(Finance) – Despite noting less optimistic forecasts, for the first quarter of the new year the “ManpowerGroup Employment Outlook Survey” (MEOS) on employment prospects, shows a positive growth forecast according to Italian employers, who expect an increase in hiring with a Net Employment Outlook (NEO) of +13%, net of seasonal adjustments. This is the thirteenth quarter in a row with positive expectations. The comparison with the last quarter of 2023 shows a drop of 6 percentage points, but the year-on-year comparison reveals a growth of +3% compared to the first quarter of 2023. The energy sector is also confirmed for the next three months as the one with the expectations best (+28%), followed by trade, IT and transport.
“Our research, while noting less optimistic forecasts compared to the last quarter, highlights that Italian employers who expect an increase in the number of people in their workforce for the first quarter of the new year are significantly higher than those who expect a decrease . It’s a positive sign, tooeverything is improving when compared to the beginning of 2023″, he comments Anna Gionfriddo, CEO of ManpowerGroup Italia. “These encouraging forecasts clash with the lack of talent with the skills companies are looking for, reported by three out of four companies. A factor that adds to the challenges related to the developments of Artificial Intelligence: 83% of companies, in fact, is preparing for changes in roles and skills following the introduction of artificial intelligence. A united commitment is therefore necessary on the part of training bodies, institutions, companies and employment agencies for the upskilling and reskilling of people, so as to offer workers the new sought-after skills by companies and alleviate the problem of mismatch between supply and demand of labour”.
In detail: the energy sector is also confirmed as the sector with the best hiring forecasts for the beginning of 2024: +28%, the best among all economic sectors. Trade and services (+23%), information technology (+21%) and transport (+21%) also follow with good prospects. Positive prospects also for industry (+13%), communications (+12%), finance and real estate (+9%). The only sector that shows a decline in expectations is that of healthcare and life sciences, which marks -11%.
It also emerges that Italian companies continue to report a serious problem of talent shortage on the labor market: 75% declare that they have had at least some difficulty in finding candidates with the required skills and for over one in ten the difficulties there were many. As many as one in four say that it is difficult to find the right IT skills (25%) and for almost one in five there are problems with the skills required in the production departments (19%). This is followed by engineering (17%), administrative (16%) and logistics (16%) skills.
Regarding the challenges posed by artificial intelligence and ecological transition, l‘83% of Italian organizations are reflecting on how to manage the challenges related to new jobs and tasks due to the development of AI. 23% think of training staff already in the company and 23% want to hire new qualified professionals. 17% believe they need to better define which tasks can benefit from AI and 16% believe they need to understand which current skills will need to be updated. 15% are considering whether to create important training and refresher programs for their staff.
Regarding the ecological transition, the majority of Italian companies think that a large part of the skills in each business sector will have to change to adapt to more sustainable and ecological practices. For example, according to Italian employers, all IT and Operations functions will have to change 66% of their technical skills, updating them in a green key.