Companies looking to the mature economy

Published on Tuesday 13 June 2006 00:06

A NEW study has revealed that companies are starting to ease their prejudice against employing older workers.

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) has found that 70 per cent of employers were now actively looking to recruit people over the age of 55 and that 31 per cent wanted to take on those already entitled to the state pension.

The report comes four months before laws banning age discrimination come into force, and covered more than 800 employers in the public, private and voluntary sectors.

The report's author, Nicola Monson, said: "This enables employers to tap into the relatively unused talent pool of older workers to build an age-diverse workforce that can add real value to business, not just in terms of older workers but all age groups."

The CIPD's report found that more than four in five employers were experiencing difficulties in recruiting staff, with skills shortages the main problem.

It said that 15 per cent of employers were targeting migrant workers from EU accession states, and more than one in ten was recruiting abroad.

The survey also looked at how employers were using the internet to recruit staff, finding that nearly two-thirds were using online recruitment, mainly because it was cheaper, and 75 per cent of employers were using their corporate websites to attract applicants.

However, despite nearly half of employers predicting that online recruitment will replace traditional paper-based applications in the future, the CIPD said that the same number also thought recruiting online was increasing the number of unsuitable applicants.