New Year, New Trends - So, what’s in store for 2023?
I wanted to write a quick blog to take you all through some of the many predictions that have been coming out of the woodwork for the year ahead. I’ve used a mixture of online sources, as well as my own experiences chatting to candidates and clients about this topic to compile a few insights for you.
Overall, it’s safe to say that hiring has decreased over the last year, but this doesn’t mean that hiring isn’t still happening. Despite less jobs being advertised, the job market is still very fast paced and the war on talent continues. Layoffs and rising interest rates have simultaneously been wreaking of havoc on the job market, which is rapidly affecting candidates priorities and and the way that companies are choosing to hire.
See below for a list of Candidate Priorities moving into 2023:
1. Compensation & Benefits
2. Work-Life Balance
3. Flexibility
4. Upskilling
5. Advancement
6. Impact
7. Job Security
8. Happiness
9. Management
10. Innovation
11. Leadership
12. Culture
13. Mission
14. Diversity
The above list was taken from LinkedIn’s most recent global talent survey, and here’s my commentary on it:
It makes sense that during uncertain economic times that candidates will be slightly more concerned with their compensation and benefit packages. The problem with economic downturns is that companies are also going to be weary of how much money they’re offering… Uh-oh, I feel a war on salaries coming on…?
As far as flexibility goes - Candidates are still asking for remote work but the number of remote jobs being advertised are declining quite rapidly - in February 2022 remote roles accounted for 20% of job postings but by September 2022 this figure dropped to by 6%.
I found it interesting that during lockdowns, companies were seemingly very happy to offer remote options, but since normality settled back in during the course of 2022, I saw lots of companies go back on their promises for remote work.
I believe there’s a multitude of reasons for this, they might need to justify expensive rent in the CBD, they might be trying to preserve a certain culture, there might even be distrust between management and employees? Maybe a combination of all three. No matter the reasoning - it might be worth getting used to seeing hybrid roles advertised over remote ones, as they will make up a large majority of the roles, we’ll be seeing pop up in 2023.
Employees wanting to see more upskilling aligns quite nicely with the top trend that we are seeing amongst employers currently.
See below for a list of top trends occurring amongst companies/employers going into 2023:
1. Internal Mobility
2. Hybrid ways of working
3. Soft Skills based hiring
4. Stabilising Salaries
5. Increase in Contracting work
6. Generalists over Specialists
7. Pay Transparency
8. Emphasis on Company values & policies via Branding.
9. Improvement of Diversity hiring
10. Layoffs
This data was taken from a fantastic article from LinkedIn’s Talent blog, here’s my take on this data:
Internal mobility is the obvious answer to a talent shortage, if you can’t find someone new to fill the role, then why not look internally to see who might be able to fill the role within the organisation. The best part is that they are already so familiar with the company and internal processes! This has given rise to a movement of upskilling, bringing employer trends into alignment with what candidates are after in the job market at the moment.
As I mentioned previously, the job market is still tight, in the last few years, most companies have realised that there might have to be some compromises made in order to make hires within specific deadlines. Therefore, soft skills are becoming a higher and higher priority for employers rather than having a stringent checklists.
Due to the ongoing tightness of the market, candidate attraction techniques such as pay transparency, company branding, emphasising company values and diversity hiring are still big priorities for companies at the moment, but with the economic market threatening to plummet at a moment’s notice, cost cutting is still very important, which is where all of the recent layoffs and stabilizing salaries have come in.
Final thoughts:
I do suspect that recruitment will slow further in 2023, this means that companies are going to be a bit more careful about who and how they hire, opting to potentially be a bit fussier than before. If there was ever a time to work on your soft skills, it’s now! – take that Udemy course!
So, will we be in for an easier ride than 2022…? The answer in my opinion isn’t exactly Yes, but it’s also not a No! I think 2023 will not necessarily be an “easier” year, but the challenges we will face will be different, and I think the main source of those challenges will be discourse between the employer and the employee, as the market adapts to a different financial climate, candidates and companies alike will have to go through an adjustment period where their expectations will have to realign with the reality of the new direction the market is headed in.
Personally, I’ll be strapped in and ready for anything 😛