The Recruitment Experiences and Outlook Survey (REOS) Recruitment Insights Report for April found that recruitment eased, and fewer employers were expecting to increase staffing numbers in the next 3 months.
The recruitment rate decreased by 1 percentage point to 48% of employers in April 2024. This is 11 percentage points lower than the record highs of 59% in mid-2022. The proportion of employers expecting to increase their staffing numbers also eased by 2 percentage points to 20% over the month.
The decreases were driven by Rest of State areas (which generally cover regional Australia), where recruitment activity eased by 6 percentage points to 47% and employers expecting to increase staff also dropped to 15%.
More employers had difficulty recruiting in April than they did in March, a 3 percentage point increase to 53% of recruiting employers. Despite this increase, the long-term movement of the recruitment difficulty rate has been easing since mid-2022. This month’s figure is 9 percentage points lower than it was in April last year and is 22 percentage points below the peak of 75% recorded in July 2022.
