Market Insights for 2022

A new year, a new market, a new you! The last two years, businesses have been faced with extreme uncertainty. The market is evolving and in order to survive and thrive - it's time for businesses to evolve with it. The post-pandemic world is a world of change and innovation and naturally, looking at trends and best practices for 2022, it’s safe to expect that the norm shall be turned on its head yet again. 

For the first time in a long time, the recruitment market is a candidate-driven market. As observed this last year, candidates hold more power than ever before in this generation. So, while candidates are making choices, businesses must adapt to tackle competition in order to attract and retain the best talent. In order to make the best decisions for your business, it should be informed by research and industry information. 

Here is some insight from Savant into how the market is looking for 2022. Based on Info-tech’s report, businesses are increasingly shifting to a digital economy and the IT sector is more important than ever. The challenge for CIOs in supporting their CEOs drive growth is to rapidly climb up the maturity ladder of their IT departments. Most Info-tech respondents stated they were on the “support” or “optimise” level, whereas, in order to increase revenues and instil digital transformation, they need to scale up to “expand” or “transform” levels. 

Fig : 2022 Tech Trends, Info tech Research Group 

In order for businesses to achieve these levels - specialised, skilled and experienced IT talent is more important than ever. The latest Confidence Index published by CwJobs suggests that 79% of the IT professionals they surveyed were confident in the current state of the UK Tech Industry. Based on this research, one of the biggest drivers of confidence in the IT sector is the increasingly important role of tech in maintaining business continuity and growth during the pandemic. UK tech workers have experienced an increase in job satisfaction, responsibilities, and purpose in their roles post-pandemic. 

Research suggests that amongst a high proportion of IT professionals who trust that the demand for specialised in-depth tech skills will increase, also believe that in the near future over the next 12 months cyber security (33%) and cloud (27%) experts will be crucial. They also believe that over the next 4-5 years a strong talent pipeline in artificial intelligence should be built as the demand for these skills will be higher then. Businesses would be in a good position if they prepare for these changes and upskill and expand their workforce to support these changes. 

However, there are several external and internal factors businesses need to be wary of: Brexit’s impact on tech talent availability, IR35’s effect on hiring contractors, migration of talent overseas, very strong competition for tech talent from other companies, recruitment staff lacking technical expertise and knowledge required to make these hires, the inability of tech decision-makers to find the right specialist tech skills for their team, the inability of tech decision-makers to predict skills essential for future tech teams and struggles to recruit talent at the pace required for growth. These factors have a direct impact on the ability of businesses to attract and retain tech talent which will ultimately determine their competitiveness in the market. 

While these challenges are not insurmountable, businesses need to adapt and alter their practices if they want to overcome them. Employers need to put their best foot forward and in 2022 should focus on revamping their EVP (Employer Value Proposition) branding. They need to dive deep into their company culture and identify what separates them from the competition and what makes them more desirable for employees. Businesses in 2022 should also be ready for greater open-mindedness. Remote working and remote recruitment is here to stay, providing employees an option to work remotely can be the difference between making and breaking the deal and it will do businesses good to accept the new norm and implement it into their practices. Employee retention should also be a top agenda for businesses going into 2022; employee benefits, rewarding loyalty and suitable company culture should be a priority in order to ensure retention. Businesses should be prepared for technical assessments of their candidates; as knowledge and expertise to do these is largely unavailable to most businesses, external support becomes vital. 

Savant Technology is here to help, with experience in the technology sector for more than a decade and key partnerships with technology experts, we can provide you with exceptional highly skilled talent that is technically and behaviourally vetted by us and our partners! The Savant Team is data-driven and with key market insights and research, we intend to support your decisions with gold standard consultations. 

To request a meeting or free consultation, reach out to our technology team at - technology@savantrecruitment.com