Maximise your customs team's effectiveness

The talent crunch is impacting everyone

The global talent crunch is real: 77 per cent of global trade professionals say it is difficult to find talent to fill key roles (Thomson Reuters Institute Global Trade Report, 2022). But the customs and trade sector is by no means the only one struggling to find talent. 

Across Australia, a staggering 90 per cent of businesses expect to be affected by staffing shortages in 2023, with 36 per cent of CEOs predicting skills shortages will inhibit their business growth (Australian Industry Group). The economy-wide nature of the talent shortage compounds the challenge by increasing competition for already-scarce talent as young people gravitate to industries where salaries have boomed since COVID (Seek).

A talent shortage in customs and trade is not just an inconvenience, it also creates several risks.

• Reduced productivity and capacity to carry out tasks beyond day-to-day work, compromising the function’s ability to plan strategically, drive continuous improvement and adapt to change. For example, understaffed teams will struggle to take advantage of the current improvement in global shipping.  
• Increased workload for existing staff leading to potential burnout, low engagement and higher attrition. 
• Lower-quality staff can impact quality of work, leading to reputational damage among the customer base. 
• Increased costs of recruiting (higher salaries), training, and retaining staff. A staffing shortage can also result in increased overtime and temporary staffing costs, further impacting the organisation’s budgets and finances.
• More offshoring leads to challenges such as reduced transparency and control, poor communication, language barriers, lack of trust and time-zone differences. 
• Delays and backlogs can impact customer satisfaction and cause customers to migrate to competitors

The talent shortage has arrived at the worst possible time. In the wake of the pandemic’s supply chain shake up, many countries and organisations have turned their focus towards resilience. They are actively fostering new trade relationships, diversifying their international networks, and tapping into new markets. 

But this resilience comes at the cost of increased complexity. There is enormous potential for recovery and growth, but only if organisations have access to the right skills, experience, and capabilities required to navigate these challenges. 

The solution lies in developing new ways of working and collaborating

The primary solution to the talent shortage lies with your recruitment efforts. Organisations must offer competitive salaries, greater flexibility and genuine career development opportunities to attract and retain their best workers. Customs and trade teams should also seek out candidates from other professions with transferable skillsets and engage temporary staffing agencies to fill critical gaps. 

The reality is that talent acquisition teams will continue to face an uphill battle so long as the current economic and market conditions persist. But this does not mean upcoming projects will need to be shelved until conditions improve. 

Companies can mitigate the impacts of the talent shortage by leveraging the strategic capabilities and support offered by an external partner such as Grant Thornton’s Global Trade and Customs team. Working with an external partner is not about filling empty seats. Instead, the partnership provides access to the experience, capabilities and resources needed to create a practical pathway to:

• streamline the movement of goods
• discover time and cost efficiencies through better processes and technologies
• ensure compliance obligations are fulfilled
• focus on future international plans

Don’t shelve your optimisation projects just yet 

Now is not the time to abandon efficiency and optimisation projects. Rather, these projects should be prioritised before the impacts of the skills shortage begin to bite even harder. 

An external partner can help you work smarter by uncovering efficiencies to ease the urgency of your recruitment efforts. Every process improvement has the potential to reduce headcount pressure. 

For example, we can support your team through the complex Australian Trusted Trade program accreditation process. Accreditation can lead to priority treatment and streamlined processing of goods, meaning fewer team members will be needed to keep your goods moving. 

Similarly, our partnership with Telstra Enterprise Visibility Imports provides organisations with a single source of truth for tracking and reporting ocean freight with a significant reduction in the need for data crunching by hard-to-find data analysts. 

Looking ahead, the European Union’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) will come into force later in 2023, making the introduction of carbon tariffs by other economies seemingly inevitable. An external partner can help strengthen your trade compliance focus and meet ESG reporting requirements, as these factors will determine the level and impact of carbon tariffs.

Let’s talk about your customs and trade needs

Remember, this approach should complement, not replace, your ongoing recruitment efforts. Get in touch with our Global Trade and Customs team to discuss how we can help you resource upcoming strategic projects, maximise your existing team’s effectiveness and support them in getting the best outcomes for your customers and your organisation.

Learn more about how our Global trade and customs services can help you

Visit our Global trade and customs page