14/08/2010
More than half of Saudi companies tends to recruit in the next quarter
Arecently study conducted by job website Bayt.com in collaboration with research specialists You Gov Siraj showing that 54% of Saudi companies will be hiring during the next few months. More than a quarter of the companies surveyed in the Kingdom indicates that it will "definitely" carry out their recruitment processes during the next three months, while 26% said it "may" so probably not. On the contrary, By contrast, 6% said they would definitely not be hiring in the next quarter.
Across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, the countries recorded varying propensities to hire as part of the Bayt.com Jobs Index. Respondents in Oman had the highest propensities to hire, with 41% saying that their organizations will definitely be recruiting new staff in the coming months while Jordan showed the lowest propensity to hire with just 18% of respondents saying they will definitely hire in the next three months.
Job seekers in Oman are likely to be the luckiest at finding work in a year’s time, with 45% of the country respondents stating they will “definitely” be hiring in 12 months’ time. In KSA, only 7% said they will probably or definitely not be hiring in a year’s time. By contrast, 32% said they would definitely hire in a year.
Respondents in Algeria were also highly confident that their organizations will be hiring in the future: 37% said they will definitely be hiring after a year. This is contrasted with just 24% and 23% of respondents in Tunisia and Egypt – the lowest figure among all of the surveyed countries.
For the most part, organizations are looking to recruit staff for less than five positions: 46% said that less than five jobs will be available, and 22% said that between six and 10 jobs will be available. Interestingly, 2% of respondents said that they will be looking to fill more than one hundred vacancies in the coming quarter.
“The adverse effects of the global recession on hiring practices in the Middle East region seem to be easing. While some regional companies appear to be maintaining their human resources budgets at relatively low levels in a bid to save money.
The survey found that junior executives are the most likely to find themselves with a job offer: 34% of organizations said that they would be looking to employ junior executives, followed by 27% that said they would be looking to hire on an executive level.
According to the study, 26% of organizations around the Middle East favor employing staff that are qualified in this field. Furthermore, graduates or postgraduates in commerce, engineering and administration are equally sought after by the region’s organizations, with 24% of respondents citing personnel in these fields as highly desirable. Less attractive to organizations in the region were those with qualifications in psychology or social sciences, and in flight training: just 3% and 2% of organizations, respectively, agreed that these are important qualifications that new staff should possess.
“The studies that Bayt.com conducts alongside YouGov Siraj aim to provide the region’s organizations and HR professionals with regularly updated research that sheds light on various elements of the Middle East and North Africa job market.
Data for the July 2010 Jobs Index was collected online between 23 June and 18 July 2010, with 2,763 respondents from the UAE, KSA, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria and Pakistan. Males and females aged over 18 years old, of all nationalities, were included in the survey.
