Giovanna Labartino, Francesca Mazzolari and Giovanni Morleo

• L’annuale indagine Confindustria sul lavoro, svolta tra febbraio e aprile 2024, fornisce informazioni per il 2023 e inizio 2024 su struttura dell’occupazione e politiche aziendali di gestione del lavoro nelle aziende associate. A this link sono disponibili le tavole riassuntive e comparative relative alle principali variabili oggetto di indagine.
• Particular attention this year is devoted, on the one hand, to the issue of hard-to-find skills by companies and the actions taken to deal with them and, on the other, to the collective variable bonuses paid and welfare initiatives adopted at company level. The survey also takes up the topic of agile work, continuing to monitor its diffusion and asking companies how many workers have been employed in this mode of work and how often they are used.
• Among the companies with ongoing personnel searches at the time of the survey, 69.8% stated that they were experiencing recruitment difficulties. Breaking down these difficulties in relation to the skills sought, they emerge above all for technical skills (overall reported by 69.2% of companies) and for manual tasks (in 47.9% of cases at national level and 58.9% in the industrial sector). With reference to business areas, in two-thirds of the cases the difficulties are found in the search for skills functional to the digital transition, in almost a third of the cases if functional to a greater internationalisation of the company, in about 15% of the cases as a function of the green transition. Among the actions taken in response to skills needs, companies mainly plan training activities aimed at their current staff (in 59.7% of cases). Almost half of the companies (49%) also make use of external services such as consultancy, and almost a third (28.5%) say they are involved in educational programmes in the area (ITS Academy, PCTO, curricular internships, etc.).
• With reference to agile working, the results indicate that 32.6% of the enterprises that participated in the survey used this working mode in 2023. In particular, this share is almost four times higher than the enterprises that used it before Covid. Concerning the intensity of agile work use, in the enterprises where it is envisaged, on average 34% of non-managerial employees used this working mode, mostly for 2 or 3 days per week (between 4 and 12 days per month).
• The survey continues to monitor the application of company collective agreements and the subjects regulated by these agreements. At the beginning of 2024, more than a quarter of member companies (25.2%) apply a company contract, i.e. signed with RSU/RSA or territorial representations. The spread is greater in industry in the strict sense (where the company contract is present in 33.4% of companies) than in services (18.1%) and in larger companies (76.9% in those with 100 or more employees) than in smaller companies (11.6% up to 15 employees).
• The prevalence of company bargaining thus shows higher percentages when calculated on the basis of employees: 65.1% of the employees in the overall sample are employed by companies that apply it - an average between the 69% recorded in industry in the narrow sense and the 59.1% recorded in services.
• The subjects regulated by the company contract, when present, are mainly collective performance bonuses (in 60.4% of the contracts), the conversion of performance bonuses into welfare (47.7%), working time (46.7%), the provision of additional welfare services (39%), and work-life balance (36.7%).
• This year's survey contains a focus precisely on collective variable bonuses and their conversion into welfare. First of all, the survey found that in 2023 in more than 60% of companies the collective variable bonuses provided for in the company contract were actually paid out. Moreover, in 40.2% of the companies an average of one third of the employees decided to convert two thirds of the bonus received into welfare.
• 51.3% of the enterprises declared that they provide welfare. This share derives from the sum of those who provide it because it is provided for by company bargaining (14.4% of the total) and those who provide it because it is provided for by other sources (e.g. CCNL) or on the unilateral initiative of the employer.

1. Employment in Confindustria System companies in 2023

Employment increased, driven by female employment Total salaried employment in Confindustria member companies increased by 1.4% between the end of 2022 and the end of 2023, reflecting an increase of 0.5% in service companies and 1.9% in industry companies. The increase involves enterprises of all size classes - albeit to varying degrees - from those with up to 15 employees (+0.6%) to those with 16-99 employees (+2.1%) to those with 100 employees or more (+1.1%).

In the associated enterprises, employment growth in 2023 is driven by the female component (+3.4%), while the male component is more or less stable (+0.3%); Figure A). According to the Rilevazione sulle Forze di Lavoro (Labour Force Survey) data conducted by ISTAT, overall employment in Italy in 2023 recorded similar average annual growth for men and women, with an increase of +2.2% and +2.5% respectively.

