Romanian companies are planning to increase headcount in 2020

Over half of the respondents in Romania (54%) plan to increase employee numbers by an average of 11% in 2020, according to PwC Romania’s HR Barometer.

The IT&C sector has the highest demand for new employees, followed by industry, automotive and retail. According to the respondents, 91% of IT&C companies plan to increase the number of employees by an average of 20% next year. In industry and automotive, 71% want to hire 6.2% more people and 50% of retail companies need an additional 6.4%. Personnel increases were also mentioned by 40% of financial services companies and 30% of pharmaceutical companies.

„Our estimates show that Romania needs another one million employees in the next five years to achieve an average economic growth of 3.5% annually. As we know, in recent years, the workforce has become more difficult to find, which risks limiting the potential for economic development. For this reason, the government and companies should be involved in education programmes to develop the employee skills, especially digital ones, increasingly demanded by employers as new technologies become widely adopted,” says Ionuț Simion, Country Managing Partner PwC Romania.

According to the survey, almost all of the new positions created in 2019 were in the Digital & Social Media area, such as Chief IT Digital Solutions, Instructional Designer, Social Media Specialist, Digital & Multichannel Manager, Digital Manager, RPA Specialist and Online Manager. The survey respondents also indicated their belief that accounting, IT support, administrative, financial and business analysis departments would be most affected by automation.

“The main challenges faced by human resources departments in 2020 will be staff fluctuations and low commitment, rising wage costs, the impact of digitalisation and workforce shortage. New technologies and automation mean new skills and positions, which is increasingly being reflected in Romanian employers’ organisational charts. For example, most of the new positions created in 2019 are in the Digital and Social Media area,” says Oana Munteanu, Senior Manager – People & Organisation, PwC Romania.

Almost all of the HR Barometer respondents consider themselves prepared for the workforce shortages and wage cost challenges in attracting and increasing employee numbers in 2020.

PwC Romania conducted the HR Barometer study on 65 companies in various sectors during October 2019.