Engineering stands out as the UK’s most attractive staffing segment overall in Staffing Industry Analysts recent report on the Most Attractive Staffing Sectors in the UK. It is followed by the IT and marketing/creative sectors.

The least attractive occupational segments are office/clerical and finance/accounting, according to SIA’s analysis.

This report provides staffing companies a holistic assessment for the relative attractiveness of investment opportunities for those firms wishing to expand their business to new occupational categories within the UK. The research evaluated and compared the potential of the nine major occupational sectors in the UK staffing markets. The findings cover both commercial and professional staffing sectors, and attractiveness is identified according to 10 different criteria.

Click on chart to enlarge.

Source: Most Attractive Staffing Segments in the UK

The engineering segment ranked fourth in a previous analysis conducted last year; it has experienced an upswing in demand over the 2017-2018 period. This segment’s strengths lie primarily in the strong growth in the temporary and self-employed workforce, as well as ongoing shortages of engineering professionals. The temporary and self-employed workforce population has grown faster than any other segment in the last two years.

The roles within engineering which temporary workforce population increased the most over the 2014 to 2018 period are technicians qualified in chemical and physical sciences, civil engineering and mechanical engineering; design and development engineers; quantity surveyors; and quality control and planning engineers.

However, the relative merits of each market and their strengths and weaknesses will likely differ depending on the reader’s own company culture and specific business case. With this in mind, SIA also provides a customisable tool, which allows for weighting of the 10 sub-components used in this analysis to better suit the user’s specific requirement.

The full report is available for EMEA corporate members online.

For more on the UK engineering recruitment market, also see free the Staffing Industry Review Online story “Engineering for Change.”