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“Companies are aggressively seeking accounting and finance professionals with industry specific specialties and experience,” Jeff Holloway, vice-president, Robert Half International, said in a statement announcing the fourth quarter findings. “To attract and secure top talent, many employers are offering increased compensation packages and hastening their hiring processes to ensure candidates are not lost to competing offers.”

Participants are drawn from a stratified random sample of Canadian companies having 20 or more employees. CFOs in the finance sector are most optimistic regarding fourth quarter hiring plans. Seventeen percent of those surveyed in this sector intend to expand their accounting and finance teams, compared to only 1 percent forecasting reductions in staffing levels. In the manufacturing, construction and business services sectors, a net 24 percent of CFOs surveyed anticipate bringing in additional full-time accounting and finance professionals during the fourth quarter. Only 1 percent expect to reduce staffing levels.

Among executives expecting to expand the accounting and finance teams, 52 percent cited business growth as the primary reason. Nine percent attributed hiring demand to rising workloads.