Government departments slow to hire, finds Bullhorn

Some ministerial departments take up to four months to fill vacancies, according to Freedom of Information requests submitted by Bullhorn, the recruitment software company.

Bullhorn asked for information on total recruitment spend during 2013/14 from 24 government departments, and nine responded. It also requested information on the number of vacancies advertised, how many were filled and how long it took.  

One of the key findings was that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport filled less than half of its vacancies during the last financial year, and took an average of three months to find candidates for roles. The Attorney General’s office said it took 3.9 months, on average, to fill available vacancies, although claimed to have filled all of its roles.

The most ‘efficient’ department of those that supplied data was the Office of the Leader of the House of Lords, where more than 90% of jobs were filled, and the average time-to-fill was one and a half months.

Peter Linas, international MD of Bullhorn, said: “The results provide a fascinating insight into Whitehall’s recruitment efforts. We were shocked by some of the time-to-fill and percentage of positions filled figures posted by the ministerial departments.”

In Bullhorn’s UK trends report earlier this year, recruiters reported time-to-hire periods of anything from six to 46 days.

Linas added: “Even though only three per cent of UK agencies considered time-to-fill their most important metric last year, it will certainly be important to these ministerial departments and there is clearly room for improvement.”

“The agencies most effectively pooling their candidate databases and social media networks will triumph in future, as well maintained applicant tracking systems and CRMs provide recruiters with quality candidates in a time efficient manner.”