Dominic Joyce had applied for more than 100 jobs by the time he was named a finalist for a maternity cover HR position this summer. After two online interviews, he attended an assessment day that included meetings with senior bosses at the tech company where he hoped to work.
So when Joyce received a short rejection email, he was devastated. He seemed no closer to finding a job than when he was laid off in March. Worse still, the company offered no constructive feedback. Half of the 156 jobs he applied to got no response at all.
“There were times when it was Friday and I got three rejections in one day,” he said. To make ends meet, Joyce drove for Amazon and sold family heirlooms. “I wasn’t in a great place. You have to put on a smiley face.” [but] This process is rotten.”
Joyce’s background is in recruiting — a field that’s been flagging in hiring slowdowns — and he knows he’s not an exception. After a surge in job openings during the pandemic, hiring has stalled in professional fields from finance to technology to administration, leaving white-collar workers facing much stiffer competition than some have been accustomed to in recent years.
Flooded employers
By the end of 2021, there were 60 percent more job openings in the United States and the United Kingdom than there were before the pandemic. Currently, job openings are just 12 percent higher than pre-pandemic levels in the United States and 8 percent lower in the United Kingdom. Candidates report applying for hundreds of jobs and getting only rejections, if any, of them. “Everyone I’ve talked to, young and old, feels this is worse than the financial crisis,” Joyce said.
This may come as a surprise to some job seekers. The labour market has been relatively tight since the pandemic forced many people out of the workforce, according to recruiter Indeed. There were an estimated 1.6 unemployed people for every vacancy in the UK in August, higher than the 2022 low of one but down from the average of 2.9 over the past two decades. Unemployment rates also remain relatively low in Europe and the US, but a slowdown in hiring in recent months, combined with a mismatch between the skills employers want and those workers have, means many candidates are struggling to find the right roles.
Kory Kantenga, chief economist for the Americas at LinkedIn, said rising interest rates over the past two years have limited employers’ ability to invest in hiring. Fewer new jobs mean fewer people leaving, further reducing opportunities.
“The job market has become more crowded, with more people applying for each job. Employers can be more selective,” Kantenga added. LinkedIn measures “job search intensity”—the number of job applications made per person on its site—and says it has increased by more than 8 percent in France and Germany and 4 percent in the United States over the past year. “That leads to people having to work harder to get a job.”
At first glance, this is good news for employers. Data from consultancy Recruitonomics suggests that UK employers could spend £12 to attract a job applicant by the end of 2023—on costs such as recruiting firms or advertising—compared to more than £20 in 2022. But the picture is more complicated.
“We’ve seen a really rapid shift in the mindset of employers. Two years ago, their biggest complaint was volume or lack thereof,” said Andrew Flowers, director at Recruitonomics. Now, many say they’re overwhelmed with applications—but still struggling to find quality candidates among them.
Artificial intelligence is part of the problem. A survey by content creation platform Canva found that around 45 percent of job seekers globally are using AI to build or enhance their CVs. “AI is being used to tweak CVs — it’s making life harder [for recruiters] because not only is the volume increasing, but it’s also very good,” said Kantenga. This makes it difficult for recruiters to filter out the best candidates.
Spray and Pray
Bonnie Dilber, director of recruiting at staffing company Zapier, says recruiters are getting so many applications that it’s impossible to review them all. “We have no reason to consider anyone who isn’t the best — other applications aren’t even being considered.”
This risks creating a vicious cycle. Candidates who are met with silence will send out more applications, sacrificing quality for quantity in what industry experts call a “spray and pray” approach.
At the same time, recruiting departments are being cut back as companies scale back hiring, resulting in fewer people to handle more applications and a less personalized process. “The basics of recruiting are being lost” because recruiters don’t have the time, says Jane Curran, director of talent acquisition at real estate firm JLL. “We all want to do better.”
Not all industries are facing a candidate glut; some low-wage and highly skilled industries are still struggling to attract candidates. LinkedIn applications per person are highest in technology, media, professional services, and finance, and lowest in healthcare.
“There’s a dichotomy between what I call standing work and sitting work,” Flowers said. In sectors like trade or hospitality, workers are finding it easier to hire. In white-collar, college-level jobs, the post-Covid hiring boom “has been reversed very quickly” as interest rates have risen. “Demand has completely disappeared.”
At the higher levels, the difference is less pronounced because jobs are less advertised. But competition is fierce, and success requires networking. “We don’t advertise a percentage of the jobs we do,” says Lewis Maleh, founder of executive recruitment firm Bentley Lewis. “There are fewer jobs…so you have to tap into the hidden job market.”
Interview fatigue
Marketing specialist Sarah, who asked to remain anonymous because she was in the final stages of the job application process, was at a critical point in the job market. She had left her previous job after suffering burnout last year and her employer had assured her that she would have a job, or freelance work, when she returned. But when she got back in touch in early spring, the offer had evaporated, as had other vacancies.
“It was horrible,” she said. She applied for about 100 jobs but only heard back from about half, most of them automated. She got to the interview stage five times. “It was frustrating. It was the subconscious space it took up… the guilt associated with not doing the job,” she said. “When you get a no, it’s incredibly painful.”
Jose Hervas, who works in sports marketing, initially had no problem getting responses but said he was “tired of doing interviews”. “I’ve done over 30 interviews since February and my confidence is getting lower and lower.”
Hervas said that even after the final stages of the interview process, which can include multiple online screenings and days of preparation, he often doesn’t hear back. He’s still waiting to hear back from the final stage interview he attended in June. “My experience has been really bad, hearing back from companies and understanding why it wasn’t me… It’s really heartbreaking.”
Data from European recruitment firm The Stepstone Group shows that the average time to hire has increased slightly to 4.9 weeks in the second quarter of 2024, with businesses with more than 1,000 employees taking longer. Pam Lindsay-Dunn, director of people and culture at recruitment firm Hays’ European Business, said the economic uncertainty meant employers and candidates were more cautious: recruiters were now talking about a “big stay” after a “big quit”, with turnover rates lower than in 2021. “People seem to be waiting for something,” Lindsay-Dunn said. “This is the most unusual market I’ve ever worked in.”
But frustrated job seekers should not despair. Kantenga said the situation would improve as monetary policy normalizes, adding “a little bit of momentum to the labor market.”
And this week, Joyce finally landed a role. In a LinkedIn post announcing his new position as senior talent manager, he said: “I can’t wait to get started.”
