How to recruit for hard-to-fill positions

Skills shortages are looming for economies across Europe at a time of demographic change and transitions towards digital and green technologies. Here, we explore which roles are hard to fill in Europe – and suggest some tactics that employers can use to boost hiring.

What are employers’ hard-to-fill positions?

The European Commission has identified 42 shortage occupations, across the healthcare, engineering, construction, tourism and transportation sectors. Lorry, tram and bus drivers are listed alongside nurses, medics, engineers, software developers and systems analysts, bricklayers, cooks, waiters, and more.

Shortages are growing as existing workers retire from their roles, and demand rises from new growth areas, including the digital and green industries. A 2023 Eurobarometer study found that 78% of SMEs – which make up 99% of Europe’s businesses – said they had difficulty recruiting skilled workers.

EU support for employers includes the Pact for Skills, part of the European Skills Agenda since 2020, with a mission to upskill the European workforce. Benefits for member companies (7 500 in 2023) include networking, knowledge and guidance hubs, as well as access to training and events. By 2023, more than two million people had already benefited from advanced training.

Tactics for successful hiring

Bringing in new workers, helping those who have previously not worked to take up jobs, and training up existing workers with new skills can all help to tackle skills shortages, a 2024 report suggests. Here are some key tactics and examples of how businesses put them into practice, drawing on the report.

Attract new workers to the sector: improving the quality of jobs and sector attractiveness, while exploring the possibility of mobility from other EU countries and beyond can all help companies to find new sources of talent. One Croatian hotel successfully avoided seasonal worker shortages by offering paid overtime, loyalty bonuses, part-time and flexible work options, as well as support with the cost of housing, and using regional trade support for local, national and international marketing.

Activate underutilised labour: reducing barriers that keep those with health issues or caring responsibilities out of the workplace can help to encourage more people into the workplace, as can support measures to integrate migrants and refugees. The Czechia branch of research company Ipsos offered maternity and paternity leave, flexible working and an onsite crèche to recruit and retain those with caring responsibilities. In Sweden, the Ukrainian Professional Support Centre organised networking events and job fairs, created CV databases and provided training to attract skilled refugees into roles as varied as health and social care and ICT.

Upskill local workers: work experience and training programmes can help upskill existing staff and local jobseekers. Employers may also find that improving recruitment strategies and tools (e.g. social media) can help to attract much-needed talent. Cyprus Public Transport set up its own bus driver apprenticeship scheme that covered the cost of lessons for successful hires after six months, Dutch IT company Aurai offered an advanced traineeship covering areas from data engineering to machine learning and the City of Helsinki launched a flexible work-based training scheme to enable the unemployed, refugees, migrants and others to become healthcare assistants.

How EURES can help

EURES can help employers recruit workers from other European markets. The EURES network of advisers in the 27 EU countries, Switzerland, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway offer advice and practical support with hiring both to employers and to the jobseekers who take up their offers. The network can help identify where surplus workers from other markets may be available for hard-to-fill jobs.

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