Trends Show Govt Frontline Attrition Exceeding New Hires

Analyses appears to show that rigorous contract negotiations during substantial job shortages has resulted in an increase in attrition rates and a decrease in job vacancy fulfillment rates for some frontline workers.

Moreover, trend analysis data reveals that the current rate of successful hiring of front-line workers, including Nurses, Doctors, and also Teachers is decaying at a progressive rate, while there is a doubling of the success rate for hiring advisors, management, and other non-frontline roles.

The statistics gathered from Government websites, including the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Health job vacancies, as well as government job listings sites, may indicate the success rate for hiring front-line workers is currently less than half the same rate of hiring non-frontline employees.

Additionally, a cursory analysis of the total number of personnel operating from headquarters such at Molesworth Wellington for the Ministry of Health and the Elsdon, Porirua office of the Ministry of Education has increased by over 30% in the past 6 months. Both locations show substantive staffing increases of non-frontline Government employees.

Moreover, statistics gathered during the November – December 2022 period indicate that front-line staffing shortages are now expanding rather than contracting.

This increase in frontline vacancies is unusual, given a rise in expenditures for Government job advertising and marketing.

Cursory analysis of the job vacancies data shows a potential trend toward vacancies for Nurses, Doctors, and Teachers increasing at a rate of approximately 2% per month. This may be an early indicator that frontline attrition rates are rising during staffing shortages.

Conversely, even though the rate of new job vacancies advertised for non-frontline workers has also increased, the fulfillment rates are significantly higher, with the current average of 70 roles filled per month.

These cursory statistics, extrapolated from the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education vacancies websites and other job listing sites Trademe.co.nz and Seek.co.nz, indicate strong overall Government employment hiring.

Trend analysis shows that as of the writing of this release there were 1352 unfilled vacancies listed for the role of Teacher on the education.govt.nz website. With all non-frontline Ministry of Education positions declining to less than 100 for the first time in 6 months.

Similarly, performing evaluation of Ministry of Health job vacancies, trend analysis demonstrates a marked decline in non-frontline roles displayed on job advertising websites including Seek.co.nz. Currently showing 9 such roles, while at the same time the Ministry of Health currently listing an increasing number of Nurse specific roles, now totaling 579 vacancies listed on Seek.co.nz.

The Nursing vacancies sampling demonstrates a potential trend for declining success rates for hiring front-line staff, while continuing ongoing hiring of non-frontline workers into Government roles.

The combination of hiring non-frontline workers, while seeing trends for attrition of Government specific frontline employees is creating two potentially decaying trends:

1. Pressured frontline roles such as Nurse or Teacher will continue to see an increase in attrition rates as staffing shortages compound frontline stressors;

2. While overall Government expenditures for new employment remuneration increases due to non-frontline worker roles being filled, resulting in additional budgetary pressure on expanding frontline workers.

Trends also indicate that the Government attempts to hire new frontline staff is not achieving its intent.

This may be a result of attempts by Government to negotiate salaries while attempting to address job shortages in the health and education sectors.

Analyses appears to show that correlating rigorous contract negotiations during substantial job shortages results in an increase in attrition rates and a decrease in job vacancy fulfillment rates.

Trend Analysis Network is a think tank based in New Zealand created to identify and publish analytical results of future trends in politics, society, and economics.

Government websites evaluated for cursory jobs data include jobs.govt.nz, careers.health.govt.nz, and gazette.education.govt.nz. All data was extrapolated from the search results at the time of writing. Seek.co.nz and the (“SEEK”) name are trademarks or registered trademarks of SEEK Limited (NZ) Limited. Trademe.co.nz and the Trademe logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Trade Me Limited.

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