We ran a poll on LinkedIn recently (and thank you to those who responded) around whether people are more or less likely to look for work this year. Given all the changes to workplaces and the relationships between employees and employers that occurred, it was interesting to see the results.
73% believe they are more likely to look for work this year than prior to Covid. There is a number of factors at play here.
During Covid lockdowns there were less jobs being advertised so people were far less likely to be looking.
As we return to the workplace, there is a natural consideration of what is important to us and whether the job we are in or career we chose, is where we want to be.
There is optimism in the labour market which is presenting more opportunities.
I found the results to be the inverse of what I imagined. Particularly looking at the relationship between employee and employer, I felt there might be a sense of obligation to employers from workers who feel they were accommodated during the last 12 months; and that candidates might have some PTSD around looking for work with a slower than expected vaccine roll-out and the ever looming return to lockdown.
It’s great to see the general optimism from people to look for work and bodes well for the rest of the year.