Job hunters no longer calling the shots in a softening labour market

The national unemployment rate ticked up from 3.8 per cent to 3.9 per cent in November, while the number of job ads on Seek fell. Job ad volumes in November were 20.2 per cent lower year-on-year, but 13.6 per cent higher than in November 2019.

‘Performance managed’

Recruitment agency Robert Half, which specialises in administration, technology and accounting roles, named the gradual shift to an employer-driven market as one of its six hiring trends to watch in 2024.

The others were a moderation in salary offers; demand for workplace flexibility; hiring based on skills and not just qualifications; companies recruiting more retirees and otherwise tapping into more diverse talent pools; and employees pushing for more learning and development opportunities.

Andrew Brushfield, a director at the agency, said demand for labour across the roles he recruits had cooled significantly since 2022 and the early part of 2023 when “everyone and his dog was hiring”.

Where some companies were once hiring candidates just to prevent them from joining a rival – and paying hand over fist to get them through the door – now they were only bringing in fresh recruits when the need was acute, he said.

“Employers are probably giving [the recruitment] the time and headspace and thought process that it deserves, versus a couple of years ago when there was a real sense of, ‘if I don’t hire this person, and hire them quickly, I’m going to lose this person’,” Mr Brushfield said.

He told The Australian Financial Review that many technology workers hired during the post-pandemic boom had since been “performance-managed out” as companies had rushed their hiring processes and some of the recruits “weren’t up to speed”.

More deliberate hiring after frenetic two years

Slower hiring processes have also been observed by Andrew Hanson, NSW managing director of recruitment firm Robert Walters, who agreed that some employers were recovering from the fallout of “hasty recruitment processes” in 2021 and 2022.

“[Employers] are taking the time to assess individuals and really try to ensure that, for permanent roles in particular, the cultural fit is there,” Mr Hanson said.

He told the Financial Review the tech sector had experienced the most significant slowdown. “That would be the area that had the biggest shift from, say, nine months ago to now,” he said.

The slowdown in hiring has led to a moderation in salary offers across the board, with the days of double-digit pay rises now in the rearview mirror for most white-collar workers.

Mr Hanson said pay rises above 3.5 per cent were now uncommon for white-collar job-switchers working outside high-demand areas such as cybersecurity and machine learning, unless they were getting a promotion.

Mr Brushfield offered a similar portrayal of market salaries, but put the typical pay rise outside high-demand areas at 5 per cent instead of 3.5 per cent.

Employers tighten office mandates

Both recruiters said the cooling jobs market had emboldened more employers to ask their staff to come into the office more frequently. Mr Hanson said many companies had beefed up their mandates from one or two office days each week to three or four days.

As for Mr Comissi, he is hopeful he can land a job by early February given he has already had a few “positive” interviews and is dedicating a few hours each day to his job hunt.

“I know I’m an efficient, strong worker. So it’s just [about] scoping out the right opportunity,” he said. “It’s a matter of staying tenacious and staying observant, seeing what pops up and putting my name in the ring right away once it comes up.”