Elections will intensify construction skills shortage

Election promises will intensify construction skills shortage

Election infrastructure spending promises will expose the construction sector’s skills and talent shortage and significant new industry recruitment is required, says building industry veteran Aaron Muir.

Muir, a construction management consultant, says the construction industry is already under pressure from a pre-election programme of public and private works valued at $125 billion over the next 10 years according to Infrastructure New Zealand.

The additional infrastructure spend promised by the National and Labour parties in the lead-up to the election is adding up to $14 billion to those works and Muir says firms need to innovate in order to find sufficient qualified and experienced staff to deliver existing and new projects.

“The infrastructure commitments are great news for New Zealand and we certainly welcome the investment but we already have a skill and talent shortage and this is going to make an already acute situation much tighter,” says Muir. “New Zealand is a small market and we already have a huge project list on the books, for which construction companies are struggling to find the skills and talent to execute.”

National is promising $14.36 billion in new infrastructure spending, including 10 new roads of national significance, transport and commuter rail and housing among the big ticket items. Labour has pledged a range of large rail projects, regional transport initiatives and housing among infrastructure items totalling $8.14 billion.

Says Muir: “We now need to get smart in our recruitment by not only training more New Zealanders but targeting overseas markets for the project managers, civil engineers and surveying technicians that we need now and in the next few years.”

Muir is part of a consortium of public and private companies and organisations, led by HainesAttract and their migration talent attraction brand Workhere New Zealand, which in October launches an innovative marketing campaign called LookSee Build New Zealand to attract some of the additional 2,282 higher-skilled jobs that the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment estimates are needed to meet current demand. MBIE estimates predate the election infrastructure promises.

Auckland Transport has signed up to LookSee Build NZ and its chief infrastructure officer Greg Edmonds says the scale of construction, particularly in Auckland, is unprecedented and requires unique procurement solutions.

“We’ve already seen how difficult the market is even for our largest construction companies and we really need a whole-of-industry approach to skills procurement,” Edmonds says. “This is not about New Zealand companies competing against each other; this is about New Zealand competing against Dubai and Singapore for the best global construction talent.

“Industry collaboration is the key and the LookSee Build NZ innovation has the potential to significantly add to New Zealand and Auckland’s construction capability,” Edmonds says.

HainesAttract director Hamish Price says his team’s success with LookSee Wellington earlier this year, which attracted applications from 48,000 skilled IT workers to address the capital’s technology skill shortage, proved the innovative LookSee model can successfully compete against other growth markets seeking the same skillset.

Price says the upcoming LookSee Build NZ will take the concept to another level: “This is about collaboration across the entire building sector and we’re aiming to involve every significant construction player in the market as we seek to attract the highly-skilled managers and workers the industry needs.”

“With LookSee Build NZ we are essentially trying to future-proof the construction industry for a level of infrastructure build that this country has never seen. We’ll be targeting the UK and Ireland and other selected markets for the right people to come here and live and work in New Zealand,” he adds.

As part of the LookSee Build NZ package, candidates will be offered a range of quintessential Kiwi experiences such as bungy jumping, fishing, boating and weekends away at Waiheke Island or Rotorua in order to entice them to make New Zealand home.

www.lookseebuildnewzealand.co.nz

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