Hiring desires begins to stir

Recruitment intentions in south and west Romania are picking up – with finance and manufacture looking promising

Romania is seeing the first signs of recovery for recruitment in the manufacturing area - which is vital for building exports to close the country’s trade deficit.
“Automobile spare parts companies are once again looking to hire an increasing number of people,” says Manpower Romania’s general manager Camelia Stanculescu. “And also manufacturers in the west and central regions in Timisoara, Brasov and Cluj.”
In addition to Bucharest, there are automotive suppliers for Ford’s factory in Craiova and for Renault Dacia in Mioveni, while Ploiesti is also developing on its industrial heritage in oil, gas and manufacturing.
While these areas are mildly enthusiastic about the job market, businesses in the northwest, southeast and northeast have negative outlooks.
Businesses with a positive perspective include those in finance, fmcg, accounting and sales and consultancy.
Meanwhile the weakest growth for new jobs is in the public and social sector, as Government austerity measures bite, along with construction, transport, storage and communication. Unemployment has stagnated in Romania at 7.4 per cent for the last three months – a figure that may rise due to Government cuts in state employees.
Romania is suffering from a chronic skills shortage, following years of underinvestment in training and education and a mass migration of skilled workers abroad.
At the height of Romania’s upswing in 2008, 73 per cent of Romanian employers were having difficulties filling in job vacancies, according to Manpower. In 2009 the shortage reached 62 per cent and fell to 36 per cent in 2010. This may be a decrease, but Romania continues to occupy the second place in the top countries facing shortages in Europe, Middle East and Asia, following Poland on 51 per cent.
“The top vacancies are encountered in engineering and skilled trades – also in sales representatives, drivers and managers,” says Stanculescu.
There is demand in automotive, civil engineering, mechanical, electrical, construction in civil engineering for those candidates with relevant experience. In skilled trades Romania is still facing an important need for electricians, fork-lift truck drivers and computer numerically controlled (CNC) operators.
Romanians traditionally perform well at trades that need a practical schooling, such as electricians, painters, plumbers and carpenters. But many of these skilled working classes have left to fill the trade gaps in western Europe, along with engineers, doctors and nurses.
Around one million Romanians are now working in Spain and one million in Italy. Both these numbers increased in 2010. Between 20 and 25 per cent of Romania’s employed workforce - two to three million people - have jobs abroad, compared to the nine million working at home.
“There is little to come back to,” says Marius Girlea general manager of website Jobsinro.ro. “Even if we see people coming back, it is only temporary and crisis-related. Romania will be a net labour force exporter for many years. It is not the job, but the salary that drives people home. Romania is not and will not be able to compete on the European or world wide labour market.”
Outsourcing options
Romania follows Hungary and Poland as a target for shared service centres and BPOs (Business Process Outsourcing). Currently Cluj-Napoca and Bucharest are the cities with large investments – with internationals opening seven BPOs in Cluj-Napoca in 2009. “The advantage of the Romanian market is young graduates who speak a high level of foreign languages,” says Stanculescu. “The minority communities are also attractive because of their Slovak, Czech, Polish or Italian language skills – as well as English, French, Hungarian and German.”
Following Bucharest and Cluj-Napoca, Iasi could also become attractive for this type of outsourcing due to its good universities and graduate foreign language skills.
More companies are also hiring people on a fixed term or temporary work contract. “The advantages are that the costs are limited to a certain period, it offers flexibility and the ability to test staff for future projects,” says Stanculescu. The economy still shows a high level of uncertainty, so companies are hiring more staff for limited periods – varying from one or two days to up to six months.
Romania’s employment services market was worth 120 million Euro in 2009, around 130 million Euro in 2008, and the same value is predicted for 2010. This shows a stable market in a period of unrest.
Meanwhile recruitment firm Lugera & Makler has seen ten per cent increase for 2009 to 2010 period on the previous year. “But we lost a lot of projects because we requested advance payments and maintained our tariffs,” says Cristina Savuica, general director at Lugera & Makler Romania. Meanwhile Manpower Romania intends to expand from its nine branches to more cities in 2011 and 2012.
Around 1,000 are employed in executive search and recruitment in Romania - while those employed in human resources are probably in the 10,000s. Although recruitment tends to be a low margin industry, new international entries are interested in accessing the Romanian market.

Report by Michael Bird and Teodora Vaduva