With respect to the type of contract, during 2023 in associated enterprises there was an increase in permanent employees (+1.7%) and a decrease in fixed-term employees (-5.4%), a divide also recorded for overall dependent employment in Italy (ISTAT data). Compared to the total, permanent employment is confirmed as by far the most prevalent type of contract in member companies (92.6% of total employees are employed under such contracts), while fixed-term employees represent 5.2% of the total. Between 2022 and 2023, there was a marked increase in the number of apprentices (+14.9%), both in industry (+5.4%) and especially in services (+29.4%), where they had fallen in the previous three years.

Widespread use of administration contracts Almost a third of the member enterprises (30.6%) employed at least one temporary agency worker (ex-interim) in 2023, with a higher prevalence in industry (39.9%) and large enterprises (72.3% in those with at least 100 employees). To give an idea of the intensity of use, consider that the number of temporary agency workers used by the company overall in the year averaged 7.4% of the total workforce reported as at 31 December 2023.

Administration for an indefinite period of time (staff leasing) was used on average by 9.6% of the companies, again more in industry (14.3%) and in large companies (35.1%), for a share of contract workers during the year of 1.0% of the company workforce (Figure B).

The use of staff leasing, in terms of both the number of companies using it and the number of workers involved, was large and very stable in 2023 compared to the previous survey for 2021, confirming that it is a form of employment that companies make effective use of to select specific resources to be included in the workforce at an early stage.

Higher labour turnover in services As in previous editions, this year's survey measures incoming turnover (amounting to 17.8% in 2023) and outgoing turnover (16.2%). The overall turnover rate, therefore, given by the sum of workers hired and terminated during the year over total employment at the end of 2022, was 34.0%. Turnover is significantly higher in service companies (47.1%) than in industry (25.7%), while there are no substantial differences between size classes.

A large part of the outgoing turnover is determined by resignations, which were the cause of the termination of employment in 65.8% of the cases.

2. Absences from work in 2023

Higher absenteeism rates in larger companies During 2023, the average number of hours worked per capita, net of Wage Guarantee Fund hours, was 1,701. Of these, 111.9 were not worked due to absenteeism (paid and unpaid). The absenteeism rate (calculated as the ratio of hours of absence to hours worked) thus stood at 6.6%.

The incidence of absenteeism, as calculated on the basis of data from the Confindustria labour survey, was higher in services (7.2%) than in industry in the narrow sense (6.2%).

The absenteeism rate was confirmed to increase with increasing company size: 7.3% in those with 100 and more employees, 4.5% in those up to 15 (Figure C).

Different causes of absence by gender Non-occupational illness was confirmed as the most frequent cause of absence (3.5% of the average employee's working hours), followed by paid leave (amounting to 1.1%), while the categories of leave for Law 104 and other paid leave each accounted for 0.7% of the hours of absence in the year. The incidence of absences was 5.8% among men and 8.3% among women. Parental leave explains almost all of the difference, accounting for 2.6% of the hours worked for women and 0.5% for men.

3. Corporate policies, agile working and human capital

Company contract present in one in four member companies Based on the results of the latest Confindustria labour survey, in the first months of 2024 more than a quarter of the member companies (25.2%) are estimated to apply a company contract, i.e. signed with RSU/RSA or territorial representations. The overall figure averages out to be higher in industry in the strict sense (33.4%) and lower in services (18.1%).

Agreements are also much more widespread in large companies (68.3% among those with at least 100 employees) than in small ones (11.8% if there are no more than 15 employees). Consequently, the proportion of employees covered by a company agreement is higher than the proportion of companies and reaches almost two thirds of the total in the overall sample (65.1%) and 70.8% in industry in the narrow sense.

Among the matters regulated in company contracts, first and foremostCollective performance bonuses: more than 60% of the company contracts in Confindustria member companies provide for them, and the share rises to 83.4% among companies with at least 100 employees (the spread reaches 91.3% in large companies in industry excluding construction).

