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Businesses are looking to reduce costs this year, the survey found. (PhotoXpress)
Most financial controllers at 73 of Australia’s top listed companies say they have no plans to increase staff numbers in the next year.
The latest quarterly Deloitte CFO Survey shows 84 per cent of chief financial officers expect employee numbers to drop or stay the same in the period.
Confidence also fell over the December quarter, the survey found, as concerns about the global economy continued to grow.
Almost four in five respondents believed economic uncertainty was above normal levels.
But a spokesman for Deloitte, Keith Skinner, says some industries are still expected to add workers this year.
“There probably is some industry bias in this in that in some industries obviously there’s a significant shortage of people at the moment; mining would be a good example, and I’m sure those organisations are looking to put on people,” Mr Skinner said.
“But generally, across the board, the attitude to hiring is that the majority are saying that that’s not in their plans at the moment.”
The proportion of CFOs willing to take on more risk dropped to 27 per cent from 45 per cent in the previous quarter, and Mr Skinner says these results show that business will display greater caution in the coming months.
“It’s just a caution across all of the activities,” he said.
“There is a big push now back to reducing costs, so just control and improving cash flows.”
Topics:
business-economics-and-finance,
economic-trends,
management,
australia
First posted