In the early part of the year, a lot of professionals in the Digital & Tech sphere considered offers, and either made a career move or decided to stay put…
We saw a record level of counteroffers, and this means that newer hires are usually at the higher end of the salary bracket. However, counteroffers tend to arise as a last-ditch attempt at retention for businesses, and with recession fears fading, counteroffers become less effective. I think we are therefore likely to see a scenario whereby those individuals who have been counteroffered but chose to stay will become disengaged in their role again and will be looking to make a move again. We are also likely to be in a unique situation where many will start to become better off towards the end of the year than they were at the beginning of the year.
As the originator of flexible and remote working, the Tech industry isn’t feeling the effects of return-to-work mandates that are dominating headlines currently; developers, by their very nature, are more productive at home, without any distractions. Some will choose to go in, say once a month for example, but there isn’t the same change in direction or tact in Tech which is impacting other industries. But, with all of that being said, in a project-management scenario, there is a push for a return to office work. Traditionally, developers are the most flexible, but with more face-to-face positions such as project management and project of change roles, there is naturally an increased need to return to the office because of the people aspect of these positions. But, generally speaking, there isn’t really a pushback on this, because this is a given for these roles and something that the individuals themselves enjoy regardless.
The largest industry news and talking point is, of course, AI and it’s growing prevalence in our daily lives. It is arguably the most mainstream piece of tech being discussed in such depth in a long time, becoming a household term and a widely debated topic. AI is akin to being the new robotics; ultimately, this means that there are an increasing number of opportunities to work within AI companies that are in need of more developers and project managers in the backend. On the flipside, larger companies are increasingly starting to use automation to drive efficiency, so there is a possibility of jobs being affected as a result of this.
I think we are likely to now start seeing a lot more investment into start-ups too. These investments have always traditionally been a big part of the IT industry, but these have naturally been put on hold somewhat at the start of the year. We are now seeing the return of those investment funds into startups and emerging tech, and this is likely to continue gaining momentum into the latter half of the year.
Whilst the cost-of-living crisis and recession fears loomed over the first part of the year, these seem to be more or less behind us now. What this meant is that most industry professionals received some form of a pay rise, incentive, or even reduction as a result of the crisis. But now that this era is, for the most part, behind us, companies are now looking at their next hires, and the hiring market is regaining traction and becoming a lot more fluid. In both contract and perm, our consultants are seeing more and more coming onto the market, in terms of both jobs and people.
“Now that fears of a recession are, for the most part, behind us, companies are now looking at their next hires, and the hiring market is regaining traction and becoming a lot more fluid.”