Australian accounting, finance and legal professional services staff are being offered pay rises of up to $40,000 (on a $90,000 salary) to stay in their current jobs, and up to $100,000 sign-on bonuses.
Costs of hiring have more than doubled and employers are forced to wait an average six weeks to hire new employees, potentially delaying growth plans for some businesses, or even just making up for the shortfall with staff leaving, or shortfall from a mis-match in resources to business requirements as a result of covid.
And there is now more acceptance that staff may return to a job (known as the boomerang effect), which means staff can take extended leave to travel or take a sabbatical, try to get their side hussle off the ground, or even try another job – even in another industry.
The new government under Albanese has inherited a problem of labour resources post covid, with a labour shortage strangling the competitiveness of Australian businesses. Skills shortage threatens economic recovery, government warned.
In one story, a team of workers flown to Adelaide from oversesas were being taken by bus to the fruit grower’s property when the bus was flagged down by a neighbour who persuaded the workers to work on his property on higher remuneration.
NAB looks to Vietnam, India for digital, data and technical engineering resources. In response to the worker shortage, NAB has converted an outsourcing centre in Vietnam into a regional innovation centre to attract more people to join the bank. It’s certain that the current de-globalisation of the manufacturing and food services is not impacting services in the digital world such as accounting outsourcing, which will only continue to be in high demand given the ongoing shortage of the Australian labour quartette of workers, students, immigrants and skilled visa workers.
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