Programmed Skilled Workforce ensures the greater Geelong business community can navigate the current global talent crunch through access to a flexible, on-demand workforce.
Despite pay rates up as much as 25% from pre-COVID-19 levels and businesses struggling to find suitable candidates across most industries, Programmed is busier than ever, supplying contingent workforces and permanent recruitment services to meet fluctuating needs and surges in activity.
Victorian Regional Manager Matthew Neate tells GMC that Programmed supports businesses to focus on their core business and not be distracted by the current recruitment challenges.
A member of the GMC for almost 15 years, Programmed conveniently meets fluctuating staff demands and surges in requirements.
“It is a challenge to source people,” he says. “Employers need us more than ever; they lean on our support. Pre-COVID-19, you would probably have people lining up out the front, so you had choices and options, but now, you require a strong employee value proposition to support your attraction and retention strategy.
“Our customer’s requirements are constantly changing. Working with us, they can pick up the phone and say, ‘We need five people, or twenty people, next week,’ and we organise it with our rostering technology.”
Programmed is also seeing strong demand for permanent recruitment services in the current market, fulfilling 50 plus permanent production roles in the Geelong region in the past three months.
There are great opportunities for job seekers across Programmed’s customer base in Geelong, especially right now in the lead-up to Christmas. In particular, with a leading, local action sports and lifestyle customer who Programmed maintains a casual workforce of 150 plus employees.
“There’s a lot of seasonality in their business. We can go from supplying 100 people a day to doing 160 people a day,” says Mr Neate.
Programmed recruits skilled staff with a wide range of capabilities across Australia and New Zealand, serving more than 10,000 customers a day. It began in 1951 as Norman Miles Paint Services with “just one paint van and a few tradesmen.”
It now employs more than 20,000 people each day across a range of disciplines.
Forklift operators and stock pick operators are particularly hard to source currently and can demand higher pay rates. More broadly, Mr Neate said there is “fierce competition for any good candidate that comes through.”
“We’ve been quite fortunate; it comes down to the businesses that we work with. We leverage some of those brands to attract candidates. While it has been challenging, we have grown the business in some areas through COVID-19.”
Mr Neate says the demographics of Geelong, with Deakin University helping to attract a cosmopolitan community, mean filling roles compares favourably.
“I find the Geelong market has been easier to source candidates. I find it more challenging in regional centres like Bendigo and Shepparton, and Melbourne is very, very challenging. We sometimes have requirements for up to 700 additional employees at any one time.
“Especially with Deakin, the multi-cultural demographic here in Geelong allows us to attract the right candidate and still have that constant supply of applicants wanting to work for our customer partners.”