Survey finds B.C.’s high cost of living eclipsing talent shortage as top barrier to recruitment Curt Cherewayko After achieving peak employment in 2008, B.C.’s technology industry shed 6% of its workforce, or 4,700 workers, between September 2008 and September 2009. However, many respondent companies in the BC Technology Industry Association’s (BCTIA) latest snapshot of the sector’s labour trends believe the worst is behind them and expect to increase their headcount 6% by September 2010.
That’s a conservative growth forecast compared with previous years, according to the BCTIA’s 2010 TechTalentBC study, but it would bring the industry back to peak employment levels. The study suggests the tech sector could reach a new peak demand for talent in the years to come, assuming that the industry maintains a 3.95% compounded annual growth rate. As well, the job reductions in 2009 could have been more dramatic, but it appears that, while roughly one-third of companies reduced their headcount, the one-third of companies that grew last year absorbed many laid-off workers. The high cost of living – or perceived high cost of living – in B.C. has eclipsed lack of available talent as the top barrier to recruitment in the sector. Many senior executives who responded to the survey, which largely compares data compiled in the 2008 talent survey, drew a link between a shortage of capital and an inability to maintain or increase their staff. Vancouver-based wireless hardware manufacturer Sierra Wireless (TSX:SW; Nasdaq:SWIR) reduced its headcount in B.C. by roughly 10% in January. “We had seen the economic changes starting in October 2008, as everyone else did,” said Pat Watson, Sierra’s vice-president of human resources. The reductions were largely a response to declining sales related to conservative spending by their customer base. “Our largest customer base is in the U.S.” said Watson. “At that time, there was probably more of a concern in the U.S. about the economy.” The company’s sales remained flat in 2009’s first and second quarters, but began increasing in the third quarter. One-ninth of the overall headcount growth in the technology sector this year is expected to come from positions within hardware, software and network development. That demand, according to the BCTIA, is not surprising given B.C.’s historical reliance on the information, communications and telecommunications sectors as the backbone of its technology industry. Software engineers have the greatest expectation of growth (275 full-time employees in 2010). The TechTalentBC study reported a “surprising” reduction in the number of systems and operations professionals, whose jobs are increasingly being hosted by or outsourced to cloud computing and software-as-a-service firms. RackForce Networks Inc., which opened a new data centre in Kelowna last summer, is among the B.C. companies capitalizing on the transition. The company had 23 employees at the beginning of the year; it now has 32. It expects to have 50 staff in about a year’s time as it opens new sections of its data centre. Brian Fry, Rackforce’s vice-president of sales and marketing, said the company ramped up the development of its data centre in the first half of 2009 when talent was cheaper and more available. “We could bring in contractors for much better rates, whereas a year earlier we were struggling to find people.” He agrees with the BCTIA’s findings that talent will become a precious resource again. Fry said the stigma that became attached to the tech sector following the dot-com bust deterred many students from pursuing degrees in technology. That created a shortage of graduates. Taking a long-term view, however, Fry noted that demand for talent in some sectors might drop as technological efficiencies increase. Collectively, the TechTalentBC study’s 236 respondent companies represent $4.8 billion in revenue and had 13,789 employees on September 1, 2008. •
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This article from Business in Vancouver February 9-15, 2010; issue 1059 Business in Vancouver (www.biv.com) has been publishing in-depth local business news, analysis and commentary since 1989. The newspaper also produces a weekly ranked list of the biggest companies and players in a wide range of B.C. industries and commercial sectors, monthly features and industry-focused sections that arm its subscribers with a complete package of local business intelligence each week. |
