Positive vibe for trades recruitment sector

NZBusiness went to Cat and Jonny Peters, founder-owners of Auckland trades recruitment company Hirestaff for their perspective on today’s construction job market.

When it comes to the state of New Zealand’s job market right now, particularly across the building and construction industry, Hirestaff’s Cat and Jonny Peters (pictured above) report that it’s very different to 12 months ago.

“We hear our competition saying there aren’t any candidates available; that it’s hard to fill roles. But we see the opposite,” says Cat. “There’re so many candidates out there and we are getting hundreds of applicants each week.

“There’re also a lot of job opportunities if you know where to look.”

“The building and construction industry is seeing some tightening, but skilled tradespeople always get placed into work,” she says. “If you’re skilled and reliable, there’s always consistent work; we always keep good candidates working. If they finish up on one project, we simply call other clients who will snap them up.”

Cat says Hirestaff is yet to see a drop in the number of skilled people being placed into work. “The types of projects are changing, but they are still there. We have, however, seen some clients shut their doors, whereas others have an abundance of work and are demanding more staff.

“It’s really mixed, but in general things feel positive.”

The sectors currently seeing real growth are tourism, logistics and manufacturing, she says.

“We forecast a slight flattening in the next three to six months, but things will ramp up soon after the election and once we get through this bad weather, which seems to be having more of an impact than we would like.”

Hirestaff, still a relatively young business, has experienced revenue growth of 47 percent on the same period last year. “Our internal recruitment strategy for salespeople and recruiters allows us to find great talent who are hungry, driven and want to do a good job for our clients,” says Cat. She says her company has a different strategy for finding candidates for jobs.

“We essentially fish from an entirely different pond which allows us to get better candidates for our clients.”

Growth for the company has meant growing the team significantly. At the beginning of 2022 Hirestaff employed six people, now there is a team of 19.

“We have a recruitment freeze for the next six months but will open up again going into Q4,” says Cat. “We’re looking to grow to 24 FTE’s by the end of the next financial year to accelerate our growth even further.”

More work to do

With New Zealand’s election approaching fast, Cat and Jonny have a message for the incoming government around the state of the building and construction sector, and what’s needed to correct things in the short to medium term.

“We need to make it easier for businesses to hire migrant workers,” says Cat. “In our experience, becoming accredited was a big challenge and you only hold it for two years.

“Although Hirestaff is accredited now, we still need to jump through hoops to hire people from overseas. If they made the process easier, then we would be able to bring more people in.”

Lifting the restrictions and removing job checks would help Hirestaff fill their skilled vacancies, say the couple, such as qualified electricians and builders.

“We also need to invest more in upskilling local talent,” says Cat. “It amazes us how many people come in with the inability to read or write, let alone carry any qualification or trade skillset. A lot of these people don’t even hold a driver’s licence, making it difficult for them to even get to work.”

Looking to the future

Looking ahead, Jonny and Cat’s advice for employers is to invest in your people and retain good talent. “Through challenging times people often look to cut costs, but you should double down on the areas that traditionally bring you a good return, staff being one of them,” advises Cat. “Marketing investment is also important. The advertising line is often the one to get cut, but this is where you should be investing more.”

Their message for tradespeople is: don’t be scared to change jobs during this time – if you’ve got the skills and are good at your job, don’t be afraid to go after a new opportunity.

“There are great roles out there, you just need to know where to look,” says Cat.

The couple say this year won’t be harder than the last couple of years with Covid.

“We more than survived that period of time, so this year shouldn’t be any worse,” says Cat.

“We’ve adapted our systems and processes, invested in key areas of the business and will continue to grow – even if business confidence is down and remains low for a short period of time.

“We have great people in our team and good talent always do well and allow us to succeed. We just have to be better than everyone else,” Cat says. “As long as we invest in our people, recognise and reward them, then we’re extremely confident about the future.”