The 2023 job market for those looking to change companies, sectors, or functions introduces a whole new set of rules to the workforce game. While hybrid work expands, higher demand for employee engagement will engrain employees deeper in their new environments.
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A renewed workforce balance
A fresh start to a new year for job seekers allows us to cleanse our pallets and expel any bad work-related taste left by 2022. If the 2022 workforce prevailed through economic inflation, lingering employment-related pandemic residue, and other taxing challenges, it will withstand the trials and tribulations that 2023 has in store. However, job seekers will need more search assistance from recruitment organizations like CSS Professional Staffing Group to succeed in a tighter labor market.
“The fresh job-seeking workforce of 2023 will experience greater workplace flexibility and attention to wellness balanced with the challenge of intensified responsibilities in response to the quiet quitting movement of 2022. Look for managers to offer personalized work hours and benefits with the expectation that job seekers will respond with an uptick in productivity.” Says Shannon Young, CSS PSG Regional Recruiting Director.
1. A tighter market will require recruiter assistance
The darker side of finding a new role in the current hiring climate is the fact that many companies, especially in tech, have over-staffed themselves these past few years. Layoffs are sure to ensue followed by a smaller supply of roles (at least to start) in 2023, so job seekers need to buttress their own search efforts by collaborating with an experienced recruiting house like CSS Professional Staffing Group. This will give job seekers the widest exposure to a diverse portfolio of job opportunities. Not only does CSS PSG place candidates at dream clients, but 85 percent of those contractors are eventually converted to full-time employees.
Working with a top recruiter to help connect job seekers with dream roles will alleviate pain points from identifying live opportunities to coordinating touchpoints with hiring managers.
2. Hybrid work to expand with location and work hours
If management learned anything about its employees in 2022, it’s that hybrid work is still highly preferred even two-plus years removed from the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. A recent Gallup survey polling employees’ preferred work environments in 2022 and beyond found 59 percent of employees prefer a hybrid model. Compare that with the 32 percent in favor of full remote and just nine percent wanting to be fully on-site, and it is obvious that management will continue offering the hybrid model to pacify employees.
Entrenching hybrid locational work in company culture will introduce the standard of hybrid working time as well. Job seekers should inquire about time flex in addition location flex to doctor their work schedules around the times in the day when they are the most productive.
3. With great flexibility comes great responsibility
To earn flexibility, employees need to produce results, and the freedom allotted to workers around physical location and time needs to be balanced out with greater production. 2022’s detrimental quiet quitting trend shrank company revenue, and more importantly, hindered employee skill and professional development. To avoid this, organizations will be investing more in career mobility and learning and development opportunities for current and prospective employees.
Job seekers should inquire about a potential employer’s L&D initiatives, upward career mobility within the company, and potential lateral opportunities as well to keep themselves as interested and invested in their work as possible. Employees invested in themselves will in turn invest more time and energy into a company providing professional growth opportunities.
4. Candidate DE&I requirements will be of utmost importance in 2023
Candidates are not just looking for a job according to skillset and experience, but for inclusion potential as well. A recent ClearCompany study reported that 76 percent of job seekers noted company diversity as very important when considering a job offer. Even more so, 89 percent of respondents to the same study said they want their company to be inclusive of individuals with intellectual and other disabilities, a population that makes up 17 percent of the global population according to the World Economic Forum.
5. Getting personal with your coworkers
Keeping with the theme of inclusion and community, job seekers should go to greater lengths in 2023 to interview with multiple managers and team members to gauge personality fit. The Covid-19 pandemic deprived us of in-person contact with our coworkers which alienated us from one another. In-person communication proved to be more important than we anticipated. A separate Gallup study found that having a “best friend” in the office was a key component of workplace happiness and production. The study found that 49 percent of employees who reported they do not have such a relationship at work are looking for a new job. While remote flexibility is valued, active job seekers should ensure they appease their human instinct by forming enjoyable professional relationships in the office as well.
6. Looming elimination of noncompete contract clauses will allow for wiggle room
A quick note to job seekers looking to stay within their industry; a combatant to the shrinking labor market may come in the form of the abolishment of noncompete clauses. The Federal Trade Commission announced recently that it intends to ban noncompete clauses that keep employees from leaving their current company for a competitor. This ban would open doors for workers looking to move within industries traditionally gatekept by upper management to keep trade secrets.
Though nothing is set in stone at the moment, the FTC has a strong case for this ban citing employee wage suppression and hindrances to new business startups potentially allowing for more movement and greater opportunity for job seekers.
7. Partner with an expert CSS Professional Staffing Group recruiter to start your dream career in 2023
Start your 2023 off right and land your dream role by reaching out to the recruitment professionals at CSS Professional Staffing Group. Specializing in human resources, accounting and finance, office support, and call center support, CSS PSG has been a staffing industry leader for almost 20 years with stellar client reviews. Connect with CSS PSG today to make your career dream a reality!