Research Data

Andersen's Global Best Practices group released results of a 'Solving the People Puzzle' survey in 2001. The survey focused on how senior tax executives in Fortune 500 companies saw recruitment, retention, and managing change issues. Respondents said that in the future a greater emphasis would be placed on non-traditional traits such as being a strong communicator and understanding the business, and somewhat less emphasis would be placed on traditional tax skills. Major findings in relation to recruitment were:

• Only 7% reported that HR departments helped develop strategies for new hires

• HR performed the more administrative tasks, such as initial screening (40%) and communication and negotiation of employment offers (50%)

• When not using Recruitment firms, 'word of mouth' was a candidate identification technique identified as `mostly effective` by 30%

• Intranets, the Internet, and internal communications were 'never used' or considered 'rarely effective'

• The largest pool of talent for recruiting consisted primarily of Big Five accounting firms and other large corporations

• 62% said they never hired new accounting graduates; Internal company transfers were reported as an unlikely staffing option

• A large number of respondents said it was difficult to hire professionals with highly specialised tax skills - creative tax planning (90%), international income tax (92%) and partnership tax (72%)

• Skills such as writing well, working well within a team, being personable and exhibiting professional behaviour were cited as `most important` in the hiring process because of the increased need for participation in strategic and operational business decision-making

Respondents reported that vacancies for experienced tax professionals averaged 10 months to fill. Replacement costs (i.e. recruiting fees, signing bonuses, retraining time), were estimated at more than $60,000 per person.

Another survey was conducted of 108 businesses concerning strategic recruitment practices i.e. recruiting staff based upon compatibility with expected future demands associated with the organisation's changing environment. Data was collected over a four-year period (1997-2001) with 180 respondents describing actual recruitment experiences by constructing a flow chart and appending the job/person descriptions associated with the position. All respondents were studying HR modules as part of either postgraduate or management programmes. The survey results indicted that the great majority of firms did not practice strategic recruitment despite recognising its significance. The data below shows the reported inputs used by organisations for analysing recruitment & selection requirements.

Organisational Requirements:

Job Requirements:

A survey was completed over a combination of the Fortune 2000 100 Best Companies to Work For (BCWF) and a random sample of 100 of the Fortune 2000 500 Highest Revenue Corporations (HRC), to determine the sort of information top US companies include on their corporate websites to promote recruitment. The survey showed that corporate websites displayed the following information:

In a study by iLogos of the top 100 recruiting companies in Canada it was found that 42% of the top 100 accepted on-line job applications. However the study also reported that only 5% of the top 100 recruiting companies pre-screened applicants using assessment tools and only 16% profiled applicants.