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Job market takes on international flavour
Doors are opening around the world for South Africans with marketable skills, writes MARCIA KLEIN
AS SOUTH Africa becomes integrated into the global village, its people are becoming a tradable commodity. South African recruitment companies are opening branches offshore and overseas recruitment and immigration specialists are setting up shop in South Africa to tap into the mobile-people skills market and to service corporate clients wishing to globalise. Mathew Collins, managing partner of London-based immigration and commercial consultant Ambler Collins, says his company has opened a branch in South Africa in response to "a large demand for our services". Collins says he is in "the people import-export business, taking over management of applications for visas and work permits". He works for companies looking to relocate personnel and is involved in niche markets like professional sports and music as well as doing specialist skills searches. "There has been a large demand from South Africans for our services. There is also a large demand for young professionals and skilled South Africans to fill skills shortages, especially in the UK." Collins says the large demand should not be considered unusual and does not necessarily point to a desperate flight of skills out of the country. According to a recent research survey, 65% to 70% of South Africans under 30 years of age do not regard leaving South Africa as a permanent move. "They are doing what young people in other Commonwealth countries do, looking for a life experience, at opportunities to work in an overseas market and gain skills," says Collins. In certain industries there is a shortage of skills, he says, and companies and countries are competing in the global village for these skills. Countries are also importing skills to boost their economic growth as they cannot source the necessary skills locally. The government of Southern Australia, for example, has advertised for people because it wants to fuel the growth of the domestic economy. New Zealand, which is in a position where it cannot train or equip enough people to fuel its economic growth, is recruiting masses of people in certain industries, for example in nursing. "We see an economy boom and then a chase to get people into that economy," he says. Collins says about 100 000 SA citizens under 30 years of age are leaving each year to enter the UK - but this is not different on a per capita basis compared to other Commonwealth countries. A recent Gallup survey commissioned by The Telegraph showed that 49% of British working adults said they would emigrate if they could. Apart from recruiting South Africans overseas, there are about 150 multinational companies showing an interest in coming to South Africa. They will need to bring in specialist personnel and senior management. There is also a growing demand from people wishing to retire to South Africa, an attractive country because of its devaluing rand. Major recruitment group Renwick has opened a London office "with the prime objective of hiring top level skills through head-hunting, advertised selection or interim contract management". Renwick managing director John Sherratt says South Africa's lack of sufficient technical and managerial skills has been caused partly by low levels of immigration into the country. While South Africa achieved a net gain of 205 391 people from 1975 to 1984, this dwindled to just 25 143 in the 10 ten years to 1994. Renwick will also try and tap into "the huge pool of South African talent now resident in the UK, possibly as high as 400 000". Renwick aims to try and coax these skills back to the country and to recruit for companies coming in and SA companies operating abroad. With the global village becoming a reality, skills are crossing borders. Hoechst, for example, is a German company headed by an American. Initial training in Hoechst includes international business courses and personnel are sent to Hoechst bases around the world. The aim, says Sherratt, is to make the company truly global. Sherratt says SA managers are considered extremely competent because of their broad experience, caused in part by the lack of middle management in the country.
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