Hays Contact Centres - April 2007

New Zealand

Hotspots

• Candidates with 18 or more months' experience.
• In all sectors within the contact centre industry experienced telesales and entry-level collections staff are required.
• Customer service professionals.

The coming quarter

As the skills shortage continues and the industry expands, those organisations with well-established brands, which offer career development, who are located close to amenities and transport and who offer standard business hours will continue to attract and retain staff. The speed and turnaround of candidate applications is also a major factor in successful recruitment. To combat the skills shortage more companies are becoming open to hiring candidates with non-traditional skills sets.

Salaries

Focus has turned to the total employment package rather than just the salary on offer. However having said this, salaries have increased by as much as 10 percent in SME's. In contrast larger institutions have experienced modest increases of around 2 percent.

Candidate trends

There is now a pool of very experienced team leaders and managers seeking the next step in their careers but finding it difficult to gain that opportunity. Consequently many are looking at alternative options. Similarly senior CCR's, especially within organisations who lack the infrastructure to provide ongoing training or true career development and progression, are looking outside at other options.

Many large organisations are investing in staff training and learning and development, with linkages to performance, internal promotion and ultimately an internal career with the company.

The shortage of skilled staff at the entry level has led to many employers merging job roles in medium to small operations. While this has increased the skill set of those individuals, it has led to salary pressures as these staff can receive a higher salary in the open market.