The COVID19 crisis has had a significant impact on the technology recruitment industry. Research from various sources indicated that approximately 38% of businesses within the UK and Europe froze a majority of their tech recruitment. Additionally, many companies were being more money conscious with their budgets by making cuts to reduce their number of employees, as well as freezing active recruitment campaigns within the business. The impact of COVID19 on the tech recruitment industry can be best illustrated by the 43.9% year-on-year drop in tech roles that were advertised on the website in July 2020. As a result, according to CV-Library, 67% of IT professionals were concerned with their job security due to the pandemic. On the plus side, according to the finding from Gartner, 86 % of businesses within the industries that were not affected were able to improvise and adapt to these changes by conducting interviews on platforms such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams, as well as using new technology to onboard employees.
Though it will take a while to get used to these changes, it is evident that the work environment, as we know it, will change. Some businesses, such as Twitter, are accepting these changes and are giving their employees the option to work from home for the foreseeable future. Furthermore, it has been reported that some businesses that believed they required on-site technical assistant, prior to the lockdown, found this was not the case; throughout the lockdown, these businesses were able to work and operate effectively with technical support being offered remotely. In terms of recruitment, does this mean the tech related roles that were put on hold can resume as planned? Will the technology recruitment industry pick up again? In order to answer these questions, we may need to consider the alternative options this pandemic has presented. For example, working remotely means businesses now can easily access candidates from various geographical locations as the requirements of being located within a close proximity does not hold anymore.
