Qualified workers rank first this year in the top 10 sought after jobs, followed by engineers, drivers, and restaurant and hotel employees, showed data from the annual survey of the shortage of talent carried out by ManpowerGroup Bulgaria.

By comparison, last year, the top 3 sought after jobs were engineers, followed by qualified workers and managers. IT specialists also lost their 5^th position and now rank 10^th.

A total of 62% of employees experience difficulties in filling vacant job positions this year, showed the nationally representative survey of 621 companies. Every fourth employer says that the situation is more difficult now, while, according to 6%, the situation has become easier.

In 2015, 50% of the companies had such problems.

The main reason pointed out by employers concerning difficulties in filling vacant positions is the lack of hard skills (qualifications with respect to certain tasks, IT skills, or language and mathematical skills). This was reported as a problem by 32% of the surveyed.

About 30% of employers pointed out the shortage of candidates for the positions, while 13% focused on the lack of soft skills (professionalism, enthusiasm, inter-personal skills, flexibility/ability to adapt).

Lack of experience is pointed out as a reason for the shortage of cadres by 12% of employers.

A mere 11% of employers pointed out a discrepancy between the expectations of employees and the real amount of remuneration offered.