Recruiters saw the number of new job placements rise to a 12-month high in April, a new employment study has revealed.
The Bank of Scotland Report on Jobs signalled the strongest increase in job creation trends since spring last year, with temporary posts also rising ahead of the important summer season.
Recruitment firms said workplaces were advertising more vacant posts, while the labour market was “more buoyant”.
Average pay continued to rise during the month. Full-time workers saw what the survey, compiled alongside research company Markit, called a “strong” rise in wages the biggest since last May.
The bank’s composite Barometer rating system rose by one point to a monthly score of 54, indicating what it called a solid improvement in job market conditions.
The score for the UK was 52.2. Strongest rates of growth were seen in the Dundee and Glasgow areas, the survey said, while wage rises were highest in Aberdeen.
The Scottish average temp rate also rose.
“April’s Barometer rose for the second month in a row to the highest level of 2013,” said the Bank of Scotland’s chief economist Professor Donald MacRae.
“Both the number of people placed into permanent and temporary jobs rose, while vacancies increased in the month. Salaries for permanent jobs showed the strongest rise since May 2012.
“These results provide further evidence for the Scottish economy beginning to demonstrate a more robust recovery.”
Permanent vacancies were particularly strong in the IT and computing, engineering and construction, hotel and catering and accounts and financial sectors.
The availability of temp jobs rose in nursing, medical and care, engineering and construction, IT and computing, secretarial and clerical, and blue collar posts.
Finance Secretary John Swinney said: “Scotland continues to show a higher employment rate and lower unemployment than the UK as well as stronger economic growth and youth unemployment figures that continue to improve and out-perform the UK.”