Investing in people: CBI/Pertemps Employment Trends Survey 2021

In partnership with Pertemps Network Group, our Employment Trends Survey tracks labour market trends and current recruitment challenges facing businesses like yours.

Following the biggest economic and health crisis in a century, this year’s survey shows that the UK’s jobs outlook is strengthening, with 50% of firms expecting to grow their workforce next year.

However, around three quarters (76%) of businesses say access to labour is threatening UK competitiveness – the highest proportion since 2016.

The results reflect the impact of labour shortages and wider supply chain disruptions across the economy further highlighting the need for government to work with businesses to take long-term steps to boost productivity and wages.

Other key findings from the report include:

• Recruitment: 87% of businesses are planning to recruit permanent roles this year, with nearly half of firms (46%) expecting higher levels of recruitment
• People & Skills:: access to skills (noted by 77% of companies) and the ability to move UK workers across the EU (69% of companies) also feature heavily in businesses’ list of current concerns
• Workforce: factors important to labour market competitiveness include finding people with the right skills (89%), a more flexible labour market (47%) and a healthy workforce (35%)
• Pay: nearly 7 in 10 firms (68%) are planning to increase pay in line with, or above inflation – making the rebound the highest since the question was first asked in 2009
• COVID-19: nearly 3 in 5 firms (59%) are keeping COVID-19 safety measures in place to support employees’ returning to the office
• Future of work: compared to working pre-pandemic, over three quarters (76%) expect the use of hybrid working to increase, with 40% expecting full-time remote working to increase.

Learn more about the Employment Trends Survey 2021:

Click for the full report.

Find more on labour shortages here.