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Regional Trends ReportSouth East
VACANCYSOFTB u s i n e s s I n t e l l i g e n c e t h r o u g h V a c a n c y D a t a
Contents
About the Data
Overview
Analysis by Profession
About APSCo
Analysis by Sector and Company Size
Analysis by Geography
About Vacancysoft
Roger TweedyDirector of Communications & Research APSCo
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We are delighted to be partnering with Vacancysoft to provide new, regional insight on activity in the professional recruitment sector.
This monthly report series presents a regional analysis of vacancy activity in the over the last two years, identifying key market trends. The series covers five regions across the UK.
I hope you find this new research of interest.
Every day Vacancysoft monitors careers centres on thousands of company web sites, and gathers links where there is change. These links are then classified automatically, and in the case of relevant content, by Vacancysoft staff.
Our final data set for this report contains information on 19 000 vacancies. The vacancies were all advertised within the South East region (following NUTS1 rules), and we initially found the vacancies between March 2014 and February 2016. Excluded from the data are vacancies from companies that were new to Vacancysoft in that period, and those for which we were not able to produce a consistent data set. We also excluded vacancies in professions that we have not continually tracked. This allows like-for-like comparison.
Overview
London aside, the South East is traditionally England’s busiest region in terms of professional vacancy numbers. While this is mostly fueled by the London-centric economy and demographics, in the past year a lot of the activity poured into regional cities relatively distant from the metropolitan area.
Vacancy growth periods in the past 24 months were similarly spaced within calendar years, recurring in January, June-July and October. Most recently, however, vacancy trends contradicted the seasonality patterns from previous years by steadily rising in February.
The February vacancy increase occurred primarily in the largest companies, those with over 5,000 employees. We observed many new vacancies posted in smaller companies in December and January, while their February increase was proportionately smaller. Organizations in both size categories are nevertheless on a hiring spree, which we expect to continue into March given behavior in previous years.
The busiest sectors in the South East were telecommunications and IT, each with almost twice as many vacancies as any other sector and together accounting for a third of all roles in the region. The legal sector appears among the top ten with 5% of all vacancies. This is unusual in our data as normally we expect this proportion to be lower. We can therefore conclude that the South East market has a higher saturation of law firms than other regions.
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Vacancy Volumesin South East England in the past 24 months
Vacancies in Different Company Sizesin South East England in the past 24 months
Vacancies by Sector
Vaca
ncy
volu
mes
800
1000
1200
200
400
600
MAR
AP
R M
AY
JUN
JU
L AU
G
SEP
OCT
N
OV
DEC JAN
FE
B
JAN
FE
B
MAR
AP
R M
AY
JUN
JU
L AU
G
SEP
OCT
N
OV
DEC
MAR
AP
R M
AY
JUN
JU
L AU
G
SEP
OCT
N
OV
DEC JAN
FE
B
JAN
FE
B
MAR
AP
R M
AY
JUN
JU
L AU
G
SEP
OCT
N
OV
DEC
20152014 20162015
700
800
200
100
300
400
500
600
Companies with Headcount over 5000
Companies with Headcount up to 5000
Vaca
ncie
s in
500
0+ c
ompa
nies
Vacancies in 1-5000 companies
160
180
200
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
Telecommunications
IT
Insurance
Ba
nki
ng
Ph
arm
ac
eu
tic
als
Law
Consulting
AccountancyTechnologyHardware
& Equipment
ClinicalResearch
OrganisationsOther
20152014 20162015
In early 2014, the telecoms sector was offering more vacancies than any other, and remained the busiest sector until mid-2015. After June it decreased to less than half of its 2014 volumes, with only a brief surge in October. January 2016 was the lowest point for telecoms recruitment in the last two years. However, an increase in activity occurred in February, and future analyses will tell if this will continue into March.
For most of 2015, vacancies in IT behaved quite differently than telecoms, with one seemingly filling the void after the other’s decrease. The most recent activity aligns with this, with steep, consistent growth in IT occurring since November while telecoms roles decreased. The sector is currently the busiest in the region, with significantly more vacancies advertised in February in IT than in any other sector.
A breakdown by company size reveals that major telecoms companies are the largest players in the region. IT companies of all sizes had high vacancy volumes and led the way among companies with headcounts below 5,000.
Clinical Research Organisations experienced the sharpest growth of all the major sectors in the South East. This can be narrowed down to hotspots in Reading and Marlow, where 67% of all CRO vacancies were advertised. While in absolute numbers they represent a smaller sector than the market leaders, their steep growth pattern makes them stand out in comparison to overall trends.
