The data processing staff agency Computer People Group Plc of London’s St Martin’s Lane says it is looking forward to the skills shortage and is confident that it can continue to recruit high calibre staff solely through financial incentives and career opportunities, without substantially changing its graduate recruitment programme. At present it has not noticed any more difficulty in recruiting graduates than normal, but added that the company as a whole was moving away from programming skills and towards management consultancy. Computer People’s consulting revenue in the UK rose 32% to UKP31.2m, while its tiny recruitment business was highly successful,increasing its turnover by 55% to UKP3.5m. As regards the Group’s venture into the US domestic market through the acquisition of the professional services side of Sterling Software Inc in August, that company turned in a pre tax profit of UKP5m over the four and a half months for which it contributed to Computer People’s financial results. Over the next year the Group expects to add on three small US companies small means turnover of around $7m apiece – in the Chicago and Washington areas where it has no presence as yet. Once these acquisitions are made Computer People will then go for organic growth in the US as it does in the UK. The other side of its US business, termed its cross-border division, which supplies foreign nationals into the American market, saw profits drop 32% to UKP7.4m. The Group claims, that this decline stems from US management’s preference for resourcing from the corner shop. The business will, however, be left ticking over awaiting a market upturn. Computer People seems fairly complacent about its future, stressing that as it does not rely on any single market sector it can swiftly adapt to fluctuating business trends whether this type of survival tactic will still work in the demographic climate of the 1990s remains to be seen.
