Patterns to be aware of and to work into your recruiting processes
For many, summer is a time of sun and sand – a time to find balance between the day-to-day workload and moments of relaxation throughout the season. While sunny days and beach vacations are highly valued perks, they don’t mean your urgent hiring needs suddenly disappear. With the summer season comes a change in IT hiring trends, and it’s important to be aware of these patterns so you can most effectively work them into your recruiting processes.
The good
The summer can feel like a natural time to begin the search for a new job, for both new grads and established professionals alike. With more and more people choosing to dip their toe into the job market and explore new opportunities, there are likewise more chances for your company to scoop up talented IT workers, who maybe weren’t available or weren’t looking earlier in the year.
There can often also be reduced competition in the summer, as some companies choose to slow or halt their hiring completely and pick back up in the Fall. This creates the potential where you have access to more talent who have fewer alternative options, helping you to stand out in their search. For truly critical IT roles, there will always be a continued strong demand. Keeping the hiring drive going during the slower summer months can get you ahead in terms of filling these roles and your teams with technical superstars.
The bad
The most obvious hurdle that can creep into summer hiring trends revolves around PTO. Many employees choose to take vacations in the warm summer months, and this can drag out hiring processes when key decision makers are out of office. This can also be true for candidates- they are not immune to taking vacations, and this can make them harder to reach or to schedule for interviews.
On the company side, summer can be a time for mid-year re-evaluations, especially concerning planned hires and scopes of work. Previous roles that were approved can be halted as budgets are reviewed, and there is always the chance that money has been spent on a slightly faster timeline than anticipated. This can lead to hiring freezes or pauses until later in the year, or even until the approach of the new fiscal year. Priorities change, and it’s important to keep a focus on the most critical hires needed to keep the company moving forward.
The plan
Hiring in the summer can be a key component to success throughout the rest of the year, and if you take summer hiring trends into account, there’s no reason you can’t find impressive new hires to add to your team. Adjusting interview processes to have less rounds and less people involved in the decision-making can be a great way to tighten things up and keep things moving, even with the increased number of vacations and out-of-offices. Additionally, having remote work flexibility means you can hire people from a variety of locations who can get to work faster (even if that work is being done from a beach).
Keeping the focus on essential hires and eliminating or pausing the ones that are lower on the totem pole, so to speak, is another great way to stay laser-focused on key objectives during a traditionally slower time. Take advantage of the new additions to the talent pool and triage your needs to figure out which roles need to be top priority!
