Creative Skillsets Employment Census 2015 for games and other Creative Media sectors now published

Did you complete Creative Skillset Employment Census for games and all other Creative Media sectors launched in September of last year ? 657 employers or organisations did.

We know this as the results have now been published on the Creative Skillset website without any fanfare at http://creativeskillset.org/about_us/research/creative_skillset_employment_survey_2015

The finding are remarkable and critical to all bodies interested in employment and the makeup of the Creative Media sectors. No press release has been issued by Sector Skills Council, Creative Skillset to signal that the numbers are in the public domain. But we should be grateful that the numbers have been crunched and made available on their web site. Creative Skillset has been publishing these surveys since at least 2006. They are to be commended for working on this survey every 3 years to bring to the UK the results that are so important in understanding how industries are growing and creating wealth with analysis on the representation of women and Black Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) talent, the workforce by region and freelance employment status. Most European counties do not collect this data at national level and are unable to formulate and measure the effects of policy impacting at sector level.

Women in Games has reproduced below 2 tables from the Survey and has commented on possible headlines in the 2015 data. In understanding the data, there are some health warning on comparative data because of a change in methodology and weighting compared to previous Employment Censuses. To underline this, what started out as the regular 3 year Employment ‘Census’ when launched in the autumn of last year has now been renamed the 2015 Employment ‘Survey’. The Key Findings published by Creative Skillset have included comparable figures from the 2 previous surveys for reference so we will be including and commenting on trend data. Often this is the most interesting analysis. The 2015 will be the most reliable data ever published as it is clear that more and more effort has been put into tying the numbers down. Only 371 organisation responded to the 2012 Census in comparison. Just bear in mind that the data in previous years – which was thought to be the best data available at the time – will not be quite as robust.

Headlines

• The 7 Creative Media Sectors in the UK – TV, Radio, Post Production, Film, Animation, VFX and Games – employed 147050 in the autumn of 2015.
• The TV Sector in the UK is the largest of 7 Creative Media Sectors employing 58650 which is 40% of the total in Creative Media.
• The UK Film Sector now employs 38150 and is second biggest employer in the Creative Media sector behind the TV sector.
• TV and Film combined employ almost 97000 people or 2/3 of the Creative Media sector.
• After TV & Film, 5 sectors, Radio, Games, VFX, Post Production and Animation, are each reported to employ between 13550 and 7750 in their own right.
• Games is now the fourth largest employer after TV, Film and Radio and at 10300 has almost doubled in size since the last Survey in 2012.
• VFX employs 10000 in UK and like Games with 10300 is growing employment faster than any other Creative Media Sector.
• Employment in UK Radio, 13550, and Post Production, 8560, has not changed significantly in the last 3 years.
• The number employed in Animation sector in UK at 7750 makes it is the smallest Creative Media sector but it has grown substantially since 2012.
• 39% of those employed in 7 Creative Media Sectors in UK – TV, Radio, Post Production, Film, Animation, VFX and Games – are women, 57800 out of a total of 147050. k
• The Terrestrial Broadcast subsector of TV in the Creative Media industry in UK is the first to achieve parity in the workforce – 50% men and 50% women in the history of the Creative Skillset Census.
• The representation of women in the Cable and Satellite subsector of TV at 32% is substantially below the TV subsectors of Terrestrial Broadcast (50%) and Independent Production (47%)
• TV and Film combined employ almost 42600 women which is 73% of women in Creative Media industry. #employment #CreativeCensus2015
• More women are employed in Radio 46% than TV 45% and Film 43% but these sectors employ substantially more than the newer industries of Animation 30%, VFX 26%, Post Production 24% and Games 19%.
• The games industry continues to employ the fewest women in Creative Media Sector but the growth in recent years is remarkable with almost 2000 now making games compared to 400 in 2009.
• There are more women working in Television in the UK than all the men working in the Games, VFX and Animation industries combined. #diversity #CreativeCensus2015
• Just 7% of those employed in 7 Creative Media Sectors in UK – TV, Radio, Post Production, Film, Animation, VFX and Games are men and women of colour compared to 13% of UK population
• 9% of those employed in TV and Radio sectors in the UK have BAME heritage which compares with BAME groups representing 10% of the UK workforce and 35% of London’s workforce.
• There are more people with BAME heritage employed in the TV sector in the UK, 5200, than all the 6 other Creative Media sectors combined.
• 4 sectors of the Creative Media Industry – Film, Post Production, Games and Animation employ 1 in 20 people of colour or less, compared to all other industries where the average level of employment is 10% or 1 in 10.

In the original report there is additional analysis that looks at the proportion of women and BAME groups in the strategic management or executive teams in the 7 Creative Media sectors. We have not reproduced these here as it looks misleading, certainly for the games sector and possibly for most groups. The numbers are statistically correct reflecting the responses for this particular survey question. What does not look to have been taken into account is the large number of respondents who have skipped the question on the grounds of it being difficult or even too embarrassing to answer. If those skipping the question had all answered nil, the average would have come down significantly. It is just not our experience that almost 3 in 10 of every games team at executive level are women.