Labour shortage and labour retention as a possible strategy in a difficult economic situation based on empirical data of a transitioning economy

The article presents the Hungarian results of research conducted in Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries. The main objective of the study was to examine organizational responses to labour shortages and labour retention strategies based on organization size and ownership background. In the theoretical part, we present the general situation of the Hungarian labour market and then discuss the effects of COVID-19 and the Russo-Ukrainian War, followed by labour shortage and retention. Our research was based on a survey of 383 organizations in Central and Eastern European economies, during which four hypotheses were tested. The SPSS 27.0 software package was used to evaluate the results. In the findings, we confirmed that organizations of various ownership and size differ in the means they use to retain labour force and also in the factors that contribute to labour shortages in different positions. As an implication of management and economics, we found that size and ownership affect not only retention strategy as suggested by previous literature but also the factors that contribute to labour shortages in different positions.Implications for Central European audience: A novel feature of the paper is that it takes into account the effects of organization size and ownership while analysing the consequences of the Russo-Ukrainian War for the first time. It is also the first Hungarian study to investigate the effect of the economic crisis due to the Russo-Ukrainian War on labour retention and labour shortage by size and ownership of organizations. The findings would set a comparison for corporations in Central European countries too.