Photo: RNZ / Cole Eastham-Farrelly
The reopening of the border means young people who've put travel plans on hold because of the pandemic can finally book flights and embark on their long-awaited OEs.
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While much has been made of the skilled workers New Zealand is set to gain as the country opens back up, there's been less focus on the group of young, highly productive workers who'll be jetting off overseas in search of new adventures.
Today The Detail's Jessie Chiang looks at whether fears of a brain drain are warranted and what employers need to be thinking about in the months ahead.
Ben Pearson from recruitment agency Beyond Recruitment, says the group of workers he worries New Zealand will lose are those aged between 25 and 35.
"In our business we employ about 85 people, we've got quite a large number of people who would fit in that bracket," he says.
"We're very, very concerned about losing a lot of them as they go on their OE and a lot of them have communicated that to us that's what they're going to be doing."
Pearson says 25- to 35-year-olds are the "worker bees in the hive" - typically smart, productive and fresh thinkers with a couple of years' experience.
There are just over 750,000 people in that age bracket - about 20 percent of the working-age population.
Jane Matthews, who is a reporter for the Taranaki Daily News, fits perfectly into that age range and description.
Covid-19 dashed her plans of going to London in 2021 and 'what-if' scenarios played on her mind, but the lure of the overseas rite of passage proved too strong.
Photo: Supplied / Jane Matthews
"I thought to myself, I've been sitting here for so long. I've been living in the same place for five years," she says.
"I don't know what the world is going to be doing if I wait another two years...it's time to just go."
Ella Shepherd, a fifth year Auckland University law student, is also looking to make the trip to the UK for her OE and says the reopening of the border is a huge relief.
"It's not only being able to get a date to come back at the end of six months or a year, but I've got family here, you never know what's going to happen," she says.
"It's having that flexibility."
Beyond Recruitment's own report late last year found that finding talent was the biggest recruitment issue in New Zealand, and it has gotten worse since 2020.
Largely, businesses didn't feel the effects of any brain gain from returning Kiwis, rather 81 percent of employers are concerned that skilled Kiwis are leaving, the report said.
Job ads on sites like SEEK have grown every month since last September and last month, it had the most jobs it's ever had on its website.
Even though opening borders means we'll have workers coming into the country again, Pearson says they won't fill in the gaps that those going on their OE's will leave behind.
"The incoming people from offshore are on working holidays, the OE in reverse kind of thing. They really play to the hospitality industry, maybe temp working, admin type jobs," he says.
"I don't think we'll get a like for like style of worker who's leaving versus the style of worker who's coming in."
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