Employers turning to offshoring roles, contractors to fill vacancies: survey
More than seven in 10 employers in Hong Kong are struggling to find new employees as talents grow more cautious in looking for a new job, according to a Robert Walters survey.
The survey, as reported by Hong Kong business, polled over 120 business leaders in tech to discover the shortage despite a larger pool of tech talent available.
According to the survey, 50% of employers have a shortage at the managerial level, especially in the digital transformation sector.
Robert Walters attributed the shortage to "The Big Stay," after a LinkedIn Talent Insights report revealed IT professionals are having longer tenures.
LinkedIn found that the average tenure of IT professionals went up 1.6 years in the first half of 2024, up from the 1.4 years in the third quarter of 2023, Hong Kong Business reported.
According to Robert Walters, this indicates that top talents are becoming more cautious to transfer jobs, leading to more selective applicants over employment terms and slower decision-making in job-hunting processes.
To address the talent shortage, the report found that respondents are turning to contractors in order to secure talent, while others are offshoring roles to Southeast Asia.
Hong Kong's Top Talent Scheme can also provide relief to employers seeking to fill vacancies, according to Robert Walters.
The scheme seeks to "attract top talents with rich work experience and good academic qualifications from all over the world to explore opportunities in Hong Kong."
The government is currently considering easing the academic criteria in the scheme to allow those outside of the top 100 global universities to apply.
