Care Professionals Say If a Job Vacancy is Open for 83 Days, There Must be Something Wrong With It

LONDON, October 5, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --

Employers need to fill job vacancies within 83 working days - almost 17 weeks - before care workers assume it's a job no one wants, according to research carried out by Randstad Care, the social care, allied health and medical recruiter.

Randstad asked 2,001 members of the public, "How many working days does a vacancy for a permanent job have to be open before it starts to look like a bad job that no one wants?"

The UK's adult population said they thought a post has to be vacant 72 working days before it looks like a bad job that no one wants, 11 working days - over two working weeks - less than care professionals.

In a similar survey, Randstad found that, on average, professionals in health and social care feel they currently have to perform the job of 1.5 people meaning they are covering 50% more work than one person should be; the equivalent of fitting an additional two and a half days worth of work into the ordinary working week.

Vicky Short, operations director of Randstad Care, said, "Although care professionals are more relaxed about the length of time a vacancy's been advertised than the UK as a whole, they also won't wait forever.   Recruiting for acare post is like trying to sell your house. Leave it on the market too longand, for whatever reason, people start to think there is something wrong with it. That leads to fewer applications and increased pressures on the rest of the staff left trying to cover the empty position.   We know social care professionals already feel they are performing the job of one and a half people.   If they're cramming an extra two and a half days worth of work into a working week, they are going to find it extremely difficult to cover for vacant job posts, too. Leaving a hole in the workforce too long will inevitably undermine service provision."

IDEAL PERMANENT RECRUITMENT PROCESS 75% FASTER THAN VACANCY SHELF LIFE

As part of the research, recruitment consultants working at Randstad Care were asked what the ideal length of time was to fill a vacancy, balancing the time needed to secure the best candidate for the job and the need to for organisations to fill a skills gap.  The poll found that given those criteria, Randstad Care's consultants thought up to 20 days was the ideal^[*]

Vicky Short said, "While social workers won't start judging a job negatively until the vacancy's been advertised for 83 days, the ideal time is actually quarter of this.  The best applicant is often the one who turns up early in the process.  The trick is not to turn that person down in order to keep benchmarking against other people who may or may not be in the market.  If employers see the right person on the first day of interviews, they need to have the courage of their convictions and hire the candidate straight away.  If they don't, they have to be prepared to see that job seeker walk into the arms of another local authority or care home who is willing to move faster."

Notes to editors

The Randstad group is one of the leading recruitment & HR services providers in the world with a top five position in the UK and a top three position in fifteen countries including the US, France and Germany.

In the UK, Randstad's business lines serve the public and private sectors across Accounting and Financial services; Business Support; Construction, Property and Engineering; Education; Health and Social Care; Interim Management and Search; Human Resources; IT; Legal; Retail; Sales, Marketing and Creative; Student and Worker Support and In-House and Managed Services.

At the end of 2011, Randstad had 1,930 corporate employees in the UK, working in 255 locations. UK revenue in 2011 was €789 million. Randstad was founded in 1960 and is headquartered in Diemen, the Netherlands. Randstad Holding nv is listed on the NYSE Euronext Amsterdam. For more information see http://www.randstad.co.uk and http://www.randstad.com.

Research

The results of this research are gained from data from 2,001 people surveyed by Canadean between 23rd and 30th July 2012  (including 142 from the Care Market sector) and a survey of 65 Randstad Care consultants conducted on Weds 19th September on the ideal time to hire.

* (with a further 15 days to allow for final checks and compliance)