in projects - creating jobs for local contractors, who then employ local people and take on apprentices. It all helps to keep the small business economy going.
Lack of skilled construction workers - Due to the pandemic, Australia looks set to remain closed to non-residents until at least mid-2022, locking out international students and many skilled migrants. However, this means more opportunities for local workers and apprentices to move up the ranks.
Aging population = increasingly smaller number of people capable of working - A report by Construction Skills Queensland found over the last two decades, the number of construction workers aged 55 or over has grown from 8% to 14.2%, representing a trend found across the nation. They’re also retiring later. This shows a decline in physical health and capability to get tougher jobs completed. However, we encourage our clients to consider more mature workers as an asset to the industry. Their skills, professional knowledge, and expertise are valuable in senior positions - as it keeps the industry moving and helps with the training of new workers.
Lengthy interview processes slow down recruitment - To hire the best staff as possible, we recommend making quick, yet informed decisions. It’s important to pitch the job opportunity clearly, ensure you have a strong differentiated brand that staff want to work with, and know the type of experience you require vs opportunities to train them on-the-job.
Conclusion
While you might see a range of challenges in your industry, our Construction team at CGC Recruitment know how to navigate through these tricky times. We offer our clients and candidates unique industry insights that cover today’s trends and add value beyond filling a job brief.
We hope you’re now feeling more confident about the months and years ahead.
About CGC Recruitment
CGC Recruitment is a specialist construction, infrastructure, engineering, and architecture recruitment consultancy. We view our clients as our partners and work closely with them to meet their business needs. We work with some of Australia’s largest construction brands through to specialist SME’s and boutique consultants. We have proven experience delivering permanent, contract and retained recruitment solutions, consistently providing the right candidates for the right roles at the right time.
If you have an active role you’d like to discuss or just want to talk to a specialist consultant, please contact us.
Alternatively, you can complete our online client form and a member of our team will contact you.
