Job Market Conundrum Continues
The May jobs report indicates postings broke a four month slide of year-over-year postings decline. May 2022 postings were flat compared to May 2021. However, coming on the heels of four straight double-digit declining months, it was a welcome bit of good news. Unfortunately, the overall market remains in a bit of a malaise with no meaningful movement to counteract the current jobs stalemate.
Open Postings Back Over 100 Days
For a number of months, the average days in postings, a measure of market movement had declined to below 100 days while posting volume increased. In May, open days popped back over the 100-day mark while the number of open postings declined. This double-whammy signals the continued challenges associated with filling open jobs.
Other job statistic indicators support the challenges employers face.
- One in five jobs from the first quarter remain unfilled
- Reposting rates climbed to nearly 35% for Q1 jobs indicating one in three ads are reposted
- One in four job ads were flagged as urgent
Early Indicators of Compensation Increases
Ad compensation in Q1 was flat. However, with two months in for Q2, compensation has increased 3.3% in the quarter. Ads with disclosed compensation are on the rise and can be an influencer. The percentage of ads with disclosed compensation increased from 49% in February to 68% in May. Transparency laws and Indeed’s disclosure and estimation processes may significantly impact these numbers.
Remote Shifts to Hybrid
Permanently remote postings declined for the first time since December. However, hybrid remote postings continued the fourth straight month of increases.
Heightened Job Seeker Activity
The number of resumés increased 10% in May. While increases in customer facing industries (retail, food service) top the list, educational services also showed double-digit increases.
Using workforce migration analysis, we can see that one in five educational service workers have moved to the healthcare sector.
Workplace Satisfaction Continues Decline
We posted previously about the decline in worker satisfaction and employer reputation. This trend is continuing thus far into the second quarter. We curated over 310,000 reviews in April from Indeed® and Glassdoor® in our TalentView Employer Reputation Insights solution and applied text analytics for sentiment scoring and opinion mining.
- Ratings continued to decline
- Sentiment continues to emphasize passivity in the workplace. Positive reviews are flat or declining.
Opinion Mining Cites Correctable Environmental Factors
Employers use opinion mining to unlock the clues to attracting and retaining workers by surfacing subject-adjective pairs. Consider the top subjects from April and May as shown below.
- Employees ranked the people in the organization at or near the top and the sentiment is overwhelmingly positive. This creates challenges for remote work environments.
- Employees cite management frequently, but sentiment is diverging.
- Pay is not as important as many think – it rarely is ranked as the most important subject. The sentiment around pay is overwhelmingly positively.
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