Insight Days

If I had told you three years ago that an Assistant Company Secretary with five years’ experience should expect a salary of £75,000 you would have politely told me to go away.

Fast forward to 2016 and this is the reality for many companies looking to hire – the knock on effect of which is placing a huge strain on workloads and departmental budgets.

What is causing salaries to rise?

To my mind there are two key catalysts. The first is the effect Sarbanes Oxley had on the professional services firms back in 2002. Prior to the Sarbanes Oxley Act, there were many more professional services firms providing company secretarial services to their clients. These firms were a significant ‘entry point’ for students and graduates starting their careers, some firms taking as many as 10 trainees each year and providing study support through to qualification.

Across the sector, around 50 high-quality trainees would qualify each year, creating a steady supply of well-trained, technically proficient company secretaries, many of whom would later move
into industry.

Sarbanes Oxley stipulated that professional services firms could no longer provide company secretarial services to audit clients. This led to closure of functions and some high-profile consolidation in the sector. The overall effect was a significant reduction in the number of entry level opportunities and a longer-term restriction on the flow of newly qualified governance professionals transferring into industry.

The second, perhaps more surprising catalyst is the global financial crisis of 2008. This recession led to reduced headcount and recruitment freezes within many secretariats across all sectors.

To lock in key talent, employers began offering salaries above market rate with enhanced benefits packages and long-term share incentives. This has created a market where many individuals are now priced out of consideration for senior roles required to enhance their careers. Many are understandably reluctant to take a pay cut in order to move.

The impact of increased regulation and legislation in the years since the financial crisis (and more recently post-Brexit) has brought governance to the top of the corporate agenda, fuelling demand for high-quality company secretaries. In isolation this is positive for the profession, however, we find ourselves in short supply of talent at the junior/mid level which is pushing salaries for experienced individuals ever higher.

What can be done?

There is no quick fix – we need to think long term. Areas where employers and individuals can have a positive impact include:

• Be more flexible when it comes to hiring experienced individuals – recruit those with the right attitude and approach, the gaps in technical knowledge can be taught.
• Invest in your own professional development to broaden your knowledge and skills set. Recognise skill gaps and ask for exposure in the relevant areas in order to fill them. This will make you more marketable in the longer term.
• Become a mentor and help develop the careers of those more junior to you.
• Raise awareness of the profession among students and graduates and if you can, create more work experience and entry level opportunities.

Since launching the DMJ Insight Day initiative back in August, we have signed up over 200 students and graduates who are committed to pursuing a company secretarial career, or at the very least learn more about it. This confirms my long held belief that a company secretarial career is fast becoming a career of choice rather than a job you fall into.

Hosted by the secretariats at some of the UK’s leading employers, including Schroders, BP, Aviva, Sky Plc, Rolls Royce Plc, Capita and National Grid Plc, the insight days seem to be having the desired effect of raising awareness and attracting high quality individuals to the profession, some of whom have already secured paid work experience.

We have a collective responsibility to address the challenges faced in order to prevent a longer-term skills shortage at a time when interest in the profession is rising.

David Press is Director of DMJ Recruitment ltd