Surveys Show Lack Of Qualified Applicants A Top Challenge For Employers
Yahoo! Finance reports on two recent surveys that highlight a key challenge faced by small business owners – finding the right person for the job. One of the surveys, from Babson College, examined responses from 1,800 small business owners across the US. These business owners reported that “the so-called skills gap was their biggest hiring challenge.” The Babson survey found that nearly “half of the respondents said hiring and keeping good employees is one of their top two growth challenges,” and that “72% of the respondents had difficulty hiring qualified employees in the last two years.” In particular, small business owners in companies providing transportation or construction services had the hardest time finding qualified workers. The other survey, NFIB’s Small Business Economic Trends report, found that of the 700 small business owners surveyed in May, 48% of those attempting to hire during the month “said they could find few or even no qualified applicants for the jobs they were trying to fill.” Askinosie Chocolate CEO Shawn Askinosie “said qualified applicants are out there but that small businesses don’t have the resources to recruit them.” He explained, “In other words, the battle for attention on most social media channels (including job boards) is so overwhelming that it’s a significant challenge to be seen and heard by great candidates. The only way over the noise is money and we don’t have the budget to turn up the volume on our search objectives.”
What This Means For Small Businesses
Finding qualified applicants is key to helping drive small business growth. The current hiring challenges small business owners are facing is contributing to stalled growth. As NFIB Chief Economist Bill Dunkelberg said in the May Small Business Economic Trends report, “The bottom line is that without an empowered small business sector, the economy will grow at a mediocre pace.”
Additional Reading
The AP also reported on the Babson College survey, while Bloomberg News covered the NFIB’s Small Business Economic Trends report.
Note: this article is intended to keep small business owners up on the latest news. It does not necessarily represent the policy stances of NFIB.
