Construction firm goes to UK to fill vacancies
As soon as the borders began to reopen, Craig Treloar, head of building projects at Hawkins, was off to the United Kingdom.
But instead of heading overseas to find his own fortune, he was seeking people to come and work on the pipeline of projects the construction firm has on its books.
‘‘We went in March to the UK, I think we were one of the first companies to go to the UK on a drive,’’ Treloar said. The visit was a chance to recruit people for roles such as quantity surveyors, engineers and project managers.
The median project manager salary in New Zealand was $105,000 a year, according to NZtalent.com, and ranged up to $138,600, while the median annual pay for quantity surveyors was $95,000, and up to $133,000.
In general UK salaries were fairly similar for the roles being offered in New Zealand. ‘‘Some expectations were a little out, but we carefully managed those,’’ Treloar said. Around 60 people were interviewed, and the company had made offers to about 30 people. The company had recruited out of the UK for 15 years, with some people staying and moving up the ladder. The people signing up wanted the New Zealand lifestyle and to progress their career, he said.
The company had done recruitment drives in the past in South Africa, and was looking at Canada as an option, but found the UK was the best option so far.
‘‘The culture’s very similar to the UK, we find it’s better they can come in and settle in and find the
New Zealand way of doing things, and then work their way up if that’s what they’re wanting to do.’’
A lot of businesses were planning trips, he said, and recruiting overseas, for example through LinkedIn, and there was a lot of competition for talent.
‘‘We were over there very early, certainly the people we’d talked to hadn’t been interviewed by anyone else at that point, but as the borders are freeing up there’s more and more of that happening.’’
Hawkins was training and developing young people, and doing more internal promotions than Treloar had seen in 19 years with the business, but it took years to get people to the mid-level roles being recruited.
‘‘We encourage all of our subcontractors to employ apprentices, and they’re certainly on board with that. Some contracts have a minimum amount that you need to have on board on the project, so I think that’s all helping in the numbers you’re seeing of apprentices growing,’’ Treloar said.
New Zealand is expected to be 118,500 construction workers short by 2024, Te Waihanga/New Zealand Infrastructure Commission said in a report in May.