Posted by Kelly Grant, TCC Senior Technical Recruiter
Remember January 2020? Unemployment was 3.1% in Indiana (https://calendar.in.gov/site/dwd/event/january-indiana-employment-report-3/)
and tech companies were hiring like crazy. Then the COVID-19 lockdown started, and it feels like our world has been turned upside down.
Has there been a significant impact on hiring in the tech industry? Dice’s Q1Tech Job Report this year focuses on Q1 2020 data to look at the effect of the outbreak on the tech industry so far.
http://marketing.dice.com/pdf/2020/Dice_Q1_Tech_Job_Report.pdf
The report broke out the job posting data into four sets to make it easier to see the impact on different locations, roles and skill sets, as well as a comparison of Q1 2019 to Q1 2020.
The first set of data we will compare is year-over-year job posting volume. The report indicates that overall Q1 2020 saw a significant increase over Q1 2019. There was a dip in volume in April, but overall, it appears that the tech industry is more insulated from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic than some other industries.
Next the report compared location data for job postings. Every state experienced growth in Q1 2020 compared to Q2 2020. However, the report notes that due to the variance in when states enforced a “stay at home” mandate, the data shows a lot of variability at the state and city level. For instance, Virginia saw a 15% increase in job postings from February to March, while Alabama saw a 19% decrease.
At the city level, 19 out of the 25 featured cities showed an increase in job posting from February to March. Raleigh, NC had a 28% increase at the top of the range and Boston, MA showed a 6% decrease.
This variance may be explained by the types of companies doing business in each location. For instance, Arlington, VA had a 20% increase in job postings and hosts a high volume of defense and federal government contractors. Southern California cities such as San Diego and Los Angeles also had growth of 23% and 9% respectively, with businesses such as Booz Allen Hamilton and Qualcomm hiring. Silicon Valley hosts a number of companies that produce products and services for remote workers, and this is reflected in the increase in postings of 13% in San Francisco and 12% in San Jose.
The report notes that the increase in posting growth from February to March is in part due to the demand for technology professionals who can provide products that promote social distancing and remote work, such as e-commerce portals and cloud architecture.
The data for early April indicates slightly less hiring overall, but these numbers will require monitoring over the coming weeks to determine if this is a short-term fluctuation or a long-term trend.
In the next post, we will look at the data in this report for different types of employers.
For more information on hiring at TCC please visit our website https://www.e-tcc.com/open-positions.
Technology, Process and Expertise 