Major Players, the UK’s leading creative recruiter, reports that permanent front-of-house briefs (such as admin jobs, secretarial, reception and PA jobs) have doubled since the last quarter of 2009, as companies across the marketing and creative sectors recruit support staff, encouraging speculation of further recovery in the coming months.

Fiona Wood, director of recruitment for business services roles at Major Players commented: “During the last year when urgent core cuts were needed to help cash flow, administration roles were often the first to go. In the first quarter of 2010, there has been a dramatic increase in briefs for key organisational roles such as reception and admin jobs. This suggests companies are re-building their infrastructure ahead of expected new business wins and additions to core business functions such as creative, production and project management roles.”

Looking at the number of briefs received from October to New Year (104), compared with those from New Year to April (206), these administrative roles have risen by almost 100%. In the same two quarters, Major Players has seen a 12% rise across all other sectors (creative jobs, PR, advertising and design jobs), and anticipates a further increase in job briefs over the coming weeks.

Further hopes for recovery were highlighted in a separate job satisfaction survey conducted by Major Players across candidates in creative and marketing roles to reveal some of the reasons for their current job search or career change. From a sample of some 400 applicants, some surprising answers were revealed, with a large proportion (44%) indicating that their position had not been affected by the adverse economic conditions. The majority of respondents also appeared content with their current salary (30%), working hours (60%) and holiday entitlement (53%). The full results to the survey are available here.

Fiona Wood added: “The increase in briefs alone is cause for optimism, but gaining such healthy results from an industry wide survey of our candidates is just further reason to believe that things may be finally looking up for the industry and the economy as a whole.”

If you’re looking to add some new superstars to your support team, Fiona Wood can be contacted by email here, or by calling 020 7845 7232.

Candidates looking for new opportunities in this rapidly expanding sector should visit the Major Players website for the latest business support jobs including admin jobs, secretarial, HR, finance, reception and PA jobs.

Chancellor Alistair Darling has squandered a “golden opportunity” to provide concrete help to the construction industry in today’s Budget, Rok Scotland Managing Director Andy Mallice has said.

Rok has been leading a campaign north of the border called ‘Repairing Scotland’ aimed at getting Mr Darling to cut VAT on repair and maintenance work to 5% to safeguard jobs and skills.

Andy Mallice said: “This Budget is a kick in the teeth for the construction industry. The Chancellor has simply closed his ears to the legitimate pleas from tradespeople to reduce the rate of VAT on repair and maintenance work to 5%.

“This cost-neutral move would have sparked extra demand by making work more affordable, creating and securing thousands of jobs and apprenticeships for plumbers, plasterers, joiners and others.

“Regrettably, the Chancellor has chosen to squander this golden opportunity to provide practical assistance to the Scottish building industry, but we will continue, via our Repairing Scotland campaign, to press our case.

People can sign up to Rok’s Repairing Scotland e-petition at http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/repairingbritain/.

If you are bored with the same old nine to five slog, why not start a whole new life as the manager of your own hotel – a stylish sixteen-bedroom hotel in Wiltshire and £50,000 annual income is being offered as a prize in the latest property competition to hit the headlines…

The Landmark Swindon is set in the heart of the beautiful Marlborough Downs near Swindon in Wiltshire.

Its directors, Malcolm and Margaret Pearson, have owned the hotel property since it was built in 1979, converted and refurbished the building into a Hotel in 2000.

Now, they want to take a step closer to retirement and give someone else the chance to run the hotel.

To enter you need to buy a ticket for £25 and answer three locally based multiple choice questions via the competition website. The odds of winning are far better than the lottery as only 48,000 tickets will be sold in total.

“We decided to ‘sell’ our Hotel by competition because we love the thought of someone having the life changing opportunity of winning this amazing investment property,” said the couple.

“So many people talk of winning the lottery and what they would do with the money, this gives who ever enters a much better odds of winning a £850,000 hotel but would also give them the chance to instantly have an annual income of £50,000 – so, we thought this would be a fun way to make that happen for someone,” they added.

Each of the individually decorated bedrooms in the hotel is named after local Wiltshire landmarks and there is also a boardroom and restaurant.

If the couple fail to sell enough tickets to cover the asking price of the hotel, a raffle will still be held and the winning ticket holder will receive a cash prize.

The conditions of the competition mean the couple would be entitled to retain up to 35% of the entry fees to cover administration and marketing expenditure which will be verified. The remaining balance would be the prize fund, which would then be given to the cash prize winner.

The competition closes on 31st October 2010 and you can enter as many times as you like. Visit www.winahotel.co.uk to find out more.

For more information on hotels for sale and the property market in general, please visit http://commercial.themovechannel.com/

-ENDS-

Notes to editors:

TheMoveChannel.com is a property website that was founded in 1999 as an online resource for buying, selling and learning about property. It now receives as many as 300,000 visits per month and advertises over 50,000 properties in nearly 90 countries, which are listed by over 500 partner organisations.

For further information, please contact:

Dan Johnson
Managing Director
www.themovechannel.com
0207 952 7650