The UK job market has been hit hard due to COVID-19, however, some markets have seen a sizeable rise in the number of vacancies they are posting, particularly those within the key worker sectors.
This research comes from CV-Library, which found that despite job postings and applications dropping by 15 per cent in March, those in certain key worker industries saw huge rises. Job postings in the public sector increased by 104 per cent, agriculture by 99 per cent, social care by 18 per cent, education by 3 per cent and distribution industries by 2 per cent.
CV-Library has also seen new candidates register on its site rise from 8 per cent month-on-month and 11 per cent year-on-year.
Still, the industries that have witnessed the largest decrease in job postings are:
- Administration (down 39 per cent)
- Leisure/Tourism (down 39 per cent)
- Media (down 37 per cent)
- Marketing (down 37 per cent)
- Design (down 36 per cent)
- Recruitment (down 36 per cent)
- Sales (down 32 per cent)
- Catering (down 30 per cent)
- Legal (down 29 per cent)
- Automotive (down 28 per cent)
Lee Biggins, CEO and founder of CV-Library said:
It’s not surprising that the outbreak of COVID-19 has prevented businesses from moving forward with their hiring plans. With global supply chains disrupted and many organisations forced to close their doors in order to respect social distancing rules, companies have had to change the way they operate and adapt to this new normal. Sadly, this has involved placing existing employees on furlough and even making redundancies.
The national unemployment rate is set to soar in April and there’s no doubt that this will be a really tricky time for business owners across the UK. However, we will come out the other side of the pandemic and organisations need to be ready. Remember, we may be under these social distancing restrictions for some time, so be prepared to hire remotely and consider how that’s going to work. For example, you’ll probably need to adapt your recruitment process to rely on techniques such as video interviews.
The sad reality is this is going to be a tough year for many businesses. And, while the government’s assistance should provide some respite, the future of our economy and the UK job market remains uncertain. I your business falls into a key industry that is experiencing growth, you should definitely continue moving forward with your hiring efforts and provide opportunities to the millions of people who may be out of work.
After all, the country is in a perilous situation and needs these key services to continue operating efficiently. So, if you’re struggling to find the best candidates, you should consider recruiting workers from outside your normal sector. Most professionals have transferrable skills that will be of use to your business and this is crucial if we want to keep the country running during this difficult time.
CV-Library gathered this data by using its job market data from March 2020 and compares this with figures from February 2020 and the same period in 2019.
Darius is the editor of HRreview. He has previously worked as a finance reporter for the Daily Express. He studied his journalism masters at Press Association Training and graduated from the University of York with a degree in History.
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