Irish recruitment company forecasts a 25% increase in job opportunities in 2021

DUBLIN: An Irish recruitment company predicts a 25% increase in job postings by 2021. The recruitment company says the uncertainty in the economy caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and Brexit will stabilize by next year.

FRS Recruitment says the release of the vaccine will bring back confidence in the market and create a strong pipeline of jobs in the second half of 2021.

Their report shows that the expected increase in roles next year will mark a change from 2020. It says the number of job postings is down 36% compared to the last 12 months.

The company’s forecasts published in the FRS Recruitment 2020 Review and 2021 Trend Forecast indicates that there will be continued demand for skilled IT employees and health workers.  It also predicts an increase in demand for construction, life science and temporary commercial and industrial personnel.

It says the biggest drop in opportunities were in Arts, Entertainment and Recreation (down 75%). Hotels, hospitality (61.9%), banking and financial services (58.2%) also saw a drop in opportunities.

At the same time the reports shows that certain sectors such as IT Support Services (up 174.1%) and private sector healthcare (up 42.2%) recorded an increase in opportunities.

The company recorded an increase in the number of vacancies in 12 of the Republic’s 26 counties last year. The largest percentage increases were in Roscommon (up 115.4%), Wexford (up 36.1%) and Kildare (up 26.9%) and the greatest decrease were recorded in Westmeath (down 34.3%), followed by Leitrim (down 33.3%) and Dublin (28.3%).

FRS noted that a significant number of people tried to maintain job security during the pandemic instead of changing their job role. The number of applications received by the FRS increased by 2.8% to 151,131 responses.

“There is no doubt that 2020 has been a challenging year for many sections of the economy and this had a direct impact on recruitment trends over the last 12 months,” said Colin Donnery, general manager of FRS Recruitment.

“While the pandemic did create opportunities for some sectors, notably healthcare and IT, the mindset across the wider economy was more conservative with many companies and organisations implementing temporary hiring freezes,” he added.