European Year of Skills - Skills shortages, recruitment and retention strategies in small and medium-sized enterprises

Skilled workers are key to the success of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Europe according to the survey. 95% of all SMEs say that it is very (82%) or moderately (13%) important for their business model to have workers with the right skills. However, three quarters (74%) of SMEs in Europe say they concretely face skills shortages for at least one job role in their company at the moment. Also, nearly 4 in 5 companies say in the survey it is generally difficult for them to find workers with the right skills, and more than half of them (53%) find it difficult to retain skilled workers.