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12 types of professionals Malaysian bosses need

HR business partners, talent managers and financial controllers are an example of the type of professionals currently being sought by Malaysian employers.

According to the latest Hays Quarterly Hotspots’ list of skills in demand, staff movement is creating vacancies in many different industries, as job seekers constantly seek to change employers.

In response to this, Chris Mead, regional director of Hays in Malaysia and Singapore, said they expect to see employers continue to attract strong professionals into the New Year.

“But they are increasingly looking for candidates with experience gained in true multinational organisations. Genuine global or regional exposure is valued very highly,” he said.

Employers prefer these types of candidates over those with only Malaysian business experience, as “they believe they possess far better communication skills, are more commercially minded and can create a stronger success-based environment”.

Here are a selection of the skills in demand in Malaysia, taken from the Hays Quarterly Hotspots report:

1. Financial controllers – There is high demand from the FMCG industry for financial controllers with full end-to-end manufacturing experience within multinational organisations.

2. Senior managers – Financial shared service centres are looking for senior managers, as they often leave the shared service centre environment in order to gain better opportunities in core finance.

3. Talent managers - Talent Managers are sought by companies that want to implement strategic attraction and retention methods.

4. HR business partners - Candidates with at least eight to 10 years of experience and industry knowledge in FMCG or retail are in high demand.

5. IT support specialists – There is a tremendous amount of business expansion taking place in the global IT shared service industry. As a result, these people are in high demand, particularly those with application development experience.

6. Software developers/engineers/testers – Such candidates are sought by IT consultancies and development centres. In most demand are candidates with JAVA/J2EE, ASP.Net, VB.Net, Cognos, SharePoint and Mobile Application.

7. Senior geophysicists (development) – There is a shortage of experienced local candidates in this area, which is making the market competitive and increasing the need to look towards regional expatriates.

8. Senior geologists (exploration) – These candidates are in high demand in response to the large number of companies currently undertaking exploration activities, but a limited number of experienced candidates are available.

9. Drillers and senior drillers – An increased number of rigs has led to high demand for qualified drillers. This candidate pool is highly mobile, with many drillers choosing to work further afield in more challenging environments to benefit from higher salaries.

10. National sales managers – There is an increasing need to recruit leaders for large sales teams in Malaysia.

11. Brand managers – Companies are always looking for brand managers to lead marketing for growing business units.

12. Digital marketing managers - The need for these candidates is increasing as digital marketing becomes an important priority for all companies.

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