Tas Job Ads Fall Month-on-Month

The latest SEEK Employment Report shows job advertisement levels remain high with 27.2% more jobs on the site last month compared to May 2019.

“Following two consecutive months of record high new job ad volumes, we are still seeing extraordinarily high job ad numbers, with only a slight month-on-month decline of 0.6%,” Kendra Banks, Managing Director, SEEK ANZ.

“This is the first month-on-month drop since April 2020 and is to be expected after unprecedented growth.”

Current job application levels per ad however are at the lowest they have been on the site since 2012. The company believes this is a broad problem across industries and location, with a variety of underlying drivers impacting application numbers.

“Consistent with our recent reporting, the number of applications per job ad in May continued to decline – falling 8.7%,” continued Banks. “This is evident in all states and territories and across most industries, with 25 of the 28 industries we report on showing a decrease.”

They said that it appears applicants continue to monitor job opportunities in very high numbers, but there is a reluctance to apply, with possibly several factors behind this decline.

“We can see that with more jobs available, there is a knock-on effect to the number of applications per job ad posted with candidates both having more choice and being more selective. In addition, the reduced labour supply is impacting on the ability to fill roles, which includes the decrease in workers from overseas. There is also a hesitancy for candidates to commit to applying for new roles after such a turbulent 12 months or so, with jobseekers valuing job security in light of COVID-19.”

State of the states

Last month the job advertisement figures showed that all states and territories had a record high in April, and there is now a drop off in month-on-month numbers across multiple locations.

Queensland, South Australia and the ACT continued to show month-on-month increases in job ad volume. New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia, Tasmanian and the Northern Territory showed declines. Volume on the other hand has actually grown compared to two years ago.

Tasmanian job advertisements fell by 4.1% in May, the second-highest month on month fall after Queensland. They are however up 61% since May 2019, compared to the 27.2% national figure.

Sectorally, the Human Relations & Recruitment industry leads the biggest contribution to m/m growth in new job ad figures.

“When recruiters are recruiting you know that the market is busy,” said Banks.

“In May, new job ads in the Human Resources & Recruitment industry increased by 2.4%, which is a hopeful sign of more projects being put back into the pipeline.”

Similar to the states, where we all industries were showing record months for job ads in April, there has been a levelling off for many industries.

The top three industries making a positive contribution to the growth of job ads m/m are Human Resources & Recruitment (2.4% m/m), Mining, Resources & Energy (1.9% m/m), and Information & Communications Technology (0.6% m/m).

Roles most in-demand within the top three sectors for May are:

• Human Resources & Recruitment includes roles for consulting & generalist HR, recruitment – agency, recruitment – internal, occupational health & safety.
• Mining, Energy & Resources with the bulk of roles available in mining – engineering and maintenance and mining operations.
• Information & Communications Technology with roles for developers/ programmers, software engineers, help desk & IT support and programme & project management