The growth abroad is contributing significantly to the coffers of such companies as SThree and FDM Group as recruiters take advantage of trends such as offshoring and the shifting of their clients’ business abroad.

“The timing of the downturn has been staggered across different countries, with skill shortage hotspots offering short-term opportunities,” Sue Dodd, a director at business intelligence consultancy Agile Intelligence, told Recruiter.

Dodd added that listed recruiter SThree in particular has been looking overseas to buoy business. In its yearend results for 2008 the company reported that overseas business grew by a staggering 64% to £97.4m (2007: £59.3m), representing 45% of the group’s total revenue (2007: 32%).

Many IT recruiters were slow to expand internationally when the UK market was booming, Dodd said. “The UK has a large IT contractor base and some of the IT recruiters haven’t felt the need to invest overseas in better times,” she explained.

FDM Group’s share of international business increased from 12% to 18% over the past year, according to chief executive Rod Flavell. The group’s profit before tax increased by 30.7% to £2.39m in its end-ofyear results for 2008, partly due to its increase in international business. “Right now you have to scrap for your business wherever you can get it,” said Flavell.

At IT recruiter Globe One, international business increased as clients’ business shifted abroad. Matthew Wheeler, divisional manager, told Recruiter: “As of today I’m running five or six roles out of 15 in Europe, the Middle East or America — that’s around a 30% increase [on last year],” he said.

Nick Cox, managing director of continental Europe and rest of world at multisector recruiter Hays, said the German market, the biggest in its continental- European portfolio, had increased significantly in the past two years, due in part to demand for IT personnel.

“There’s a real opportunity to take advantage of recruitment opportunities from companies who previously have gone direct to market,” he told Recruiter. “This is a structural change which has been opening up for many years now.”

Farida Gibbs, managing director of IT consultants The Gibbs Partnership, told Recruiter drives for efficiency through outsourcing were fuelling her firm’s international growth. “A lot of clients are looking to offshore their back-end or support facility,” said Gibbs. The company was recruiting
for its Lithuania-based offshoring facility, as well as placing staff into other companies’ offerings.

The tightening of the domestic IT market, which sector skills council E-Skills recently identified as twice the rate of all other industries, has also meant contractors are increasingly willing to take jobs abroad. “At first we found the candidates were more happy to relocate within the UK and then [as the market deteriorated further] they were more happy to move abroad,” Keith Butler, managing director at NES IT, told Recruiter.