Nine out of ten small and medium-sized firms are planning to recruit new staff in the coming months, according to a recent poll of 1,500 firms by recruitment group Reed. SMEs also have significantly lower redundancy rates than larger companies, with just 5% of small firms planning to lay staff off, compared with 10% of large companies. Skill shortages were a key reason for the recruitment drive, with half of firms reporting that they had a staff shortage. Stephen Alambritis of the Federation of Small Businesses said, 'Earlier this year 43% of our own members reported an increase in employment comparied with two years ago'. 'Small firms are innovative and flexible and are set to continue to be the UK's job creation champions', he added.
Date:26 July 2004
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