A continued shortage of skilled labour will prompt a surge in the number of Irish companies willing to recruit overseas or even move their business to gain access to the right talent, according to the early findings of a major study on the future of human resources in Europe.

While 24 per cent of the 125 Irish companies polled by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) currently believe sourcing talent in a global market is a key issue for their HR departments, that proportion will rise to 47 per cent in three to eight years.

Just 2 per cent of respondents now believe it is important to move their business to a location with talented people. That will jump ninefold to about 18 per cent between 2010 and 2015, the study showed.

"The future for HR" is a Europe-wide study conducted by Boston Consulting for the European Association for Personnel Management (EAPM). It is based on polls of 1,350 HR managers and senior executives at companies including Royal Mail and Pfizer in 27 countries, as well as 80 interviews with managers in nine countries. Preliminary findings of the study, due to be released in full next month, were presented to the CIPD conference by Boston Consulting project manager Michael Leicht.

The study pointed out that the pace of economic growth in Ireland in recent years has boosted demand for skilled labour, especially in IT and engineering. However, Ireland is finding it difficult to attract students to science and engineering courses and high-specialised IT staff are in short supply all over Europe.

Irish companies are limited in their ability to recruit skilled labour from overseas because language skills and the high cost of living here have made Ireland less attractive. Indeed, Irish companies responding to the study agreed there would be intense competition for talent both here and in the whole of Europe.