The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has published results of a global survey of human resources professionals in the aviation industry, highlighting key challenges in talent acquisition, training and retention.
The survey spoke to over 100 leading industry HR professionals at airlines, airports and ground service providers. These professionals are responsible for the training and development of staff around the world, representing all geographic regions and a range of organizational sizes.
More than 73% of respondents expect the major areas of job growth to be in ground operations, customer service and cabin crew. Of those surveyed, 48% report that finding new talent is a challenge, both because of the lack of availability of candidates with the right skill levels and qualifications, as well as, in some cases, salary demands of new applicants.
In addition to the salary and benefits package of each employee, the HR professionals identified career progression opportunities (49%) and development and training (33%) as high priorities in job satisfaction and retention.
Only 28% of respondents reported that current training is effective, with many organizations seeking to complement their in-house training with external partners to improve the effectiveness of the training.
Safety and customer service skills are priorities for hiring managers across the industry. While technology is indeed changing the customer service role, it is not replacing it.
Approximately 75% of respondents expected an increase in customer service, ground operations and cabin crew jobs over the next two years. That is higher than the 65% of respondents that expect growth in security jobs and 63% that expect growth in regulatory positions.
Guy Brazeau, director of training and consulting at IATA, said, “It is an exciting time to be in this business. We were really looking forward to receiving the results of this industry survey and we hope it can be helpful to guide HR professionals in their decisions regarding staffing planning, training opportunities and areas to focus on as our industry grows to unprecedented levels.