The changing nature of work calls for companies to take a closer look at themselves and check if their current structure and strategies remain relevant and using WTW’s Workforce Analytics report allows organisations to do just that. For instance, we found that 20% of employees in the retail sector in the UK are middle managers. In contrast, just 7% of the workforce in the retail sector are in production and manual labour roles.
Our UK Workforce Analytics Report has also shown that professional roles tend to be the highest percentage of employees in the financial services, pharmaceutical and health sciences, technology, media and gaming (TMG) and retail sectors. This may indicate that the market demands across these sectors are more sophisticated, requiring more employees with better training and experience.
Source: WTW 2023 UK Workforce Analytics Report
Additionally, we also observed that most employees cluster around the sales/business development function across the retail, TMG and pharmaceutical and health sciences sectors. This accounts for about 24% of employees in the retail sector and 13% of the workforce in the TMG sector. In the pharmaceutical and health sciences industry, sales/business development accounts for about 14% of the workforce, while administration/corporate services are comprised of 15% of employees in this sector.
Source: WTW 2023 UK Workforce Analytics Report
The financial services sector has a different structure, however, where 16% of the workforce is situated in the customer support function. When it comes to employee demographics, 21% of workers in the financial services industry occupy business support roles. This reflects the strong demand for customer support in the business of financial services.
Source: WTW 2023 UK Workforce Analytics Report
Our data has shown that most employees across the four different sectors are in professional roles, indicating that there is strong demand for advanced skills. In line with this, organisations may need to review their compensation package to ensure you attract the right talent to your business.
Moreover, we also found that there seems to be a gender difference across these sectors, particularly in the higher part of the organisational structure. Male employees tend to hold more positions from the supervisory level up to the business unit head and country manager. Meanwhile, business support roles are more likely to be occupied by female employees than male employees. The only exception to this trend is the financial services sector, where 59% of supervisory roles are filled by female employees.
Source: WTW 2023 UK Workforce Analytics Report
If we learned anything from the recent global events, it is that being adaptable can save you unnecessary costs. To be able to adapt in order to navigate the volatile economic environment, organisations need to be equipped with data that will fill the gaps of their unique challenges. These issues may include functions in the organisation that may be over- or under-represented, or areas that may be top heavy or too lean. Understanding how your workforce is distributed across your organisation will allow you to identify functions that may be affecting profitability or areas where diversity issues exist. Having this in mind will help you take the right actions to enhance productivity and efficiency, as well as equity.
Investing in data that is tailored to your needs will help you make the right decision for your organisation. Our Workforce Analytics Report can provide you with both internal and external views on human capital, such as customised workforce metrics as well as industry-specific data on employee demographics, talent structure, gender diversity and organisation costs. Those reports can also include a direct comparison of your data against the market/peer group; having such data on-hand will allow you to make smart and data-driven decisions on recruitment and training and will help you optimising your human capital structure and spend.
Our 2023 Workforce Analytics reports (based on data from our 2022 compensation surveys) will be released this February 2023. For any queries on these reports, please contact us.
