Staff churn set to increase in Southeast Asia

Rob Fanshawe, managing director of Xpand Asia, which specialises in recruitment for the technology, media and communications sectors, says turnover rates have already risen from around 20 per cent a few years ago to over 30.  

“In some agencies it has recently been as high as 40 per cent,” he says.“That means people are moving jobs on average every two to three years.”

Within advertising and media, Fanshawe says much of the attrition is borne out of an industry sector in continuous change through the growth of ‘digital’.

“Online media has exploded and large corporate companies, like Lenovo, are now catching up and starting to build their own, dedicated internal teams.”

He says the Asia-Pacific region has generally higher attrition rates at the moment because, even factoring in the global financial crisis, it consists of the key growth markets where talent is in short supply.

This problem is occurring across the board, according to generalist recruitment network Robert Walters. Its latest research has found that over 60 per cent of professionals in Singapore are hoping to move jobs in the next three months.

“With so many job-seekers looking to move in the next three months, employers are likely to face an increase in staff churn and greater pressure to retain their top talent,” said Andrea Ross, managing director at Robert Walters Singapore & Malaysia.