He would rather deliver takeout than go to the factory. How can he attract young frontline employees？

　　Since last week, the recruitment after the Spring Festival has entered a critical intensive period. But according to the feedback received by reporters at many large-scale job fairs, this year’s "recruitment shortage" of general workers or universal workers in the manufacturing and service industries is more worrying than ever. Some business owners in Zhejiang said that this year’s recruitment "harvest" is not a little bit less, and even faces the situation of "no harvest".

　　Front-line employees are an indispensable cornerstone for the transformation and upgrading of enterprises. At present, many enterprises are facing the embarrassing situation of lack of personnel. An old business owner recently told reporters anxiously that the workers on the assembly line have now become an assembly line, and the cost of recruiting new employees frequently throughout the year accounts for an increasing proportion of the cost of the enterprise.

　　So where did the workers go, and how did the manufacturing industry recruit and retain workers?

　　The difficulty of recruiting workers in the manufacturing industry

　　No one applied for the job for two hours at the job fair

　　Ningbo Yinzhou District, which used to be a base for small and medium-sized manufacturing, foreign trade import and export production and processing as its main industries, held two professional grass-roots employee recruitment fairs last weekend. Many of the company recruitment leaders who came to the scene received only single-digit applicants a day, and only a handful of employees satisfied with them.

　　Ningbo Yali Import and Export Co., Ltd. is mainly engaged in the foreign trade business of industrial magic gloves. In recent years, due to its good operating conditions, the company has established a factory and built an industrial chain from production to sales and export.

　　"I originally planned to recruit a dozen new employees this year, but I came to the job fair for nearly two hours, and there was no one to sit across from me and talk." At the job fair last Friday morning, Ling Cao Fen, the head of the company’s office, chatted helplessly with reporters at the scene.

　　Before the job fair, Cao Lingfen had imagined that it would be difficult to recruit workers, but "I didn’t expect it to be so difficult". "The shortage of labor has been revealed since before the Chinese New Year, and the boss even brought people from the office to work overtime on the production line." Cao Lingfen said that the factory did not complete production until a day or two before the Spring Festival, and the boss also took advantage of the factory shutdown to have time to go out to visit customers. "The boss is still abroad these days, stabilizing the order volume, but I didn’t expect that he may face a situation where production is too late to rush to work."

　　In recent years, the company has actually been undergoing transformation and upgrading in production, introducing more and more intelligent machines. Originally, a production line required 20 or 30 people, but now it only requires about 10 people, but even so, the company’s front-line employees are still not enough. Cao Lingfen said that because of the "recruitment shortage" at the beginning of the year, during the peak production season in July and August, administrative personnel may often be required to act as front-line employees.

　　Cao Lingfen was sitting next to the head of recruitment at Laimunde Group Co., Ltd. As a large group company, it also faced the problem of shortage of universal workers at the job fair that day. "Our situation is not ideal, and two applicants around 45 years old are already relatively suitable candidates." The person in charge said that for the company, the most wanted to recruit employees, "Of course, it is the front-line workers under 40 years old."

　　Some young employees are returning to third- and fourth-tier cities

　　Some are diverted by the food delivery industry

　　So where did the frontline employees, especially the young frontline employees, go?

　　Kong Haoyu runs a shop in a large home furnishing market in Zhejiang, which specializes in personalizing furniture. "Before, our shops were all on-site bookings and then produced and processed by ourselves. Since last year, we have put our production lines in batches in Jiangxi, Anhui and other places, and some have also cooperated with local home furnishing companies to produce, and the profit is shared."

　　Kong Haoyu said that the gradual increase in recruitment and labor costs made him give up the front-line production business this year. "In fact, those production employees with skills are doing their old jobs, but many of them choose to go back to their hometown to work. For them, doing the same thing at home, the income is similar, but the cost of living is greatly reduced."

　　Kong Haoyu gave up the production line, but his company’s business was still expanding, but his production line also sank to third- and fourth-tier cities with the employees "going home". For many small and medium-sized enterprises, this situation is not unique.

　　"The young workers who are willing to stay have become my sales consultants. From the production line to the design office, it is also a more acceptable way for them." Kong Haoyu said.

　　Qianjiang Evening News reporters found at several job fairs last week that local takeaway riders, including Meituan and Ele.me, were recruited, and the registration situation was relatively hot. Sometimes there were booths on site, but the employer did not come, "because the online is already full."

　　It is reported that the average age of the takeaway industry is 26 to 30 years old, and under 35 years old accounts for nearly 70%. Another set of data shows that in 2015, the number of Meituan takeaway riders was only 15,000, but by the fourth quarter of 2018, the average number of daily active riders was close to 600,000, and the number of registered Hummingbird riders under Ele.me has already exceeded 3 million.

　　"Young laborers used to gather in factories, but now they continue to send people to the food delivery industry." Industry analysts analyze that this has also become one of the reasons why the manufacturing industry is currently in short supply of front-line employees.

　　Attraction to young people

　　The status of workplace experience is more significant

　　In fact, the current situation that the new generation of employees no longer puts salary first and places more emphasis on "workplace experience" has become one of the key topics of traditional manufacturing.

　　After graduating with a master’s degree, Mei Ting, 26, entered a Walmart hypermarket in the west of Hangzhou, where she also worked as a front-line waiter and camp collector, but for her, "The promotion channel provided by the store is a little better, and on this road, every grassroots job, we are more willing to see it as the accumulation of future management work."

　　Mei Ting said that it is also for this purpose that young people like her who have graduated from college have chosen such a job from the grassroots. Walmart China’s Zhejiang regional personnel manager said that for the difficulties in recruiting young front-line employees, the company has launched targeted talent programs in recent years. With systematic training, outstanding young people can eventually enter management positions in a shorter time.

　　A recruitment specialist at a listed company in Ningbo told reporters that in recent years, companies have begun to strive to optimize the workplace soft environment, selecting top-notch new employees to give outstanding employees such honors or team leader titles, and giving new employees attention and respect. The commissioner said that some companies have also offered various training courses for front-line employees, so that they are not limited to front-line work, but can have more sense of gain and improvement.