Global telecom talent report insights for hiring & retention

Global talent insight report
For the telecommunications sector

Introduction
We are excited to announce expand’s inaugural
talent insight report focused solely on the global
Telecommunications sector.
With 15 years’ experience recruiting for service
providers and carriers worldwide, we have a
wealth of data to share. The first edition reports
information on salaries, trends and strategies that
will help employers identify the factors which will
attract potential employees to their businesses and
help to retain them.
Our research combines the results from two online
surveys (an employee focused survey and an em-
ployer focused survey). The employee survey com-
bines a total of 500 respondents around the world
with data taken from our own internal records and
research. Our research also combines the results
from an employer survey with contributions from
over 60 Vice Presidents and CEO’s around the
world.
The research has clearly identified one key theme
which has been constant throughout our conver-
sations with the employees / employers involved in
this piece of work – the Telecommunications indus-
try has a real shortage of good quality candidates.
This is due to increased growth in the economy,
which has resulted in increased investment in
businesses, technologies and general connectivity
worldwide, the rapid evolution of services (through
the introduction of new technologies), and a surge
in exceptional candidates thriving within the
freelance market. It is clear that hiring challenges
are only going to deepen and are likely to impact
business performance. The insights we are provid-
ing as to the motivators of employees in this sector
will hopefully help businesses to optimise retention
and the attraction of new talent.
To continue and develop this theme further, given
current socio-political issues, we have also includ-
ed some information about the perception of gen-
der diversity amongst the respondents surveyed.
To be clear, this research piece has not focused
on diversity as a central theme as we wished to
provide more of a general overview of perceptions
across multiple issues.
We gathered data from respondents all over the
world and at varying levels of seniority. However,
we will be focusing primarily on North America
and Europe with some comparisons being made
with the Middle East and Asia where enough data
was gathered. We weren’t able to collect enough
data from Africa, Australasia and South America
to be able to draw meaningful conclusions in such
a way that we could directly compare and contrast
against the results from North America, Middle
East, Asia and Europe.
2 www.expandexecutivesearch.com

Talent retention and attraction challenges
Employers’ perceptions of the challenges they face when hiring
BRAND
AWARENESS
LOCATION
COMPETITION
LENGTH OF
HIRING PROCESS
TALENT
AVAILABILITY
HIRING WITHIN
PAY SCALES
0% 25%
22.6%
31.1%
19.0%
12.9%
42.9%
14.3%
9.7%
37.8%
4.8%
38.7%
57.1%
33.3%
83.9%
97.3%
81.0%
44.2%
71.4%
67.7%
50% 75% 100%
Asia
North America
Europe
Clearly, talent availability is the primary issue for
employers across all of the geographies included
in the graph above. Interestingly, this is the only
consistent response found in Asia, North America
and Europe. Therefore, we are able to confirm that
skills shortages and talent availability really is the
biggest issue faced in the Telecommunications
sector today.
As highlighted by the graph, hiring within
perceived industry payscales is also a major
issue for businesses in each continent, however,
it is perceived to be far less of an issue in North
America. The second highest issue is the length of
the hiring process; essentially if employers can’t
expedite the process sufficiently with an attractive
offer talent will go elsewhere.
What we can conclude from this is that generally
businesses across the world feel that they’re
paying too much for talented candidates.
The other most notable contrast is the perception
of competition from other businesses for talent
in Asia and Europe (where the perception is low)
versus North America where the market is clearly
much more volatile and filled with companies vying
for the same talent. This could be explained by
exploring the statistic on location where again we
see North America perceiving this issue as being
more prominent than their Asian and European
counterparts, which is possibly due to the pure size
and scale of the North American continent and the
Telecommunications market that it contains.
HiringChallenges
Percentage Of Respondents

Initiatives undertaken by companies to mitigate skills shortages
The initiatives companies have taken to address potential skills shortages
INCREASED BRAND AWARENESS
TO ATTRACT THE BEST WORKERS
RECRUITED WORKERS FROM
OTHER INDUSTRIES
USED EXTERNAL
RECRUITMENT COMPANIES
PIPELINE TALENT POOLS
RECRUITED WORKERS
FROM OVERSEAS
EXTERNAL TRAINING
(ALLOWED WORKERS TO STUDY
OUTSIDE THE COMPANY)
IMPROVED INTERNAL
TRAINING
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90%
North America
Europe
14.3%
33.3%
42.9%
38.1%
71.4%
76.2%
23.8%
14.3%
19.0%
14.3%
33.3%
85.7%
81.0%
Over 80% of the companies we surveyed, both
in North America and Europe, have improved
their internal training to address potential skills
shortages. The emphasis on internal training is
very good and a welcome long term approach
to the issue. Interestingly, at least 70% of
respondents use external recruitment agencies to
hire new talent into their businesses. This is a short
term fix if done so on an interim basis, however, it
is a long term strategy if employers are taking the
time to secure the right skill set.
To bring in more diverse skillsets and ideas, it’s
clear that businesses in both North America and
Europe explore candidate profiles from companies
outside of the Telecommunications sector (43%
and 38% respectively). It is also interesting to
note that in North America there seems to be no
perceived need for talent pipelining despite the
fact that they perceive themselves to have the
most competitive market (see previous graph).
InitiativesToMitigateSkillsShortages

