This was first published on Chathams Common Futures Conversation’s Blog.
Some months ago, I published the report for the first Nigerian Recruiters Survey Report. This report uncovered challenges, concerns and priorities for Nigeria Recruiters and Career Starters or Job Seekers navigating the job seeking process amidst COVID-19 and beyond. The Nigeria Recruiters Survey was carried out between October to December 2020 and we are delighted to publish the findings.
In the last 5 years I have personally studied the trend of unemployment and underemployment in Nigeria since I was in university studying for a Bachelor’s degree in Sociology. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has much more altered certain dynamics of the Nigeria Labour market causing a limitation to businesses, the larger economy, career plateau while also opening up exponentially the wave of technology.
During the COVID-19 lockdown, I had chosen to embark on this yearly project focused on studying and capturing local data and stories on Youth Unemployment in Nigeria. At 33% recorded by the National Bureau of Statistics’ (NBS), the Nigerian Unemployment rate today is higher than it was in April 2020 at the beginning of the lock down and the spread of the pandemic in Nigeria.
This report offers firstly an in-depth look at the state of recruitment in Nigeria amongst both small, medium and large scale organizations, and the strategies adopted to overcome the challenges in an increasingly evolving world, while also helping us provide evidence and data to the trends and skills shortage amongst young graduates in Nigeria.
About The Nigerian Recruiters Report
On a regular basis, the National Bureau of Statistics’ (NBS) engages in the Labour Force Survey to better understand and capture the realities of today’s marketplace, including unemployment rate based on certain indicators. In 2020, I set out to conduct a yearly survey and somewhat in depth study of observable and hidden factors to unemployment mostly affected by young people. This report is the first of many to come.
The 2020 Nigerian Recruiters Report surveyed roughly 235 HR Professionals in Nigeria to gain awareness of the current state of the recruitment prior and throughout the pandemic and highlight certain lessons and trends.
Here are a few of the highlights from this year’s report!
FINDING TALENTS… in a talent constrained economy
- 58.3% reports that the recruiting environment over the last 12 Months has been very challenging compared to the previous. Finding talent is hard.
- To add more context, 59.6% reports that shortage of technical skills appears as the top challenge when it comes to hiring.
The GO-TO for Talent Sourcing
With millions of young people seeking employment, and the difficulty of recruiters finding talents in Nigeria, visibility and positioning will be of more importance to both job seekers and recruiters.
- Recommendations from employees and LinkedIn are the highest channels for sourcing new talent. 76.2% of recruiters report that they use employee referrals while 72.3% use LinkedIn.
How young Nigerians can respond to the job market
As we look ahead towards the future, what does this report mean for young Nigerians? With businesses trying to bounce back from the pandemic, recruiting talents in Nigeria according to recruiters, will still be very much challenging and interesting. Some of the major ways young Nigerians can respond to this reality includes:
- The key to job opportunities are connected to skills: Employability skills are important to recruiters and employers and improves one’s chances of securing a job, retaining a job and advancing flexibly in the tight labour market. Notwithstanding, soft skills do not replace technical skills as we have found that recruiters still face the challenge of finding talents with the right technical skills for the job. Therefore, Young Nigerians must find the right balance to their hard and soft skills.
- Beyond skills, teachability has been identified as a critical behavioural attribute required from young Nigerians. Teachability is the ingredient behind the willingness to learn, ask questions, identify and evaluate your options, acquire employable skills and engage in lifelong learning. An individual must first be teachable to learn new skills.
- Be Known and be Seen: First, recruiters believe great talent always knows other great talents and so they rely on referrals from their employees to fill open roles. This means young Nigerians must be consciously building relationships and networks with other professionals in their industry or employees of organizations they would like to work.
Additionally, LinkedIn has been identified by recruiters as the second most used channels for talent sourcing. This means young Nigerians must pay attention to how they are perceived online. LinkedIn has over 600M users across the world. There is no platform that can give you that level of visibility for your career.
LinkedIn puts you in the face of most senior level decision makers and recruiters who use LinkedIn as a platform for head hunting. So you will be doing your career a disservice by not being on LinkedIn and not ensuring your profile is visible on LinkedIn.
Don’t just be on LinkedIn, be visible. Include the relevant skills for the opportunities you want on your profile.
Download the Full Report
These are just a few of the key takeaways from the 2020 Nigerian Recruiters Report. Download the report today for additional statistics and insights to help job seekers and talent professionals understand how adjusting efforts to meet the supply and demands of the job market today will progress into the future.
To download the full report click here.