Analysis by Sector and Company Size
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Top Three Sectorsin South East England in the past 24 months
Top Sectors5000+ Companies
501 - 5000 Companies
Top Sectors in SMEs
CRO vs Overall Trendlines
Vaca
ncy
volu
mes
INSURANCE
MAR
APR
MAY
JUN
JUL
AUG
SEP
OCT
NO
V
DEC JAN
FEB
JAN
FEB
MAR
APR
MAY
JUN
JUL
AUG
SEP
OCT
NO
V
DEC
20152014 20162015
PHARMACEUTICALS
IT
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
Number of Vacancies
Number of Vacancies
Number of Vacancies
IT
IT
LAW
LAW
ADVERTISING, DIGITAL & MEDIA AGENCIES
For SMEs we included companies with headcount between 1 and 500
InsuranceITTelecommunications
50
100
150
200
250
MAR
AP
R M
AY
JUN
JU
L AU
G
SEP
OCT
N
OV
DEC JAN
FE
B
JAN
FE
B
MAR
AP
R M
AY
JUN
JU
L AU
G
SEP
OCT
N
OV
DEC
20152014 20162015
South EastClinical Research Organisations
CRO
VAC
ANCI
ES
SOU
TH EAST O
VERALL VACANCIES5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
800
1000
1200
200
400
600
3500500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000
800200 400 600
1000100 200 300 400 500 800 900
0
0
0
700600
Over a third (34%) of all vacancies in our data were for IT professionals, a proportion that was persistent over the entire analyzed period. In second and third place, sales and marketing specialists together covered 27% of roles.
Although IT roles accounted for the most vacancies, a higher proportional change was observed in both sales and marketing. By comparison, much more hiring is now occurring in HR, IT, Marketing and Sales than between the two years. Between yearly and recent change in trends, marketing vacancies did not significantly slow down and increase in demand for sales roles actually sped up.
The past year brought a surge in demand for science and HR roles, with the former growing by over 50% in number of advertised vacancies. This trend plummeted as fewer scientific roles were published in 2016 so far than in the traditionally quiet months of November and December last year.
Vacancies for IT specialists showed moderate but consistent growth patterns. The proportional increase in demand was not as pronounced as in sales roles due to IT’s higher initial vacancy volume.
Analysis by Profession
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Year-to-Year Trends in Top ProfessionsChange between Mar 2014-Feb 2015 and Mar 2015-Feb 2016
ACCOUNTANT
SALES
IT PROFESSIONAL
MARKETER/PR
HR PROFESSIONAL
SCIENTIST
60%10%
25%
0
Short-Term Trends in Top ProfessionsChange between Nov-Dec 2015 and Jan-Feb 2016
ACCOUNTANT
SCIENTIST
IT PROFESSIONAL
MARKETER/PR
HR PROFESSIONAL
SALES
30%5%-5% 0
Top 8 Professions
ACCOUNTANT
SCIENTIST
IT PROFESSIONAL
MARKETER/PR
HR PROFESSIONAL
BANKER
OTHER
LAWYER
SALES
20% 30% 40% 50%
20%15%10%
Most advertised vacancies were in areas directly west and south of London. The top area was Berkshire with more than twice as many vacancies as any other county in the region. Berkshire’s individual hotspots, Reading and Newbury, each contributed more roles than any other county save Surrey.
Telecoms vacancies accounted for 38% of all Berkshire roles, compared to 17% at regional level. The county’s other busy sectors included IT, with a 9% larger share of the market than regionally, and CROs, with 3% more vacancies.
Recently, the number of vacancies has been steadily decreasing in Newbury, which was the region’s top city in our data, and growing in Reading, the regions’ top city since last June. In February 2016, Milton Keynes jumped into second place. This is closely associated with sector-related trends, as Newbury’s top sector is telecoms, while IT and CROs account for over half of all Reading-based vacancies. Among the five fastest growing cities, only Maidenhead is in either of the top two counties. It was the South East’s large city with the most new vacancies and it grew by close to 70% between late 2015 and early 2016.
Other hot cities include Eastleigh (60% recent increase in our data) and Hook (48%). Together with 44% growth in Southampton, the Hampshire area is rapidly increasing its number of professional vacancies offered. A lot of this change has been in telecoms (44% recent growth) and insurance (150%).
Analysis by Geography
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Vacancy by County/Unitary Authority
Fastest Growing South East CitiesBetween Nov-Dec 2015 and Jan-Feb 2016
Vacancy by City
MAIDENHEAD
HENLEY-ON-THAMES
EASTLEIGH
HOOK
SOUTHAMPTON
70%10%0
5
7183
Ne
wb
ury
Reading
Gu
ildfo
rd
Milt
on
Key
ne
s
Bracknell
Maidenhead
Oxford
Bri
gh
ton
So
uth
am
pto
n
Ba
sin
gst
oke
Crawley
Eastleigh
Reigate
Ma
idst
on
e
Hook
Other
20% 30% 40% 50% 60%
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The Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo) was formed to give all firms involved in the recruitment of professional talent that have a commitment to excellence, the specialist support and distinctive voice they need to be successful. It gives candidates and employers a trusted badge of quality whilst providing member firms with an innovative range of services designed for them by recruitment experts.
These services, combined with its growing international profile, commitment to Corporate Social Responsibility and opportunities for professional networking give APSCo members a unique opportunity to develop their businesses and gain competitive advantage.
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About Us• Launched in 2006, we provide Business Intelligence through Vacancy Data on subscription. • We publish vacancy data daily, tailored to your needs, so you can be informed of client activity.
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