Employer perceptions of salary vs.
Employee perceptions of salary
The results of this part of the survey came as a surprise
to us, in that it was somewhat expected that employees
would perceive their salaries as being below the
industry averages. However, what our data has shown
is that actually the perceptions of both employers
and employees are very similar. The interesting point
to take from this is that whilst both groups feel that
for the most part their salaries are in-line with their
industry average, amongst those who don’t agree (both
employer and employee) the consensus is that they fall
below the average rather than above - the perception
of being “well paid” in comparison to industry averages
is low in both groups.
What are the most important factors affecting Employees’ happiness?
Employee responses when asked about factors affecting happiness
As the graph above shows, employees feel
that financial remuneration, work/life balance,
culture & environment, recognition, training &
development and diversity & inclusion are all
important or critical, as exemplified by the fact
that the black and dark blue sections of the graph
contain the highest percentages. Where these
statistics become particularly interesting is when
examining the in-hand and low priority results;
we can see that diversity & inclusion from an
employees’ perspective is less of an important
factor contributing to an employee’s happiness.
This is notable because diversity currently sits
at the forefront of employers’ hiring strategies.
As is also clearly demonstrated from the graph
above, financial remuneration remains king of the
factors dictating an employee’s happiness whereas
diversity sits in last place.
Lower 27.59%
Higher 10.34%
In line 62.07%
Employer perception of
current salary against
industry average
Employee perception of
current salary against
industry average
Lower 34.78%
Higher 14.78%
In line 50.43%
Critical Important In hand Low priority Not importantFactors Affecting Employees’ Happiness
100%
75%
50%
25%
0%
FINANCIAL
REMUNERATION
WORK/LIFE
BALANCE
CULTURE &
ENVIRONMENT
RECOGNITION TRAINING &
DEVELOPMENT
DIVERSITY &
INCLUSION
0.87%
4.35%
64.35%
30.43% 35.09%
53.51%
9.65%
0.88% 0.88% 0.88%
7.89%2.63%
20.18%
42.11% 50.88% 49.12%
25.44%
23.68%
2.63%
34.00% 21.05% 18.42%
11.50%
39.82%
30.09%
16.81%
1.77%
0.88%
PercentageOfRespondents

How do Employers rate factors affecting Employees’ happiness?
Employer responses when asked about factors affecting Employees’ happiness
The employers’ data provides us with some
interesting comparisons in terms of the
perspectives they hold on key motivational
factors for employees’ happiness. Firstly, financial
remuneration for an employee was seen to be the
single highest contributor to their happiness which
is consistent with the employer findings. Culture is
rated higher by employees than employers which
is interesting given that culture plays a key role in
attracting talent to a business, as well as retaining
it. We had expected to see more similar results
between both groups.
We see agreement between these 2 groups
when examining the results for training &
development and diversity. For both employers
and employees, training and development was
seen as an important factor but not critical.
Given that it is recognised worldwide that skills
shortages are likely to worsen before getting
better, it is interesting to see that employers
are more concerned with attracting new talent
than upskilling their current workforce. Finally,
diversity features in both groups at around 40%-
50% critical/important, with 30%-40% in each
group believing that the issue is in-hand. The real
question here is whether or not this perception has
developed from a genuinely informed viewpoint
on either side about improvements to diversity, or
if both groups perceive the issue as in-hand due to
the level of media attention it has grown to receive
over recent years.
Critical Important In hand Low priority
RETENTION MAINTAINING
CULTURE
DIVERSITY COMPETITIVE
SALARIES
REWARDS
BENEFITS
TRAINING &
DEVELOPMENT TO
BUILD SKILLS
PercentagesOfRespondents
100%
75%
50%
25%
0%
People Issues
3.23%
6.90%
27.59%
51.72%
13.79% 20.69%
9.68% 6.45%
64.52%
25.81%
3.24% 9.68%
29.03%
54.84%
6.46%
77.42%
9.68%
3.23%
20.69%
44.83%
13.79%
19.35%
51.61%
25.81%

