State of the Tech Recruitment Market Report: Late Summer 2023
By Fay Capstick
As we all know, Covid sent shockwaves through the employment market and has forever changed the way we work, with hybrid and remote working becoming the expected norm. Everything is always also changing in the recruitment sector due to changes in the tech and IT industry and with the economy in the UK and the world. This week we shall be taking a look at the current state of the market, and what we can expect going forward into the autumn.
How has 2023 been so far?
Overall, the recruitment market is still slow in some areas. Some of the biggest tech companies, Amazon, Meta, and Alphabet, have either had a freeze on hiring or have laid-off large numbers of workers. This is partly due to the hiring boom that happened during Covid. This was caused by the big increase in demand for tech and digital services needed by people stuck at home. This has now slowed back down.
We have seen a slow Q1 and Q2 of 2023, and this has been a slowing further from the end of 2022 and has been caused by a lack of confidence in the economy. There is always a summer slowdown in hiring in many sectors, but it has been reported that this isn’t as much as the slowdown last summer (1).
What about inflation?
Inflation in the UK in 2023 has undoubtedly impacted our sector. Pressures from inflation on tech companies have put pressure on their ability to grow, expand, and hire.
What are the current hurdles to filling job vacancies?
IR35 is still causing headaches for us, and we are still finding that many contractors are only wanting work outside of IR35. Another constant headache is the need for Security Cleared workers to fill roles. This is particularly true for DV Cleared workers and those with special types of DV Clearance (London or West DV Cleared particularly).
This all means that while REC is reporting that the availability of contract and permanent workers is high, this doesn’t mean they have the required clearances needed or want the position if it is Inside of IR35.
What are we expecting from Autumn 2023?
We are expecting an upturn as we go into Autumn 2023, and we are expecting a fruitful end to Q3 and Q4 of the year. Further, we are expecting some of the bigger tech companies to lift their recruitment freezes, according to our grapevine.
What is in demand?
In the last couple of years, everything has been focused on digital transformation and moving services to the Cloud, we are now seeing the growth in digital transformation start to slow. The new trend direction is more data and Cloud focused roles. We have also been seeing a shift towards more system support and system administration jobs.
What is the outlook for 2024?
We are expecting the government’s method of managing the economy to work and for the overall impact of inflation to slow and ease, and therefore hopefully a recession will be avoided.
Hopefully, this should result in firms having more confidence to take on extra contract and permanent workers, so we are expecting that things will be improving in the market as 2024 progresses building on the boost that we are expecting in the Autumn.
Final thoughts
At Parker Shaw, we have been at the forefront of the sector we serve, IT & Digital Recruitment and Consulting, for over 30 years. We can advise you on all your hiring needs.
If you are looking for your next job in the IT sector please check our Jobs Board for our current live vacancies at https://parkershaw.co.uk/jobs-board