UK consultancy and engineering firms continue to experience increasing workloads in a buoyant sector, according to the results of the 2008 Association for Consultancy and Engineering (ACE) State of Business Report.

The report found that during 2007, 74% of firms taking part in the survey reported growth in workload. UK workloads increased by more than 5% for over half of respondents in the first half of the year, an increase on the previous year. Expected change in workload for the whole of 2007 is outstripping the forecast workload changes for 2007 in last year’s report. And 82% of firms expect their workload to grow in 2007 compared with 63% expecting growth last year.

ACE chief executive Nelson Ogunshakin says: “The ACE State of Business report contains a wealth of information and the overall results show that our industry and investors can continue to be encouraged in terms of future workload and return on investment. Once again, the predicted future growth can only be good news for UK business.”

For the second year running, consultancy and engineering firms highlight skills shortages, delays in payments by private clients and low fee levels as their top three concerns. Three quarters of firms ranked skills shortages as their top issue, the larger the firm, the more acute the concern about skills shortages.