Employers are focussing on “progressive” rather than “defensive” HR strategies with recruitment and training graduates in increased demand, according to James Callander, managing director at graduate recruiter FreshMinds Talent.

The latest Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) survey shows 27% of senior HR practitioners believe they recruit HR graduate trainees in the next 12 months (compared to 7% of seniors having done so over the last year).

Callander told Recruiter: “The focus is towards recruitment and learning and development. We are seeing a shift away from a defensive HR strategy during the recession to one that is more progressive around building up HR teams in expectation of things getting better.

“Firms want to give the graduates they have taken on better career progression. Having a really robust training and development offering will be more important because employers will be faced with a problem of retention as well as recruitment going forward.”