The possibility of converting the performance bonus into welfare (47.7%) and the regulation of working time (46.7%) are also very widespread in company bargaining. The offer of welfare services in addition to those provided for by law, CCNL or company regulations (39%), work-life balance initiatives (36.7%) and agile working (33.9%) are also regulated in over a third of company contracts; Table A).

Collective variable premiums affect blue-collar and white-collar workers more Among the companies that apply a company agreement that provides for collective variable bonuses, 60.7% state that they actually paid a bonus in the course of 2023. This share grows as company size increases, from 57.4% recorded for small companies, to 60.2% for medium-sized companies, to 79.5% for large companies.

In 2023, the incidence of collective variable bonuses on total annual remuneration averaged 4.3% for blue and white-collar workers and 3.8% among middle managers. In industry in the narrow sense, the incidence of premiums is on average higher than in services and is particularly high in industry enterprises with more than 100 employees: 5.5% for blue and white-collar workers and 4.5% for middle managers.

Welfare initiatives present in more than half of the enterprises The results of the survey show that more than half (51.3%) of the companies associated with Confindustria have adopted welfare initiatives, with the share rising to 57.0% in industry and stopping at 43.7% in services. The spread of welfare grows with company size: it is greater in companies with more than 100 employees (78.7% is the overall average, rising to 85.2% for industrial companies), while it is 58.8% in medium-sized companies and 40.9% in those with no more than 15 employees.

The 51.3% of the enterprises that are estimated to provide welfare to their employees can be broken down in relation to the source of provision, that is, as the sum of those that provide it by company contract (14.4% of the total) and those that provide it because it is provided for by other sources, e.g. the national collective agreement or by unilateral initiative of the employer. This second group, for which the founding source of welfare excludes the company contract, is preponderant regardless of the sector and in small and medium-sized enterprises, while company bargaining is confirmed as the preferred founding source in large enterprises (Figure D).

With reference to the different ways in which welfare is provided by company bargaining, in 32.5% of the companies, welfare is provided only after the conversion of a performance bonus, while in 20.8% of the cases welfare is provided exclusively in a manner unrelated to the performance bonus; in the remaining 46.7% (i.e., in the vast majority of cases) the companies provide both ways (Figure E, right-hand panel).

Among the companies that paid out collective variable bonuses in 2023, the survey found that in 40.1% of the cases at least one worker actually converted the bonus into welfare, a situation that is more common in industry (44.1%) than in services (34.0%) and in large companies (49.0%) more than in small ones (12.7%). In these cases, about one third of the workers decided to convert, on average, 67.1% of the bonus received.

Agile working in one in three enterprises, especially for two to three days a week This year's survey also surveyed the degree to which agile working (or smart working) was used by member companies in two distinct time periods, namely before the pandemic and in 2023. Companies that have used agile working were also asked about the average intensity of use, in terms of number of employees per days per week (or month) of remote working.

The results indicate that the share of companies using smart working has almost quadrupled, from 8.9% in pre-pandemic to 32.6% in 2023 (Figure F). This mode of working is more widespread in service enterprises (38.5%) than in industry (28.2%), partly because of the very nature of the activity. In particular, then, the spread of agile working is linked to company size, being present in less than a quarter of small companies, with fewer than 15 employees (24.2%), in about a third of medium-sized companies, between 16 and 99 employees (35.5%), and in two thirds of large companies, with more than 100 employees (66.6%).

Turning to an analysis of the intensity of the use of agile work, it appears that, in the companies where it is envisaged, more than one third of non-managerial employees used this mode of work (34%), with no substantial differences between the figures for industry (33.8%) and services (34.2%). More specifically, 8.9% of employees used it for at most 1 day a week (up to 4 days a month), 20.9% chose this mode for 2-3 days a week (5-12 days a month), and 4.2% for more than 3 days a week (more than 12 days a month; Figure G).

Difficulties in finding skills for more than two out of three companies In this year's survey, companies were asked whether they were experiencing significant recruitment difficulties. Of the companies that had ongoing personnel searches at the time of filling out the questionnaire, 69.8% reported experiencing difficulties.

