The number of vacancies in the labor market is sharply reducing

Maya Pakulova

Since February 24, an outflow of offers from employers has been recorded on specialized job search resources, and from recruiting agencies, and from HR consultants. The overall decline in vacancies is estimated in various areas from 90 to 30%.

Companies are sending employees on leave with partial pay and introducing shorter working hours. Career consultants say that these are only the first signs of hidden unemployment, and predict serious changes in the labor market in the very near future.

Aleksey Fedorov from the Anti-Slavery project notes the second wave of the global labor market restructuring. The first wave was during the COVID-19 pandemic. Then people changed their industries, and now many will have to change their profession:

“At the moment, most employers are withdrawing offers (offer is an application for a specialist), in recent weeks there have been 2-3 new vacancies, no more, and earlier such a number per day was considered not enough. Companies do not understand how to reorient their activities, and who they now need from specialists.

According to the specialist, stability will be in the budgetary sectors, in the defense industry. Candidates with experience in anti-crisis solutions will be in demand.

A real disaster is happening in the air transport industry. Pilots, flight attendants, flight engineers - this is a huge army of specialists, which is now out of work.

“Airlines are trying to retain staff by transferring to part-time salaries. But these are only temporary measures that will not last long. And if with the majority of workers it is possible to come up with a re-profiling for other industries, then, for example, with professional pilots, especially long-haul routes, the situation is simply a stalemate. Pilots must not fly - in addition to the loss of earnings, the experience is interrupted, but this is already more difficult to make up. Every year and a half, the pilot must confirm his qualifications. Training takes place on simulators in Russia, but qualifications are confirmed only in the USA. The airline organizes all this, that is, the pilot must “be in service” all the time, fly, so as not to lose his qualifications. In Russia, it is simply impossible to offer jobs to pilots, and now pilots are guided by job offers from foreign air carriers. But, unfortunately, there are not so many of them. Fedorov says.

The second "lost" sphere is IT-shniks. Since February 24, developers have been flying in whole teams to Cyprus and Israel. In Tel Aviv and Limassol, a community of Russian IT specialists has formed . According to Fedorov, there they are already providing funding for start-ups and projects, and it is unlikely that they will be able to return them to Russia.

“In the field of marketing, old-school skills will be in demand,” Aleksey Fedorov suggests. “With the blocking of many social networks and instant messengers, the refusal to work in Russia with special marketing tools, people who can do everything “with their own hands” will be in demand. The trend will be a device “on a call from the right person”, they will attach their people to good places, and specialists will have to fight for a place or look for “outputs” for the person who makes decisions about the employee”.

Alena Vladimirskaya, Facancy project, together with the team introduced weekly free marathons with career advice. Vladimirskaya specializes in top management and has noted a tenfold increase in competition for vacancies in recent weeks. Particularly affected industries are the aviation industry, GR, and retail. The expert recommends managers to switch to small businesses - repair and resale companies, event managers to focus on the public sector, catering specialists to wait for the emergence of new chains. According to Alena Vladimirskaya, companies are now undergoing layoffs and notifications of a temporary suspension of activities, an avalanche of top management unemployment should be expected in 1.5-2 months.

The largest outflow of employers is noted in Moscow and the Moscow region, in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region. In the regions, the influence of geopolitical processes on the labor market is not so noticeable, and the focus on foreign business is shifting from Europe towards Asia.

Lyudmila Ivanchina, a career consultant from Yekaterinburg , notes that the situation on the labor market is very beneficial for Russian companies - they will be able to hire experts from a structured business with a full range of competencies. According to the specialist, such skills as flexibility, adaptability, the ability to keep focus on goals during a period of turbulence, the ability to work and make decisions in conditions of uncertainty will become relevant and in demand now. “As for the reorientation of international cooperation towards China, the main problem is expected to be the difference in mentalities and language barriers”, - the consultant believes.

The greatest number of free hands is now among students and professionals starting their careers. Over the past 3 weeks, there has been a 32% increase in the number of people looking for unskilled work, part-time work, or just starting a work activity. At the moment, the reduction of job offers is observed in the sector of catering, marketing and services.

According to the SuperJob portal analytics, the situation with personnel for charitable and social projects is literally catastrophic. Since the end of February, the number of offers has decreased by 76%. A specialist in social work with people with disabilities or training in financial literacy in a family center - all this is a part-time job and a social lift for future teachers, psychologists, lawyers, doctors. Now these proposals are melting every day.

The situation is similar for top management. Having lost their jobs in foreign companies, white-collar workers (knowledge workers) with a high level of competencies and skills are trying to reorient themselves to Russian commercial structures. Those, in turn, paused recruiting, trying to develop a company strategy in a changing market, and only then formulate a request for a particular specialist.

According to HH analysts, the increase in the number of vacancies is recorded only in the civil service. However, most of the offers are the position of a policeman, a vacancy for a computer operator or a social worker.

Least of all changes in the request of specialists in the field of medicine and pharmaceuticals, as well as in the field of security and legal services.

HR consultants and their teams have shifted to almost round-the-clock work, trying to help people who are losing their jobs in droves. Many have introduced free consultations, blogs and marathons to provide psychological support to people who have lost their jobs.