Regardless of 2024 being a difficult 12 months for a lot of tech professionals, marked by layoffs and fewer job alternatives, a brand new report from Cube signifies that the state of affairs might be worse.
In a survey of 520 fully employed U.S. tech professionals, 80% preserve a constructive outlook for the tech sector within the subsequent 5 years. The extra instant image acknowledged that “layoffs have been notably extreme this 12 months,” with 60% extra tech professionals dropping jobs in 2024 than in 2023.
Moreover, the report discovered “a notable lower within the proportion of full-time staff inside the tech sector.” In final 12 months’s survey, practically half of respondents (48%) have been employed full-time. This 12 months, that determine has dropped to 38%, which factors to a troubling development of lowered job stability, in line with the report.
The proportion of respondents who’re unemployed however actively looking for work has risen sharply, from 34% in 2023 to 40% in 2024.
Regardless of the turbulent occasions, the survey’s extra shocking findings are that “in comparison with final 12 months, a considerably bigger variety of tech professionals presently employed full-time are actively looking for new roles and usually tend to change employers within the coming 12 months,’’ Cube CEO Artwork Zeile advised TechRepublic. “That is occurring regardless of their decreased confidence to find a positive place inside the tech business.”
Views on tech progress within the present financial system
The report famous combined sentiments on the way forward for tech progress.
Almost one-third of tech professionals (31%) stay cautiously optimistic about financial situations over the following 12 months, unchanged year-over-year. Nonetheless, an nearly equal share of tech professionals harbor pessimistic views, indicating a break up in financial sentiment throughout the business. Simply 20% of youthful professionals between the ages of 18 and 34 have an optimistic view of the financial system, the bottom amongst these surveyed.
Tech professionals who maintain a extra optimistic view attributed their constructive outlook to:
- A robust perception in technological progress.
- Confidence of their capabilities.
- The presence of favorable financial indicators.
“In an election 12 months, it’s not shocking to see that this optimism is commonly tempered by an consciousness of potential challenges, together with financial and political shifts that might affect what the following 12 months brings,’’ the Cube report acknowledged.
The extra pessimistic tech professionals expressed considerations about financial coverage, job market volatility, inflation, and political instability.
SEE: Hiring Package: Immediate Engineer (TechRepublic Premium)
Areas of focus: AI surging, cloud expertise declining
The survey additionally discovered an emphasis on AI and machine studying expertise, which “aligns with tech professionals’ expectations that AI/ML would be the most quickly rising area over the following 5 years.” Already, 76% of HR professionals reported that their corporations already provide the chance to be educated or upskill in AI or ML skills.
Regardless of the heavy concentrate on generative AI, “fewer tech professionals appear to have adopted the expertise into their workflow than anticipated, with simply 30% utilizing GenAI at the very least as soon as every week,’’ Zeile famous.
The concentrate on cloud applied sciences has “declined considerably this 12 months,’’ to 46%, in line with the report. This can be as a result of maturity of cloud applied sciences in recent times, driving the skillset to be extra generalized and main fewer professionals to spend money on upskilling on this space.
Different areas that tech professionals mentioned they have been coaching/upskilling in anticipation of future progress are cybersecurity (46%), large information (43%), Web of Issues (22%), and robotics (15%).
What tech professionals need of their subsequent function
Almost all job seeker respondents (94%) are concentrating on full-time positions. Motivations for contemplating a job transfer embody:
- Increased compensation (65%).
- Larger accountability (42%).
- Improved advantages (36%).
“These elements spotlight a workforce that isn’t solely financially motivated but additionally looking for profession progress and stability,’’ the Cube report mentioned.
Dissatisfaction with their total profession, job, and administration are the elements propelling tech professionals to modify jobs. This dissatisfaction can be compounded by a better price of burnout, which is 3.3 occasions extra widespread amongst these planning to modify employers, in line with the report.
The main explanation for burnout cited by these professionals is a “poisonous work setting,” reported by 28% of these prone to swap — adopted by unfair pay, which was talked about by 21% of the tech professionals on this group.
Most tech professionals can discover roles in industries outdoors of tech that also leverage their specialised tech expertise. Nonetheless, working inside tech is the clear desire amongst surveyed individuals. Almost seven in 10 tech professionals would most prefer to work for a tech firm, and 21% choose to work for giant tech firms particularly.
Whereas tech layoffs and a decline in sure roles have outlined a lot of 2024, Zeile identified that “sure tech subindustries akin to cybersecurity are … going through an acute scarcity of employees with very particular talents.” He cited the 2024 ISC2 Cybersecurity Workforce Research, which discovered there are 4.8 million tech professionals wanted worldwide to fill open cybersecurity roles.
Zeile stays optimistic concerning the future for tech professionals, saying “new applied sciences, akin to AI, are already altering the panorama — bringing extra new sorts of jobs and definitely extra wanted expertise to the market than they’re taking them away.”
He added, “Whereas right this moment’s hiring panorama could seem tumultuous, if there’s one factor historical past and information constantly present, it’s that hiring tendencies are cyclical. Indicators are pointing to tech hiring selecting up in comparison with final 12 months. Tech professionals and functions should keep optimistic and proceed their concentrate on constructing their profession for the long-term.”
Test these programs at TechRepublic Academy: