Critical Skills

Preliminary results from a benchmark survey of South Africa’s most critical skills suggest that engineers remain the most difficult professionals to recruit, closely followed by ICT experts and skilled artisans.

For the first time in almost a decade, two new occupational categories feature among South Africa’s 10 hardest-to-fill skills. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and emerging technology, along with senior project management roles, are now proving particularly difficult areas for employers to find local talent.

Not too long ago, when visiting a Department of Home Affairs (DHA) office you could find a room stacked to the roof with files and paperwork relating to waiver and appeal applications, all waiting to be adjudicated.

A renewed backlog of overdue visa applications which has built up over the past few months, prompted the Department of Home Affairs (DHA) to step up processing efforts by implementing practical interventions, including daily monitoring of progress and approved overtime for officials to meet additional targets.

Give us engineers.

Over the past five years, that has been the constant refrain from companies across South Africa. According to findings from prior annual Xpatweb Critical Skills Surveys up to 2025, corporates needed chemical and mechanical engineers; they searched for electrical and maintenance engineers and turned to international recruiting to find industrial and mining engineers.