BC continues to have the second highest private sector job vacancy rate in Canada 3.5%, resulting in 66-thousand unfilled jobs.
That’s according to the latest report from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business.
Vice-President and Chief Economist, Ted Mallett spoke with My PG Now on some of the issues small businesses across Northern BC are facing.
“So it shows that businesses are struggling a lot more when looking for the right people but making sure that they have the working environment that can retain the people they’ve got because the biggest problems for small firms is the high degrees of turnover because a lot of time is spent in the recruiting and training process.”
Mallett says companies who are easily visible can attract workers more often, some of the most effective ways to do this is with social media or a company website.
He adds unlike much bigger operations, a lot of workers seem to be happier when working at a small outfit.
“We do tend to find on surveys that working for small and medium-sized enterprises tend to have higher job satisfaction and we think that is partly because they are closer to the owners of the business, they know what the business strategy is and they know what they are trying to accomplish.”
“Their jobs can be quite flexible in many respects and if you need time off for family or emergency needs small firms tend to react to that very well.”
Mallett admits posting a job that is outside your location may not be the best approach when trying to acquire new employees.
“For many small businesses, it’s actually tougher to attract people from outside the area because of their maybe many similar businesses dotted around the province where it would give people the chance to choose.”
According to the CFIB, the best thing for small businesses to do is to focus on the current workforce you have, utilize the word of mouth that the business may have with their employees, a positive work environment will only benefit the storefront.