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Work-life balance critical to attracting best staff in energy sector

Demonstrating a decent work-life balance has been identified as crucial if employers are to recruit and retain the best talent in the burgeoning energy sector, according to a new survey published this week.

Energy Institute survey

The new survey of over 1,000 energy professionals was carried out by the Institute of Energy and recruitment specialist Hays and found that as the market expanded, family-friendly benefits, such as an on-site crèche, performance-related bonuses and flexibility remained central to all employees’ needs but were particularly critical to attracting female professionals.

“Salaries are likely to continue to rise as employers compete to attract the skills they need. While many employers are taking action to upskill their existing workforce more must be done to encourage new entrants to the industry, particularly women who are under-represented in energy.”

Greg Lettington, Hays Energy

“One of the strengths of the energy industry is the variety of highly specialist and highly technical roles,” said Sarah Beacock, skills and capability director at the Energy Institute. “The energy industry has a lot to offer new entrants, but more can be done to promote energy as an exciting and vibrant career option, particularly among females.”

The findings come in the same week that the engineering profession marked National Women in Engineering Day, an event designed specifically to raise awareness of career opportunities and so boost the number of women in the profession. 

However, while reinforcing the message that employers still need to do more to open doors to engineering careers for women, the survey also identified that there was still evidence of a gender pay gap with only 12% of women earning between £61,000 and £80,000 compared with 16% of men.

The lack of women in specialist and senior roles is identified by the survey as a critical area for firms in the energy sector to tackle and improving work-life balance in careers is seen as a clear starting point.

Boosting the number of specialist skills in areas such as power system, substation design, distribution networks and low carbon energy generation and system design means is a priority, according to Greg Lettington, director of Hays Energy, to contain rising salaries.

“The energy industry has a lot to offer new entrants, but more can be done to promote energy as an exciting and vibrant career option, particularly among females."

Sarah Beacock, Energy Institute. 

“Salaries are likely to continue to rise as employers compete to attract the skills they need,” he said. “As the current workforce reaches retirement age the pressure will be on for employers to address these skills gap. While many employers are taking action to upskill their existing workforce more must be done to encourage new entrants to the industry, particularly women who are under-represented in energy.”

The survey by the Energy Institute and Hays highlights the career opportunities and challenges across the oil and gas, nuclear, renewables, biomass, biofuels, utilities and combined heat and power markets as well as the energy demand and efficiency sector. 

It highlights that in the growing market, qualified engineers with qualifications and specialist skills, such as project managers and specialist engineers, were well rewarded. One in ten, it says, were awarded a pay rise of between 6-10%; a further 10% enjoyed an increase of over 10%. 

A free copy of the report can be downloaded at at www.energyinst.org/energy-salary-and-benefits-guide-2014.

If you would like to contact Antony Oliver about this, or any other story, please email antony.oliver@infrastructure-intelligence.com.