Job vacancies on the rise in tight labour market

Singapore's tight labour market has continued to see an increase in the number of job vacancies, with 61,900 vacancies reported in September 2013 - a 9.7% rise from the previous year.

According to the Ministry of Manpower’s (MOM) Job Vacancies 2013 report, the services industry accounted for a majority of the vacancies, making up 80% of all job openings in 2013.

Those included roles in community, social and personal services, accommodation and food services, wholesale & retail trade and administrative and support services.

The percentage of roles that were found to be hard to fill by locals remained unchanged at 66%, although the actual number of vacancies rose from 34,760 in 2012 to 38,310 last year due of the overall increase in job openings.

The biggest barriers to recruiting locals were unattractive pay (affecting 46.5% of vacancies), physically strenuous jobs (40.8%), shift work (35.1%) and a non-conducive working environment (30.3%).

Nearly two thirds (62%) of the job vacancies last year required some form of work experience; 22% were job-specific and general work, while 19% were industry-specific.

As for job openings at a managerial level, nearly all the top 10 positions in demand, barring restaurant manager, required a degree qualification, with job-specific know-how also being commonly required of managers.

It was also reported 60% of the job openings were vacant for less than six months, a trend that has been on-going since 2009.