Consultancy firms are desperately struggling to recruit skilled staff to cope with a booming market for their services, according to Building’s annual survey of the sector.

Ninety-four per cent of architects, surveyors, engineers and project managers said they were looking to hire over the next six months, with two-thirds claiming recruitment difficulties were holding back growth.

A further two-thirds were planning to offer above-inflation pay rises to keep their staff.

Worryingly for employers, the average age of staff has risen from 35 three years ago to 38, reflecting the dearth of young talent entering the industry.

And worryingly for staff, the number using their employers’ flexible working perks has actually dropped since last year – at two thirds of companies less than 10% of staff take advantage, perhaps because they are struggling under the weight of their workloads.

The average age of staff has risen from 35 three years ago to 38, reflecting the dearth of young talent entering the industry

Nevertheless, the top 250 firms in Building’s survey did manage to grow – they now employ 91,000 people, up 9% on last year, including 40,000 chartered staff.

Total fee income was up 11% to £5.6bn across all the firms who responded. It is a sellers’ market – margins have risen slightly, as has the proportion of clients paying within 30 days, now 14%. The split of work between the private and public sectors remains steady at 47% and 36% respectively, with slightly more (17%) spent on PFI than last year. Nearly a fifth of fees were earned on regeneration projects.

Atkins still dominates the main table, employing 5,807 chartered staff in the UK, up from 5,701 last year. The fastest-growing company was architect SMC Group, 169% bigger than last year thanks to a frenzy of acquisitions that saw it enter the main table at 32, and the architects table at two.