Welcome to the Neither Market

How full is the glass?

Welcome to the Neither Market.

With the latest big tech layoffs, there’s bad news for both hiring companies and job seekers. Not everything is gonna go your way.

“Easy hires are on the horizon!” – Companies

Not really.

The easier stuff may be easier still. Junior to mid level sales and marketing. Operations. Dare I say some recruiting specialties.

No offense to the peeps in those buckets. But those weren’t the hires that were keeping employers up at night. Important, but doable.

What’s still hard as hell? Software engineers. Product designers. DevOps.

No matter how many layoffs Twitter, Meta and Stripe do, those types will get gobbled up in a second. With multiple offers in hand.

If you thought things would suddenly be easier and you could “take advantage” of the situation, keep dreaming. You have to be as aggressive with your recruiting efforts today as you did 9 months ago.

Switching gears…

“I’m only looking at remote jobs and a huge bump!” -Job seekers

I regret to inform you that ship has sailed. Yes, there’s lots of companies who do full remote. And you certainly have a chance to get an increase.

But the amount of companies who will check every box on the job seeker’s wish list of “must haves” is drying up.

I’ve always heard people refer to the job market as an “Employer’s Market” or  “Job Seekers” market. Some sort of absolute binary that described the natural order of who can call the shots right now.

But the strange combination of 3.7% unemployment paired with the cool industries (tech) struggling while the uncool industries (manufacturing, supply chain, etc.) killing it…the cards have flipped.

Because neither has a clear advantage. Set your expectations accordingly.

James Hornick

Partner at Hirewell. #3 Ranked Sarcastic Commenter on LinkedIn.