Marine engineering roundtable debates skills gap

Engineering leaders convened at the start of London International Shipping Week (LISW) for a roundtable discussion on the extent of the industry's skill shortage.

The event was one of the first to bring together representatives from the United Kingdom's naval and defence, commercial, leisure, shipping and offshore sectors. A key topic of debate was the first look at survey results polling 500 hiring authorities, which confirmed 93% believe they are working in a skill gap market.

The event and survey were co-ordinated by The Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology (IMarEST) in partnership with leading engineering recruitment agency, Matchtech. Key survey talking points included:

Recruitment repercussions: 91% are concerned their business could be negatively impacted by recruitment troubles in the next 12 months

The lack of women in marine engineering: Over a third of marine engineers (36%) are working in companies with less than a 1% female workforce, while 84% of respondents have less than one in ten female employees in their organisation

Graduate deficit: almost two thirds (62%) disagreed or were not sure that graduate candidates are suitably educated and ready for work in the marine sector

The research and roundtable discussion confirmed that the skills shortage is a key unifying pressure across a traditionally fragmented industry. There are over 5,000 maritime engineering companies that employ nearly 90,000 people in UK. 89% of survey respondents recruited candidates last year, with 47% looking to increase job opportunities this year.

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