Actual percentages of salary increases over the past 12 months
achieved by Employees
How much Employees’ salaries have actually increased over the past 12 months
How should salaries be reviewed?
Employee and Employer perspectives on when salaries should be reviewed
We can clearly see that employees and employers
have very similar perspectives on salary reviews
with the general consensus being that they
welcome salary reviews that are performance
based. Here what we see is that employers
are appreciating the need to retain talent, and
are therefore seemingly keen to ensure that
employees are recognised for their individual
performance.
15% +
11 - 15%
6 - 10%
1 - 5%
0%
0.0% 12.50% 25.00% 37.50% 50.00%
SalaryIncreasePercentage
5.36%
4.46%
7.14%
47.32%
35.71%
Ad hoc as required ie.
Bonus for great
performance
On promotion
Performance based
(individual) over a period
Annual inflation based
(company wide)
68.1%
18.1%
13.8%
Employee Employer
50.1%
8.7%
26%
15.2%

What non-financial benefits do Employees receive?
What non-financial benefits are included in employment package offers
We can obviously note from the graph above that
enhanced maternity/paternity leave, subsidised
food and discounts from retailers are the most
common non-monetary benefits, and flexible
working, contributory pensions and private
healthcare are the least prevalent benefits .
When looking to retain the best talent, employers
should consider including extended holiday
allowance, travel subsidies and health and wellbeing
plans within their benefits package as these are the
most commonly sought after by employees.
100%
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
FLEXIBLE /
COMPRESSED /
HOURS / HOME
WORKING
HEALTH +
WELLBEING PLAN
IE: GYM
SUBSIDIZED FOOD CONTRIBUTORY
PENSION
PRIVATE HEALTH
CARE / DENTAL
TRAVEL SUBSIDIES ENHANCED
MATERNITY /
PATERNITY LEAVE
DISCOUNTS FROM
RETAILERS
EXTENDED
HOLIDAY
ALLOWANCE
24.56% 31.53% 28.7% 19.09% 18.18% 38.05% 27.1% 26.17% 34.23%
65.79% 36.04% 22.22% 65.45% 68.18% 25.66% 19.63% 28.04% 28.83%
9.65% 32.43% 49.07% 15.45% 13.64% 36.28% 53.27% 45.79% 36.94%
Within current package Not within current package Would like to have
PercentageOfRespondents
Benefit Availability

What Employees believe would make their compensation package more attractive (additional
comments from employees that were surveyed - results consistent between both groups have been
highlighted in blue)
What do Employers believe represent the most attractive parts of their employment package to
potential candidates (additional comments from employers that were surveyed - results consistent
between both groups have been highlighted in blue)
HEALTH FAMILY / PERSONAL FINANCIAL
Wellbeing plan Flexible working hours / location Shares / Profit share
Health / sports club membership
Flexible holiday scheme where employees can buy
or sell holidays.
Wealth Management and Planning
Cycle to work scheme Crèche facilities Better car allowance / company car
Commitment to improving work / life balance
Holiday with spouse or partner as part of rewards
program
Better training & external education, (e.g.
sponsored MBA programme)
Investment in new personal innovation (start-up on
the side)
Child care vouchers Performance-based salary reviews
Pension from day 1 rather than post probation. Higher performance-based bonuses
Relocation package
Travel subsidies
Share incentive scheme (often reserved for senior
management)
Free/subsidized car parking
BUSINESS FAMILY / PERSONAL FINANCIAL
International business operations and culture Diverse and innovative environment Performance based salary reviews
Innovative and international exposure
Ethical brand, intimate work environment,
“challenger” mentality
Strong rewards & recognition program
Interesting industry, strong brand and international
opportunities
Flexible working hours Very competitive compensation plan
Exciting company story High degree of autonomy All round offer is compelling and attractive
Flexibility to execute strategy Ability to develop professionally
Financially stable global organization
and industry leader
Sales culture much more in-line with a fun energetic
start-up
The ability to work globally with great people
It is interesting to note that we gave employees and
employers the same opportunity to comment on
additional facets of a compensation package that
could be included to make their employment offers
more attractive. Employees took the opportunity
to identify benefits that they would like to be
included in their benefits package in the future,
whilst employers simply listed what makes their
businesses attractive on a more general level. This
perhaps illustrates a disconnect between employees
and employers on the perceived level of importance
of having a competitive benefits package as well as
an attractive company proposition – both are vital.

