Are you looking for new employees? Once you know what your requirements are for new employees, it's a matter of finding them and, above all, convincing them of your company. To do this in the best possible way, you should know the priorities and behaviors of Swiss job seekers.
The study
In the JobCloud labor market study published in September 2021, over 1,300 passive and active job-seeking Swiss between the ages of 16 and 60 were surveyed about their priorities and behavior around the job search. We have summarized the study for you and drawn conclusions from it.
Why is a new position being sought?
One question participants were asked as part of the survey was "Why are you looking for a new job?" At 78%, the main reason for changing jobs is a higher salary, closely followed by a general desire to change one's professional life (76%). However, the desire for a better work-life balance (53%), a more suitable area of responsibility (54%) or company culture (55%) were also given as reasons. As a company, we can therefore advise you to respond to the needs of your (future) employees and especially to offer an appropriate salary. In addition, you can also offer benefits that make you more attractive as an employer. Communicate openly about your expectations, the scope of duties and your company culture.
What is looked for in the job posting?
The first thing job seekers look for in a job posting is the type of employment. A full 99% of participants stated this. For 98%, the commute time also plays an important role. Here, 90% of all respondents are willing to commute more than 20 minutes. An average commute of 47 minutes is accepted. For only 1% it is irrelevant when reading the job advertisement how much they will earn later. The situation is quite different when it comes to the number of employees in the company. This criterion makes it to 10th place with 21% considering this information unimportant. 96% find both the industry and an attractive place to work important. Company image makes it to 6th place with 97% agreeing, while part-time work and home office options come in at 79% and 76% respectively. When you publish a job advertisement, you should make sure that information such as
- type of employment
- Place of work
- and the possible salary range
should be mentioned in the advertisement. To additionally convince potential applicants, you can integrate benefits and a company description directly in the advertisement. Employer ratings in particular are a welcome piece of information (50% find this very helpful). People between the ages of 16 and 34 in particular appreciate this.
Reach your target group here
As a company, you have many ways to spread the word about your job posting. Now you can use all these possibilities, but this brings you only limited benefits. In the worst case, you will receive a lot of unqualified applications, which will cost you a lot of time. So it is much more helpful if you know where your target group is looking for open positions. By far the most used places are job portals and search engines (71%). For both office jobs and non-office jobs, this ranks first. In second place, at 52%, is the company's website. Social networks are used primarily to search for office jobs (40%). For non-office jobs, newspapers and magazines are well represented (33%). 11% of all job seekers also use the help of recruiters.
This is important to Swiss people on the job
In many cases, salary is the number one factor in a job. But did you know that a good work-life balance is much more important to most people than a high position or a steep career? It is also highly valued if employees can do something meaningful with their work. The least important factors are a 100 percent fit with a job description and a career.
The application process
Do you offer taster days? If not, you might want to consider changing that. 60% of applicants prefer trial workdays or taster days. More and more companies want applications in the form of a video, but this is not welcomed by job seekers. 46% rated this as negative. Only 26% find video applications positive. If interested people apply to you who are not a good fit for the company, you should still send a response to the application. 52% of participants regularly receive no response at all to their application. This leaves a bad impression. And recommendations from one's own network rank third among job search sources (41%).
Closing words
Now you know what Swiss job seekers look for and how to reach them. Nevertheless, it happens that the search for new professionals does not always go as desired. But that's where we can help!
As headhunter specialists in the fields of construction and real estate, engineering and manufacturing, and digitalization, we know how to get you the best talent. Feel free to contact us! Through our years of experience and talent database with many interesting profiles, we can
we can bring you together with the right candidates.