Travel recruiters have urged airlines to be flexible with staff rather than cut jobs or risk a talent shortfall.

Last week Virgin Atlantic announced it would cut 600 jobs while in the last month BA asked its staff to work without pay for a month.

Claire Muge, area manager and West Midlands account manager at Travel Trade Recruitment, told Recruiter that she hopes firms would negotiate reduced

hours in the first instance to maintain staffing levels to ensure they emerge from the recession with a strong, well-trained, dedicated workforce. 

“As the recession takes hold, we expect that most companies will have no option other than to make redundancies.

“Though staff may not want to lose their jobs, those at the lower level may find it totally unfeasible to go a month without wages, as BA have proposed. 

“In the longer term, the industry changes quickly, and after 6-12 months out of the industry the candidate skills are not so fresh and they may have found employment in a new sector. So we could end up seeing a real skill shortage as a result.  But again this is where Travel Trade Recruitment would do our best to bring candidates back into the industry, and offer training courses to refresh their skills and bring them up to date.”

Nina Johnson-Bennett, managing director at Management Search Executive, adds: “That’s a no brainer. Being transparent about the situation and asking employees to be flexible on pay and conditions demonstrates a working partnership. When times are hard, let’s pull together and when they get better, let’s reap the benefits.”