Covid's impact on New Zealand's recruitment landscape

Thanks to the pandemic, New Zealand’s labour market has changed significantly. As a country with a high level of migration growth in the past three decades, overseas workers have been relied upon to bring sought-after skills. But the closed international borders and limits on MIQ spots have put a stop to migration at a pre-pandemic level, forcing employers to rethink how and where they source their talent.

These new challenges have been particularly testing for HR leaders within New Zealand’s essential services where recruitment has had to continue, regardless of the hurdles standing in the way. HRD spoke to Bridget Cooksley, Manager of Recruitment Support at the NZ Department of Corrections, who said COVID-19 dramatically changed their process for assessing potential new hires.

Previously, candidates in groups of 20 to 24 took part in a day of practical exercises at the Department’s assessment centres. Cooksley said pivoting to a virtual process forced the team to move quickly and think on their feet.

“I think in some ways it has really opened up the country because it’s made the video assessment process and the video interviews so much easier and more straightforward,” she said. “It’s something that we all got very used to through using various different technologies.”

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Cooksley, who was a judge at this year’s Seek Annual Recruitment Awards, said the team has also relied more heavily on their external recruitment agency, particularly to tap into their network of candidates and screen out those who weren’t suitable. As talent pipelines shrunk, the ability to source staff, especially those with specialist skills, became one of the biggest challenges facing TA staff in the country.

“A really big impact has been the reduced candidate flow because we’ve seen a significant reduction in candidates with specialist skills from offshore,” Cooksley said. “As the whole world locked down what we noticed was we were getting a lot of overseas applications because people could see how well New Zealand was coping with COVID. But unless they were critical health workers for us, such as psychologists or nurses, we couldn't proceed with anybody, even if they had really high skill levels, because we knew they wouldn't get a travel permit.”

In a tight talent market, the relationship between employers and recruitment agencies has been paramount. The fight for talent has created a prime opportunity for jobseekers, meaning they’re in the driving seat when it comes to negotiating wages and better benefits. So as well as identifying potential candidates, successful recruiters have also become champions for their clients.

Read more: Recruitment: It’s about more than just the candidate

The Government has confirmed that current border controls won’t be relaxed until the beginning of next year at the earliest. It’s sparked even greater concern from industry bodies, especially within the healthcare sector, where workers say they’re facing crisis-level skills shortages. The promise of higher wages across the ditch in Australia is exacerbating the problem, meaning some employers simply cannot compete.

Cooksley said in response to the skills shortage, the focus has shifted to growing and developing the skills of both their own people and candidates. Now, a person’s potential and learning agility are being considered alongside their existing skills and experience.

“It's really recruitment 101 in working out what’s not negotiable and what could be developed,” she said. “Sometimes we’ve found managers have quite significantly changed the scope of the role but then they might get a contract resource to do something quite specific.”

Once the international border reopens, New Zealand’s recruitment landscape will likely undergo another significant shift. But the government plans to use the pause in migration as a chance to “reset” the labour market, raising the threshold for employer-sponsored visas and making it harder for companies to employ overseas workers in low skilled, low wage jobs. In a post-pandemic world, recruiters and internal TA specialists will have to remain as innovative and nimble as ever.