Posted on 22/12/2022 by Julia Jackson
December 2022, soon to log off for another year. We haven’t written anything since December 2019 and we thought we’d take this opportunity to update and give a little insight from our side of the job fence. Coming out the other side of Covid, we can honestly say that nothing is like it was before and yes everything seems to be a whole lot more difficult! New challenges on top of all the other challenges!
Lots of jobs, but just no candidates! For example, the typical roles we’d usually work on with ease - midweight and Junior Designer roles - almost impossible to find people. Salaries not matching expectations, only fully remote jobs wanted. You get the drift! Square peg, round hole! We have tried to understand where these candidates are at, despite drawing our own conclusions, it’s very difficult to know.
Freelance rates and salaries have seen dramatic increases, seemingly pushing up the industry standards and many companies are yet to catch on! Some would agree it was high time that this happened, but in our expert opinion some of the hikes are not realistic and we wonder if this bubble will burst?
Companies are needing teams back in the office and no longer are there fully remote permanent roles being offered. The norm is 2-3 days and we are strongly advising that everyone takes this approach, as so few candidates are going for jobs that are 100% in the office.
Freelancers are all working remotely, this has been the most major shift since pre-Covid and something we know they are all relishing! Enabling many of our regulars to be working overseas. Clients used to be notoriously nervous about remote freelancers in the past and now it has proved to work, we can’t see this changing anytime soon.
IR35 which we were all DREADING, turns out not to be as terrible as we all feared and more jobs are outside than inside surprisingly! Happily, we have many clients who are exempt from the legislation and those that aren’t are often open to uplifting the rate and have a solid system in place to keep the process seamless.
We appreciate for some of you it has been quiet this last quarter, but what is in store for 2023? Well, there’s a lot happening and we already have many great jobs to work on January! We spent time catching up with our clients recently to get a feel for the market and are happy to report that the general consensus all round is very positive thankfully.
However, we don’t believe 2023 is going to be easy for anyone, but we’ll face it head on, sieze opportunity, work hard and see it through. Please don’t forget that we are happy to offer advice to anyone who is finding it difficult right now, we can offer a view on your CV, portfolio, skill set etc. Contact info@unionjackson.co.uk and we’ll respond.
We’d like to wrap this up by wishing all our wonderful clients and candidates a very Happy and Peaceful Xmas and thank you for another year! Sharing a piccie of our Cocktails in Bath at our Xmas jolly at the weekend. :-)