Irish companies urged to review staffing arrangements following Brexit

There is a lot of talk over jobs that may be moving to Ireland from the UK after Brexit but companies here may also need to create new roles in order to deal with the new reality after the UK leaves the EU.

Jane Lorigan, chief executive of Irishjobs.ie, said the company spoke to several HR managers in Irish companies and - surprisingly - it found that just a small number of companies were actively preparing for Brexit and its effects. Of the companies spoken to, about a quarter of them have conducted a risk assessment around Brexit to identify any possible risk areas for the business. Of those companies about one in ten actually have a Brexit readiness team in place, she stated.

While some of the businesses are actively starting to work to prepare for Brexit, Ms Lorigan said the majority of them seem to be taking a wait-and-see approach. She said that is understandable as there is a lack of clarity around what post-Brexit Ireland will be like and they do not know exactly what is coming. But on further analysis, half of those companies employ people in the UK or Northern Ireland and over 40% of them are actively exporting and this points to the fact that more work needs to be done, Ms Lorigan cautions. 

For those companies who do have plans in place, they appear to be focusing on the opportunity to open up new markets and reduce their reliance on the UK, Ms Lorigan said. In terms of skills, companies are looking for sales and marketing staff with a fluency in a second language so as to help them open up in new markets, she noted. Other companies, especially those who are moving physical product, are looking at logistics staff because the country is now potentially dealing with a hard border with a lot of extra transportation documentation needed by companies. Companies are also looking for skills in the finance area as we are potentially looking at a whole area of new taxes and tariffs. Ms Lorigan noted Ireland has very little expertise in the area of tariffs. 

While no-one is yet clear about what Brexit will bring, Ms Lorigan said the reality is that it will bring changes and businesses here need to be doing their risk assessments and trying to work out what the worse case scenario could be and then planning around that. Companies who are ahead of the game are actually hiring staff and looking at opening up new markets. They are in contact with Enterprise Ireland and are playing the "long game", she added. 

Ms Lorigan said that once companies know what they are looking for, they will be looking for the same people so if an Irish company can get ahead of the game and start attracting those people now, so much the better.

From rte.ie (20/3/2017)