Accountancy slows growth at recruiter
Interesting set of results out from financial recruiter Michael Page this morning.
After the market turmoil of the last week, the company was forced to make all sort of positive noises that any impact on its own business would be limited.
'We are mindful of what’s going on in the financial markets but we’re not seeing any jobs cancelled or withdrawn,' said chief executive Steve Ingham. 'There has been no slowdown at all apart from the usual we see in August.'
More interesting perhaps are the results from the individual UK service lines.
Overall UK turnover was up 15.3%, and gross profit by 21%. Gross profit from marketing, sales and retail increased by 21%, gross profit from other disciplines by 35%. However from the finance and accounting stream it increased by 14% - less than the rate of growth throughout the rest of the business.
Ingham says 'there is a shortage of good quality candidates in virtually all the markets in which we operate and … there remain numerous opportunities for further expansion in both our existing and new businesses in the second half of this year and beyond.'
However can the insatiable appetite for accountants which has existed for several years continue? Surely not…
I've said this before about recruitment firm results but while you can never draw absolute market conclusions on a single business's results, the fact that accountancy growth (in profits at least) is slowing at such a prominent recruiter can only point to a wider slowdown.
Hmmm, 14% growth looks pretty impressive to me.
Any double-digit increase hardly points to a slowdown.
Also, when one considers that the bulk of Michael Page's global revenues come from accounting and finance, is it surprising that other parts of the business are gorwing slightly faster?
It is always that little bit easier to put up some impressive percentage growth numbers when you are starting from a smaller base.
Finally, is 'slowdown' a result of too few jobs or too few quality candidates. It could just be the case that accountants have never been more in demand.
Posted by Anonymous | August 20, 2007 5:45 PM
14% certainly is impressive and I may be over-egging it slightly; slowdown, I admit, is a loaded term. But growth from accounting reported in the company's interims this time last year was 15% - and more significantly was ahead of growth in the sales and marketing division.
Posted by Damian Wild | August 21, 2007 9:45 AM