Conclusion
The inaugural expand talent insights report set
out to research and explore key people themes
within the Telecommunications industry. We had
identified that the biggest challenge across the
world was a perceived skills shortage, and by
extension, talent availability. Our data showed that
this issue was the most prominent for employers in
Asia, North America and Europe.
We found that hiring within company payscales
was a consistent issue as businesses find
themselves having to pay over and above their
existing payscales in order to attract new talent
to their organisations. It is inevitable that this
will lead to accelerated salary growth if the
skills shortage continues. Therefore, either
organisations need to increase their payscales
to allow for the attraction of required skillsets,
or the skills shortage needs to be reversed to
put everything back on to a more even keel. It’s
also worth noting that this seems to be less of a
concern in North America.
On employee attraction and retention, we have
found that money still holds the most influence
amongst the factors we measured for both
employees and employers. Whilst there is now a
constant stream of new statistics and infographics
available on the internet that refer to the
differences between Baby Boomers, Generation
X and Millennials, we see that monetary
remuneration remains at the top of the pile. Yet,
as the demographics of the workforce change, and
the prominence of Generation X and Millennial
employees grows, it is expected that we will see
a rise in the influence of non-financial benefits
(especially in the case of Millennials). However, as
our data has shown, this remains seemingly distant.
Employers recognise that there is a distinct
skills shortage within their own workforces, as
well as the wider global talent pool. Logically it
would make sense for the first port of call to be
to ramp up training and development activities
aimed at current employees in order to upskill
their workforce, and consequently save the
costs associated with hiring new talent. In reality,
companies are greatly investing in training &
development to address the problem long-
term, yet are still engaging external recruitment
companies on a massive scale to address the issue
in the short-term. This serves to inflate salaries
creating the perceived issues around hiring
within payscales. Companies need to continue to
attract new talent to their businesses, but, they
should consider hiring at a more junior level and
upskilling those new hires with targeted training
and development to address the skills shortage.
This should address the hyper-inflation of
salaries which exists in certain verticals within the
Telecommunications sector.
Gender diversity is currently prominent as a sector
agnostic challenge - essentially all industries are
looking at new strategies to increase diversity
and inclusion throughout all levels within their
organisations. We perceive that the greatest
challenges which employers will face when hiring
new talent will continue to be skills shortages and
hiring within payscales, and offering appealing
financial remuneration will remain key in attracting
and retaining talent. Doing so whilst improving
diversity & inclusion will be more of a challenge
and will require significant understanding of, and
subsequent dedication to, the principles that
underpin improvements to diversity & inclusion,
namely equality and enhanced business performance.
To be notified of future reports, events, webinars
and roundtables on any of the themes we have
covered in this report please register your interest
with one of the Communications team. We are
also of course happy to share our own thoughts
on these specific issues, as well as solutions
that we have designed and implemented for
our clients (profiles and contact details of our
Communications team are on the following page).

Expand’s communications team
We are proud to be recognised as leading global recruiters. Working collaboratively, our Communications
team have capacity to deliver individual strategic hires or to manage complex cross boarder recruitment
campaigns. With a candidate network that covers EMEA, Russia, The Americas, LATAM and APAC our
international reach and scale allows us to attract, recruit and retain premium talent, faster and more
efficiently than your competitors. Our project based services allow you to control recruitment spend
through economies of scale.
Our flexible solutions assure an unrivalled level of service to support talent management. This can
incorporate skills analysis, succession planning, role definition, market mapping, talent pipelining,
assessments, recruitment, onboarding, coaching and full project management. These services have been
designed without compromise to attract, recruit and retain the very best people.
With a global candidate network of 60,000 professionals in Communications and extensive recruitment
experience in your sector, you can quickly access even the most hard-to-reach individuals for specialist
and senior management roles.
Aidan Walker, Director and Partner
with over 15 years’ experience of managing
executive search and large scale recruitment
campaigns for technology organisations.
Over this time Aidan has successfully won
and delivered campaigns to secure significant
professionals for his clients.
aidan@expandexecutivesearch.com
Sam Howse, Senior Consultant, a headhunter
working exclusively in the worldwide
Telecommunications market, partnering global
clients including carriers, Service Providers,
MSP’s etc. to fill critical positions.
sam.howse@expandexecutivesearch.com
Oli Ciecierski, Consultant, 4 years’
experience managing executive search
campaigns globally with the last 2 years
having been within communications. Oli
has won and delivered campaigns in the
enterprise, consumer and wholesales
communications markets.
oli@expandexecutivesearch.com
Matthew Bertenshaw, M2M/ IoT
specialist Consultant. Matthew is well placed
to deliver any search project, utilising his vast
market network.
matt@expandexecutivesearch.com
Daniel Owen, Account Manager, supporting
the Communications team in the delivery of
International search projects. Dan has 3 years’
research and headhunting experince.
daniel.owen@expandexecutivesearch.com
Mathilda Lucas-Box, Delivery Consultant,
Supporting the Communications team in the
delivery of International search projects.
mathilda@expandexecutivesearch.com
João Vidigal, Researcher. Supports the
team in the delivery of projects with first
class market and candidate research

Contact
+44 (0) 1273 668700 (Brighton)
+44 (0) 203 7351630 (London)
+1 (646) 895 6990 (USA)
Email: info@expandexecutivesearch.com
Twitter: @expand_exec

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