It's tight, and most employers feel it. The Institution of Engineering and Technology found in 2025 that 76% of engineering employers struggle to recruit for key roles, with technical and specialist sustainability skills topping the list. The pressure runs through manufacturing too. Make UK reported in its 2025 Industrial Strategy Skills Commission report that there were 55,000 unfilled long-term vacancies in UK manufacturing, costing the economy £6bn in lost output every year.
Skills shortages sit at the top of the list of barriers. Barclays Corporate found in 2024 that manufacturers named skills shortages (75%), recruitment (36%) and talent retention (32%) as their biggest barriers to growth. The good news: when the pool is this competitive, the employers who write well and move quickly win the best people.
The hardest roles are the specialist ones, and the churn around them makes the gap worse. Rise Technical's 2025/26 Insights Report, published via the IET found that 79% of UK technical professionals plan to change employers in 2026, based on a survey of over 500 employers and 1,000 candidates.
That churn cuts both ways. A workforce ready to move means more good people are open to a conversation, so your next hire may already be employed elsewhere and quietly looking. Most of that hiring happens close to home. A 2025 GOV.UK review of professionals in IT and engineering found that the vast majority of new engineering hires come from the resident labour force, pointing to low reliance on international recruitment. In practice, you're competing for UK-based people who are already in work.
Start with the skills, not the job title. Engineering covers a wide range of disciplines, so name the specific technical skills, certifications and tools the role needs, and separate the must-haves from the nice-to-haves. A tight brief helps you match faster and keeps you from screening out good people over the wrong criteria.
Speed is your advantage here. In a market where most technical professionals are open to moving, the difference between a filled role and a long search is often how fast you get from first contact to a clear decision.
We built Reed.ai to take the slow parts off your plate. We search a database of 15 million candidates, rank a shortlist in under 30 seconds, contact matched people in under a minute and can book an interview in under three minutes. Those are system speeds, and they give you a head start when every day counts and a completed hire can land in days.
Our recruitment agent manages recruitment end to end for 8% on a successful hire, with no monthly fee and no upfront cost. There's no monthly fee and no upfront cost, and it's free for the people looking for work. The 8% reflects one thing: finding the right engineer and running the whole process for you. Ready to fill your next engineering role? Start a search with us today.
