REC’s Recruitment Industry Trends Survey 2009/10

I’m always being asked about getting hold of industry stats – so I thought if I post about this here then it’ll help some people (and me!) find information when they next need it.

The Recruitment Industry Trends Survey is is an annual report report compiled by the REC’s Industry Research Unit.  You do have to pay for it and it’s £49 for members and £99 for non members.

If you don’t want to buy the report and just need a few facts/figures the major findings of the Recruitment Industry Turnover Survey covering the April 2009 to March 2010 were:

• A drop in overall industry turnover to £19.7 billion compared to 22.491 billion in 200/09. This represents a 12.4 per cent decrease in overall turnover.
• Temporary placements fell from 1,068 million to 879,302, a contraction of 17.7 per cent.
• Overall turnover for temporary/contract staff went down from £19.882 billion to £17.8 billion, a drop of 10.4 per cent.
• Permanent placements decreased from 582,803 to 436,822, a fall of 25 per cent.
• Total turnover for permanent staff also decreased from £2.609 billion to £1.9 billion, a drop of 27.6 per cent
• The largest number of temporary placements was once again in the Industrial and blue collar sector which after last year’s peak of 33 per cent of the market fell back this year to 21 per cent. This was followed by secretarial/clerical at 13 per cent and drivers at 12 per cent. Bringing up the rear was accounting/financial which dropped from 20 per cent last year to just two per cent.
• The largest sector for permanent placements was professional/managerial at 23 per cent, two points higher than last year followed by secretarial and clerical which has remained static at 14 per cent.
• Staff employment in the recruitment industry fell from 95,867 in 2008/09 to 80,528.

I'm hoping to blog a few stats from the RECs recent salary survey report  in the next week or so (once I remember where I put it!!)