ICT industry snubs mature age workers

Stan Beer
Monday, 10 April 2006 12:49

IT People - Enterprise

While the ICT industry seeks to promote an image of being at the bleeding edge of technology, it has shown itself up to be a relative dinosaur in the field of human resources, continuing to snub one of the most valuable sectors of workforce, mature age workers, according to a new survey.

Employers in the ICT sector are the least proactive in seeking to attract and retain mature aged workers, despite the nation’s rapidly ageing workforce and growing skills shortage, according to the results of the latest survey, released today by recruitment firm Hudson.

The Hudson Report survey of 8,345 employers nationally shows that only 32.3% of employers in the IT sector, and 23.8% in the telecoms sector are proactively seeking to attract and retain employees from this valuable pool of talent. These two industries displayed by far the lowest proportions returned by any of the sectors surveyed and well below the national average of 40.7%.

While the rate of employer proactivity has increased by 11 percentage points over the last two years in the IT sector, and by 7 points in the

telecoms sector, the majority of ICT employers are still not tapping into this skilful and highly experienced demographic. 

According to Martin Retschko, director of the IT&T Sector for Hudson, IT&T employers need to take serious note of these findings and act now

or risk losing serious competitive advantage, given the ageing workforce and continuing skills shortage.

“Employers in the IT&T sector have tended to be poor at reskilling mature age workers and therefore some workers have been left behind in terms of the skill sets now in demand. However, with the continuing skills shortage, IT&T employers cannot afford to do this,” said Retschko.

"Employers should be more proactive in the training and development of their staff. This will assist in reducing turnover, retain corporate knowledge, and will assist in providing mentors/coaches in the workplace.

"Organisations also need to consider new ways to proactively attract and retain mature aged workers such as flexible work options, including jobsharing and part-time work, in order to accommodate this valuable yet still under-used pool of talent."

The table below shows just have far behind the IT and telecoms sectors are the rest of the workplace in its attitudes to mature age workers.

Percentage of employers proactively seeking to attract and retain mature aged workers by Industry

Financial Services/Insurance: 46.9%

Professional Services: 45.1%

Government: 44.3%

Wholesale/Distribution: 43.5%

Construction/Engineering/Property: 40.2%

Advertising/Marketing/Media: 33.1%

Information Technology: 32.3%

Telecommunications: 23.8%

National Average: 40.7%