News

Radiography of employment in Spain: supply and demand

The Infoempleo job portal and the Adecco Group have presented a new issue of the XXV edition of the Report Supply and Demand for Employment in Spain, a complete x-ray of the employment situation in our country.

And in this case, they want to highlight the vision of companies about the current issues of our labor market: current situation, talent deficit, 4-day shift and hybrid work models, mental and emotional health in the work environment, gender equality and diversity, digital transformation, and other important aspects for business (and therefore for workers and job seekers) Spanish.

The main problems of the Spanish company

Over the last few months we have been witnessing an inflationary scenario that, for most macroeconomics experts, will continue practically throughout 2022. And this is a serious problem. for 3 out of 4 companies consulted by Adecco and Infoempleo.

Thus, 74.5% fear that the increase in costs could pose a serious danger to the continuity of their activity and of the company itself. For 31.54%, the new labor reform that came into force on April 1, 2022 may also mean a brake on its growth as it is applied. That consumption is not fully reactivated due to new outbreaks or successive waves of coronavirus (29.53%), and more so with the current inflation situation, is the next problem that the companies consulted look at with more fear.

Warning, scroll to continue reading

Faced with this scenario, companies believe that to improve the competitiveness of your company the best measures of flexibility son, in this order, offering flexible hours (55.03%), variable remuneration linked to objectives (32.21%), telecommuting (26.85%), resorting to direct temporary hiring (26.17%), partial hiring (22.82%), substantially modifying the working conditions of the workforce (21.48%), resorting to freelances (16.78%) and generating pools of hours (16.11%).

the fight for the [mejor] talent

After two years of the pandemic, the transfer of workers from one company to another has visibly slowed down. On average, companies estimate 19.8% andl volume of staff turnover which they had to face in 2021, more than 2.5 pp less compared to 2020 and more than 3 points if we compare it with 2019. 33.56% of the companies consulted believe that the main reason for this brain drain It is because they receive better salary offers from other companies. And for 26.85% these are employees who cannot fulfill their aspirations for professional or personal growth in the company.

In the last year, some factors that became very important in 2020 are once again approaching figures similar to those they had before the pandemic. Thus, 15.44% say that workers they have left due to the bad economic times that the company is going through (compared to 25.45% registered in 2020), 7.38% due to the bad work environment (14.55% in 2020), and 15.44% believe that it is because the employees do not identify with the objectives and strategies set by the company (20.00% in 2020).

Despite this scenario, more than half of those surveyed (54.36%) are calm about the possibility that in Spain a “big waiver” can be given as has happened in many US companies, because they believe that the conditions of the Spanish labor market are very different.

And what do companies look for in their candidates? Having specialized knowledge for the work to be carried out (83.89%), in addition to knowledge of new technologies (34.90%), are currently the technical skills or hard skills most required by companies. Regarding the interpersonal skills or soft skills that the ideal candidate should have, the three most valued currently are: the ability to work in a team (71.81%) and to solve problems (66.44%) together with a positive attitude ( 56.38%).

Hybrid model working as ideal

After two years of health crisis, in which many companies were forced to use the teleworking formula to be able to continue with their activity, normality has brought a return to face-to-face, or not?

According to the data collected by the Active Population Survey (EPA), in the fourth quarter of 2021, 7.9% of employed persons worked from home more than half of the days, and 5.7% did so less than half the days, data that are the lowest in the two years of the pandemic. A figure of less than 10% of the total Spanish active population reached at the end of 2020, and also far from the 15.3% that was reached during the months in which confinement was imposed.

The reasons are several. On the one hand, many people who can telecommute do not want to do so because they prefer direct contact with colleagues. There are also workers with difficulties reconciling with the family at home, who do not have adapted homes, or who have more difficulties disconnecting from work from home and suffer from work overload. Added to this is the fact that many companies are unwilling to implement remote work, that they do not have the technological means to carry it out, or both.

Another of the key elements in the implementation of teleworking has been the Remote Work Law approved in September 2020 and which establishes, among other points, the need to sign an agreement with the employee who is going to work remotely more than 30% of the weekly day for a period of three months, forcing the employer to pay some expenses . What many SMEs have perceived as a major barrier when establishing this formula.

Of the companies consulted, 58.44% confirm that they are providing their employees with the possibility of teleworking in 2022 (6% more than in 2020). In fact, 51.68% of the companies have maintained this formula in some way during 2021, either for the entire workforce (10.07%), in alternate shifts (22.15%) or at those times when some employee needed to confine himself (19.46%).

However, the companies they continue to be reluctant to propose a 100% remote work model, and are mostly committed to a hybrid model. Thus, 88.89% are inclined towards this format that combines face-to-face and remote work.

Among those that will not facilitate this option, teleworking is seen mostly as a temporary solution (46.88%), which has served to maintain activity during the months of confinement and the successive waves of the pandemic. In addition to considering it temporary, 18.75% believe that the performance of the workforce has not been entirely satisfactory.

For 12.50%, the costs of complying with the new teleworking regulations is another important impediment. And 6.25% see too many difficulties -in terms of occupational risk prevention- to carry it out. It is interesting to point out that 15.63% do not give a specific reason why they do not allow their employees to telecommute.

After a few months in which it seemed that the issue of the feasibility of the four-day event had cooled, the launch of new pilots in our country has reopened the debate. Barely 1 out of every 3 companies consulted (37.59%) considers the 4-day shift viable, a percentage that has also decreased by 0.6 percentage points in the last year. And of these, 22.15% believe that it would only be possible to reduce remuneration proportionally.

Thus, 62.42% of companies do not see it possible to implement the 4-day shift today, compared to 61.7% who thought so a year ago. Among the main reasons given for this is the impossibility of maintaining salaries or amortizing a working day, and not being able to hire more staff to cover the remaining day.

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *