Recruiters… get ready for the post COVID-19 jobs rush

UK to be fastest growing advanced economy by 2022

April 12th saw the further relaxing of the UK’s lockdown as recovery from the pandemic continues to proceed in line with the road map. Enabled by a world-leading vaccination program, the country is set to get back to work more normally and increase economic output sooner than much of the rest of the world.

The World Economic Outlook from the IMF (International Monetary Fund) has predicted the UK is set to outperform the US and Europe as it becomes the world’s fastest growing advanced economy through 2022.

Although the bad news is gradually receding about redundancies, some recent reporting of age-based analysis has revealed that some age groups have been hard hit by job losses.

Over 50s and under 25s hit hard

The Office for National Statistics’ latest Labour market overview suggests under-25s bore the brunt of job losses, making up nearly two-thirds of redundancies since February 2020. The under-25s made up more than 60 per cent of the 693,000 payroll employees that lost jobs in the year from Feb 2020 – Mar 2021.

There is also a big impact on the over 50s. Analysis of Office of National Statistics data by over 50s online community “Rest Less” shows there were 107,000 redundancies of employees aged over 50 between November 2020 and January 2021. The redundancy rate for this age group is now higher than all others and is currently 12.8 per thousand employees. Compare this to the redundancy rate across the entire workforce in the three months to January 2021, of 11 people per thousand employees.

Despite the rather negative headlines generated by these statistics, there are also some very positive indicators that strongly support the optimistic outlook put forward by the IMF for the predicted recovery of the UK economy.

For example, there was an increase of 68,000 for on payroll employment in February 2020, the third consecutive monthly increase.

Less companies firing and more recruiters hiring!

For UK recruiters this means hiring activity is set to take off. To help you capitalise on the COVID-19 bounce back, here are some takeaways from the past year under lockdowns.

• COVID-19 has been truly disruptive to the ‘old world order’ related to work and the employment market. Our notions of flexibility are further heightened, with considerations such as working from home (WFH), no-bricks companies, improved work-life balance and flexitime working now accepted as part of mainstream practice.
• Bias in any direction, whether gender, age, race, mental or physical disability, now needs to be consigned to history. Social issues such as the higher risk of the BAME population to the virus and the BLM movement have put discrimination issues front and centre. WFH renders physical disability irrelevant. Age-related bias must not be seen as a barrier to older workers. Passing over younger candidates cannot routinely be explained away as inexperience. Discrimination in any form is unacceptable, will not be tolerated and is likely to be called out.
• Give youth a chance and don’t ignore the experience pool of the over 50s. Ambitious under 25s, keen to get on in life and career are hungry for opportunities. Many over 50s fear they may not find new jobs easily. Recruiters and the recruitment process must avoid any perceptions of age-related bias.
• The right technology enables recruiters to be better prepared for disruption, in whatever shape that comes. The role of technology in today’s workplace is now further cemented. If we needed any further proof of its importance, COVID-19 has shown how tech fills the gap, enabling many in knowledge and office-based roles to continue with day-to-day business. This holds for workers agencies have placed with clients, or the staff running the recruitment business.

Recruitment tech for the post-COVID-19 world from ETZ

The influence of newly emerging and developing technologies can be a source of competitive advantage, helping to differentiate recruitment brands. Consequently, it remains essential for recruiters to keep on top of recruitment tech – ‘RecTech’.

ETZ’s leading timesheet, invoicing and payment technology sits right at the centre of the recruitment agency back-office. Through the pandemic ETZ has enabled recruitment teams to work seamlessly from home.

ETZ plugs into popular recruitment 3rd party apps right out of the box. We have the capability to custom integrate apps that are not already supported. To find out more about how we could help your agency to maximise through the post COVID-19 boom, call us on 0800 311 2266 or book a demo.