Demand for professionals to fill London’s creative hub remains high ⁰

As we reported last week, the success of the tech and media sector in London is driving the Capital’s offices market. Now new research has shown that demand for professionals in London’s creative occupations remains high, with over a third of jobs in the sector found within the UK’s main creative hub. The latest Professional Recruitment Trends report from the Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo) based on data provided by Burning Glass, claims that 33.5 percent of all creative occupation postings were found in Greater London. The South East ranks second with 16.1 percent of creative roles followed by the West Midlands in third with an 8.1 percent share of total job postings. The list of ‘in demand’ skills for creative roles is mostly dominated by coding and programming languages. However the report suggests that the skills in the highest demand, excluding those specific to IT based roles, are communication, creativity and writing.

Ann Swain, Chief Executive of APSCo, commented on the report saying; “London’s creative industries are immensely important to both the city itself and the sector as a whole, contributing an estimated £35bn to the economy and providing the capital with approximately 800,000 jobs. The extensive funding provided by bodies such as Arts Council England, which will invest over £1bn over the next three years, continues to support creative organisations of all sizes, and adds fuel to the creative economy. While the Film Tax Relief acts to bolster the UK’s film industry by offering production companies a payable cash rebate of up to 25% of qualifying film production expenditure.”

“According to a report released last year, the total gross added value (GVA) of the creative industries in London was £34.6 billion in 2012, accounting for just under half of the UK total (£72.7 billion), so it is no surprise that demand for professionals remains highest in this region.”