As 2010 draws to a close, we would like to share our view of the current executive recruitment market, offer our predictions for 2011 and a recap on our Employment Index tracker. If you require more information about the content of this newsletter, please feel free to contact us.

Matthew Cook
Managing Director
t 03 9607 5629

Matthew Hodder
Managing Consultant
t 02 8292 2120


CFO Market Overview

2010 has been a significantly better year for corporates and the recruitment market. In the first quarter, there was a pronounced increase in executive level recruitment in comparison to the previous year. The level of hiring moderated slightly through the middle of the year but has picked up again in November as companies invest in the skills needed for their 2011 plans. As always, investment confidence will vary across industry groups and this is reflected in the following summary of the key trends we are seeing in the market.

Australian Listed Companies
Australia has fared well over the last two years and is our second best performing country (China is number one) in the Michael Page network, which operates across 28 countries worldwide. The stability of our domestic banks and ongoing resources demand from Asia have produced a robust economic environment and resilient labour market, with unemployment just over 5%. The strength of the ASX recruitment market has been industry specific but overall, more positive than the foreign multinational counterparts. Industry specific groups such as resources and related services have seen a significant level of recruitment activity.
Click here to read more

 
Employment Index
Highlights 2010
 
Gender Equality
The Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency recently produced its 2010 findings which found that the progress of women in key positions within the ASX top 200 companies since 2008 to date has been poor.

Specific findings from the EOWA report include:

  2008 2010
 
ASX 200 Chairs 2% 2.5%
ASX 200 CEOs 2% 3%
ASX 200 NEDs 8.3% 8.4%

Michael Page Executive Search held a CFO Business Breakfast roundtable in October attended by 20 senior women in finance. The gender equality issue was discussed and a number of pertinent points were raised with respect to this subject.

Research conducted by Michael Page revealed that the pipeline for female senior finance appointments is light with only 41 (8.2%) women holding the CFO position in the ASX top 500 companies. A further breakdown of this list shows that there are only seven women holding the position of CFO for ASX listed companies with a market capitalisation in excess of $1billion. This clearly creates talent pipeline issues when senior CFO positions become available.

Click here to read more on the topic and download the 2010 Census Key Findings Report produced by the Equal Opportunities for Women in the Workplace Agency.

The Michael Page Employment Index is a monthly hiring forecast based on a survey of senior human resources professionals. Having run this research all year, it is clear to see that monthly staffing levels have been gradually increasing. Click here to review all the 2010 monthly Employment Indexes at our News and Research Centre.

MPEI Graph


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