The share of companies reporting difficulties is higher in industry (73.5%) than in services (65.0%) and increases with company size, from 64.8% in small companies, to 72.8% in medium-sized companies and 77.6% in large companies (Figure H).

The greatest problems emerge for technical skills (reported by 69.2% of companies as being difficult to find) and manual skills (47.2%). Less widespread are the reports concerning transversal skills (16.5%) and managerial skills (8.3%).

On the other hand, as far as company spheres are concerned, there are more problems in finding resources with skills functional to the digital transition, reported by an average of 66.3% of companies with difficulties in finding them, and in particular by 76.6% in services (against 58.4% in industry). Problems in the areas of internationalisation (32.5%) and green (15.1%) are less widespread, although for both there is a greater prevalence in large and industrial companies; Figure I).

Almost two-thirds of the companies reporting recruitment difficulties (64.3%) take action to deal with them, focusing mainly on training their current staff (59.7%). It is also noteworthy that 49.0% of the companies resort to external services, such as consultancy and collaboration, and that 38.3% took action by widening the search pool in terms of geographical areas or methodologies of recruitment. Finally, more than a quarter of the total number of enterprises (28.5%) are involved in educational programmes in the territory (ITS Academy, PCTO, curricular traineeships, etc.), more than half (50.7%) among the larger ones.

Fundamental training in response to difficulties in finding skills Still on the subject of skills, the survey shows that well over half of the companies offered their (non-managerial) employees at least one training activity other than compulsory training in 2023, for a percentage of employees in training in these companies averaging 57.0%.

As mentioned, employee training is one of the main actions taken by companies to address the skills shortage in the labour market. This evidence is also demonstrated by the fact that, while the national average of the share of companies that carried out training activities in 2023 is 57.0%, the share of 'training' companies is significantly higher among those that encountered some difficulty in finding skills (66.0%) than among those that either did not seek or did not encounter difficulties (51.4%; Figure J). This applies irrespective of sector or company size, but it should be noted, however, that the difference between the two shares is significantly higher in industry (where it is 18 percentage points) and particularly among small industrial enterprises (21.6 percentage points).

Appendix: The characteristics of the Confindustria Annual Labour Survey

Edition 2024

This note examines the results of the 2024 Confindustria Labour Survey which, as in previous editions, went into the field in the early months of the year. The administration of questionnaires by the Confindustria System Associations to their member companies began on 12 February 2024, with a deadline initially set for 29 March, later extended to 19 April.

This year's sample consists of 3.742 companies. Overall, at the end of 2023, the companies in the sample employed 813.366 employees at national level.

As in previous editions, this year's questionnaire includes questions on working hours and absenteeism, the structure and dynamics of the workforce employed under different types of contracts and company policies, with particular reference to company bargaining, hard-to-find skills and human capital.

The questionnaire also confirmed the in-depth examination of the status and opinions of companies on the use of agile working.

In the presentation of the survey results, the sample companies are classified by sector on the basis of the applied CCNL (Table A1) and by company size on the basis of the number of employees as of December 2023. Details on the composition of the sample by industry and number of employees are given in Table A2.

In this note (as in those drawn up to comment on past editions of the Confindustria Labour Survey) the average results at national level are weighted on the basis of the distribution (by 11 sectors and 3 size classes) of the employed in the total number of Confindustria member companies.

Hours and absences from work: definitions and calculation methodology

Workable days are calculated by subtracting the 365 days of the year:

• Saturdays and Sundays (105 days) and public holidays in 2023 (10 days);
• the company's figures for holidays, P.A.R. days (former holidays and reduced working hours) and time bank and time account leave.

The annual working hours are calculated:

• by multiplying the days that can be worked by the normal weekly working time of full-time staff net of paid breaks, divided by five;
• by subtracting the per-capita hours of lay-offs carried out by staff.

The absenteeism rate is calculated as the percentage ratio of hours of absence to hours worked, and is available by gender, qualification and type of absence.

The results are based on the answers provided by the 3,469 sampled companies that filled in the section of the questionnaire on working hours and absenteeism.