Hiring Frenzy Underway in Australian Councils

In 2018, the urgent recruitment drive that started in July 2017 by Australian and New Zealand Councils, has continued. The backlog in unfilled positions in NSW is understandable, given the end of the 12 month (and longer in many cases) hiring freeze caused by the forced amalgamations of councils. Yet the current demand for skilled professionals is nationwide and reflects the infrastructure development focus of most councils. We’re also seeing new interest from across the Tasman from New Zealand councils seeking to fill positions with the best talent they can find and help people make the move. The roles in highest demand across the board now are;

  • Planners – to deal with unprecedented housing and commercial construction rates
  • Engineers – to manage existing ageing infrastructure and bring new projects to life
  • Environmental experts, from waste and sustainability to water and drainage to manage the growth in population associated with all these infrastructure projects.

All of these projects need public-minded professionals to run them, so we’re also seeing demand for extremely fascinating roles, including;

  • IT specialists to integrate projects to existing council infrastructure
  • Landscape architects to beautify and shape facilities to be adored by their communities
  • Facilities and Place Management specialists
  • Digital Communications and Community engagement specialists

Councils across the country are reinventing themselves to be employers of choice, not just compared to the public sector but to all organisations right across their local communities and metropolitan regions. This rebuilding of council cultures and workforces is creating demand for HR specialists with key skills in;

  • Organisational development
  • Leadership development and
  • Talent acquisition

CouncilJobs has seen sustained growth in recruitment advertising over the past 12 months of over 50% compared to the same period in 2017. And we’re seeing councils invest heavily in technology to streamline the recruitment experience for both candidates and council recruitment staff. The rush to implement e-recruitment tools such as Scout, BigRedSky and EziJob is a strong indicator that councils expect this recruitment activity to continue for a long time. Over the past three years, we’ve seen councils’ use of e-recruitment systems go from nothing to 25% of all councils. Recent analysis by CouncilJobs indicates that this trend will only continue to accelerate.

The best way to stay on top of all the recruitment moves in Australian and New Zealand Councils is and always will be to subscribe to CouncilJobs Free Job Alerts at https://www.counciljobs.com/Subscribers.