Amey, Cadent, SGN, Thames Water and Welsh Water have joined a group of leading energy and utilities companies to deliver the sector’s new digital attraction platform, a spokesperson announced today.
The Talent Source Network provides insight into the sector and access to thousands of jobs, while the campaign simplifies a complex jobs market for potential talent. With innovative approaches to marketing directly to the network’s target audiences, the initiative has already driven over 3,500 applications into the sector since January 2017.
Committed to raising visibility with underrepresented groups, companies like Amey are hoping the network will help to attract more women, black and minority ethnic (BAME) candidates, military leavers and skilled workers at risk of redundancy in a concerted effort to close skills gaps in the industry and foster greater levels of innovation and creativity.
Early indicators show the campaign has particularly successful at attracting more women to Talent Source Network’s website to learn about the sector, with over 55% of the 31,000 visits to the website being from female users during the first two months of 2018.
TSN’s employers have also reacted swiftly to offer support to those at risk of redundancy at Carillion. In partnership with the Department for Work and Pensions, the employers were quickly able to share 850 vacancies with affected personnel. The rapid response and efficiency demonstrated was a key success factor and enabled employers to recognise the power of collaboration and the ease of mobilising effort when required.
Speaking about Amey's participation, Paul Macfarlane, HR Director at Amey, said: “As part of our commitment to investing in people and skills, and our vision for sustainability, we are proud to be supporting the Talent Source Network.
“Amey is a people business that has many great opportunities. We are looking forward to sharing those and joining a strong line up of sector employers that are pooling their resources to offer varied, exciting and sustainable careers for new entrants in a sector that is of strategic importance to the UK economy.”
The ability to engage with new and younger audiences is key to the sector’s ability to deliver its commitments to the Government's National Infrastructure & Construction Pipeline.
The sector’s 500,000 UK workforce is ageing and the Skills Strategy reports that close to 20% of it will retire within the next decade, which contributes to a total of 221,000 roles that will need to be filled by 2027. Currently 35% of its vacancies are hard to fill due to skills shortages. This is the highest percentage of any UK sector and the national average is 23%. In addition, the sector will meet further challenges: it will require more advanced digital and engineering skills as the UK moves towards a smart energy system.
Now the pilot is complete, the Skills Partnership is actively encouraging other leading sector employers to join TSN and has already welcomed several expressions of interest.
More information is available at www.euskills.co.uk/about/energy-utilities-skills-partnership/talent-source-network/