Gradate talent pool size can be surprising - with implications for recruiters

Employers that understand the depth of the graduate talent pool improve their chance of setting realistic objectives and achieving them, explains Paul Naylor, Prospects graduate recruitment expert at Jisc

Employers are experiencing difficulties when recruiting graduates in the current climate.

The Institute of Student Employers' (ISE) annual Student Recruitment Survey shows an 11% increase year-on-year in employers finding it difficult to recruit into at least one of their roles.1 The problem is particularly evident in the graduate market with 43% of employers reporting difficulties.  A contributing factor could be fewer applications, which were down from 91 to 62 per vacancy.

Before setting hiring targets, it's important to understand the depth of the talent pool you are targeting. You can have the best attraction strategy with unrealistic KPIs and therefore the strategy would be considered a failure.

This article uses Graduate Outcomes data from HESA (part of Jisc), which is a useful tool for understanding the talent pool.2 Analysed and wrapped up into the annual publication, What do graduates do? (WDGD?), this comprehensive state-of-the-nation report on graduate destinations is an essential resource for universities, employers and policymakers.

Graduate talent pool at its largest

There are around 406,000 UK domiciled graduates in a typical year. The 2023/24 edition of What do graduates do? - to be published here on Prospects Luminate in October - will cover the cohort that graduated in 2020/21 and were surveyed 15 months later in late 2022.

It shows 81% of the cohort were employed either full time or part time, with full-time employment up 3.1 percentage points on the previous year, to 59.6%. Just 5.0% were unemployed, down 0.9 percentage points from the previous year, a very substantial fall for this figure over one year.

On the surface you may consider this significant - hundreds of thousands of graduates lined up to work. But what if you have diversity targets or regional requirements?

Impact of graduate migration

It's important to understand graduate migration habits and the labour market for the areas you want to recruit in. It's a myth that graduates are mobile and readily relocate to accept a good job.

There are four migration habits. The following figures are based on the previous edition of What do graduates do?. The rough proportions have been consistent since Charlie Ball, graduate labour market expert for Prospects at Jisc, coined the concept a decade ago:

• Loyals (42%) - they do not move, studying and working in the region in which they were originally domiciled.
• Returners (26%) - move to another region to study and then return home to work. 
• Incomers (21%) - find work in a region away from their home and other than where they studied. London is the most common destination.
• Stayers (11%) - move away from their home region to another region to study and stay there to work.

This means that 68% of graduates are working in their home region. Interestingly, when you put a diversity lens on this research the number of Loyals significantly increases, particularly in Black females, and there are a lot more White male Incomers.    

To apply this data to your strategy it's useful to look at the regional breakdown. For example, in the West Midlands the Loyals percentage is higher than the national average, at 47%. When you add in returners, three quarters of the graduate population in the West Midlands has never left or has returned to work in their region of domicile.

If you are a West Midlands-based recruiter it means that you have a known quantity talent pool on your doorstep made up of people who mostly stay close to home.

Impact of diversity targets

The need for diverse talent is ever increasing. The ISE survey shows that more than one in three (37%) student employers have diversity targets. The majority (93%) have diversity targets related to gender, 73% for race and 55% for different socio-economic backgrounds.

Gender and other factors have a major impact on talent pool sizes. For example:

This may be an extreme example, but it illustrates the impact various attraction targets can have on the pool of talent available. Overlay your regional data and your graduate talent pool becomes even more shallow.

Advice for graduate employers 

• Understand the size of your talent pool, including regional behaviours and attributes, and use this to inform objectives. Prospects at Jisc can help with this. Email enquiries@prospects.ac.uk
• Build strong local attraction strategies, nurturing partnerships with universities around the site(s) you are recruiting into.
• If the data shows your local talent pool is limited, highlight relocation support in your attraction campaign.
• Think laterally - look at subjects that have modules or transferrable skills that your role needs.
• Discuss the evidence and the challenges your attraction strategy is facing and seek buy-in from stakeholders. For example, the majority of student employers are reducing minimum entry criteria.3
• Understand what students/graduates are looking for, where they look and what motivates them to position your brand in the best possible light - Prospects Early Careers Survey 2023 has the latest data.
• Ensure your hiring strategy is accessible to all – in our student survey 22% said their day-to-day activities were limited by a disability or health condition and 21% considered themselves neurodivergent.

Prospects at Jisc can inform your attraction strategy with the latest graduate labour market data and provide tailored recruitment campaigns.  

Notes

1. Student Recruitment Survey, ISE, 2022.
2. HE Graduate Outcomes Data, HESA, 2023.
3. 2.1 degrees and personality tests lose favour, ISE, 2022.

Written by

Paul Naylor

Head of employer sales

Prospects