The past year has been relatively difficult for the tech sector and job stability, especially in terms of hiring prospects, but there’s more to the story in this ever-changing market.
A new survey of 910 tech professionals and recruiters, published by Dice, shows strong currents of both short-term pessimism and long-term optimism for the tech job market. Additionally, people who work in artificial intelligence (AI) are much more confident in their career prospects than other IT professionals. Surprisingly, technology experts don’t entirely agree Innovative AI (AI generation).
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These findings are based on two separate surveys conducted by Dice. The first report is based on responses from 520 fully employed U.S. technology professionals, along with responses from 390 human resources professionals.
Many tech professionals are concerned about their short-term outlook – 31% remain cautiously optimistic about economic conditions next year, unchanged from the same period last year. A similar proportion of technology experts have a pessimistic view. Younger tech professionals, those aged 18 to 34, have the least optimistic view of the economy, at just 20%.
In fact, only 4 in 10 technology professionals expressed confidence in finding a new role that meets their expectations — a significant decrease from previous years. However, the survey found that about 80% of technology professionals expect the technology industry to continue its growth trajectory over the next five years.
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“As for any downturn in tech hiring,” the study’s authors explain, “what we found tells a more nuanced story.” “As expected given the extreme weather conditions, the economic outlook for tech professionals is more negative than in previous years. Equally worrying is that many of them feel their bargaining power is increasingly lost and are reluctant to take risks.”
At the same time, while fewer technology professionals feel confident in finding new roles, more technology professionals are actively pursuing new job opportunities. This year, 39% of technology professionals are looking for work, up 7 percentage points from 32% in 2023.
There is also an increase in the desire to switch employers, with 67% considering a change this year, compared to 60% last year.
The survey also shows that technology experts are not completely ready for the AI generation. “Overall, technology professionals are hesitant about adopting AI tools into their workflow,” the survey’s authors said.
According to the survey, “just over a third of technology professionals say they never use AI genomics tools, a slightly larger share than the 30% who use it at least once a week.” This is largely voluntary, as only 8% said their company restricts its use. The age group most likely to use gen AI at least once a week is the 18-34 group, at 38%.
40% of technology professionals believe AI will significantly impact their work in the next year, while only 8% predict it will have no impact.
AI experts are more confident than other technology professionals about their ability to advance their careers. The majority of AI experts, 58%, are confident about progress, compared with just 36% of other technology experts.
It seems likely that employers will also have difficulty retaining their talent. A significant portion of AI professionals, 73%, intend to change jobs in the next year, compared with 65% of technology professionals overall.
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AI experts are also looking to large technology companies rather than their broader technology partners. At least 29% of AI professionals want to work for large tech companies, compared to 18% of tech professionals overall. “This may be because they want to be part of higher-budget, higher-profile AI projects or because they feel more confident about their employability,” the Dice authors speculate. me in general”.
Delivering value is another matter in mainstream companies — and often, AI projects can be a given. Just over half of AI professionals feel the AI projects they are working on have strategic value to their company. A third believe that their AI-related projects are “primarily used to show stakeholders that the company is doing something with AI.”
