THE Government's higher education review will be pointless unless the sector starts to confront the crisis in academic staffing, recruitment expert Rohan Carr has warned.

Dr Carr, who was at the Sydney conference where Education Minister Julia Gillard announced the review last month, said an increase in funding would do little if universities could not find enough good academics to teach.

And the timetable of the review was too leisurely, given the acute shortage of academic talent in an ageing sector.

"Something needs to be done now because it's going to take time (to fix the problem)," said Dr Carr, a director of the Insight Group.

"In three years' time (when new funding arrangements are expected to arise from the review) we'll have lost three more years' (worth) of academics.

"It's very easy to tip more money into the sector. What you can't do in a short timeframe is retain people or attract them into the sector."

Dr Carr said accounting, engineering and health and medical faculties had senior posts vacant, sometimes for as long as 12 months. There were 15 chairs of accounting waiting to be filled.

Some universities risked losing vital industry accreditation for their programs because they had fallen below the mandated number of senior, experienced academics on staff.

"(If they did lose accreditation) students won't come (and) the publicity, you can imagine, would be very negative," he said.

About 30 per cent of the Insight Group's business was bound up in the search for senior academics: professors, deans and pro-vice chancellors.

One problem was an ever-greater emphasis on research, closing a career path for the teaching-only academics who could staff expanded programs in skills-shortage disciplines such as engineering.

Another was an imbalance between the heavier demands made of academics and the relatively poor payment and inflexible work arrangements on offer.

"(As an academic) you have to churn out lots of research, you have to have a high teaching load, you have to manage," Dr Carr said.

"The pressures on academics have well and truly exceeded the increases in their remuneration."

In accounting, for example, the rewards in private sector employment were much more attractive. Intensifying the competition for academic talent was the rapid construction of new universities in Asia, especially China and the Middle East.

Modern business had learned how vital it was to be able to attract and keep talent but most universities were oblivious to this truth. Their procedures often were too slow and cumbersome for hiring good academics and keeping them happy.

"When it comes to people-management practices, they are a long way from leading edge," Dr Carr said.

Over the next decade, skill in securing and hanging on to first-rate academics might become more important for quality and reputation than the established advantages of a sandstone institution.

"Already some universities are becoming more nimble at this than others," Dr Carr said.