The SEEK recruitment intensity signal
Hirers are working harder
There are various indicators measured by SEEK that paint a picture of how hard hirers are working to fill a role at any given point in time. These include the number of ads being posted, growth in advertised salaries, desired work experience and applications per ad.
Separately they tell part of the story, but when combined, the common movement highlights the relative activity levels within the jobs market.
Introducing the Recruitment Intensity Signal.
Recruitment intensity is the overall effort made by employers to attract and hire suitable candidates and can impact how quickly they are able to fill an open role.
SEEK job ad data provides several indicators of recruitment intensity.
Ads per hirer
Advertised salary growth
Desired work experience
Applications per ad
Trends in these indicators, including slightly stronger growth in advertised salaries, an increase in no-experience job ads and an uptick in ads per hirer have lead to a recent rise in recruitment intensity.
These indicators show recruitment intensity plunged at the start of COVID-19 and surged as the economy reopened before peaking in 2023.
For employers looking for staff, understanding when and where recruitment intensity is changing will help them understand when they are likely to face more competition for staff, when it will take a little longer to find the right staff and where there might be opportunities to attract staff from other regions.
For education and training providers knowing that employers are changing salary offers and the qualifications that a role requires should help them adjust their courses to ensure students are obtaining in-demand skills.
Understanding the drivers of recruitment intensity can help policymakers develop better policy which can boost employment.
With special thanks to Damien Miller and Sharp & Carter.
About Blair Chapman, PhD
Dr Blair Chapman is SEEK’s Senior Economist. Blair undertakes economic analysis and forecasting of the Australian and New Zealand economies and labour markets. He leverages SEEK’s data to
develop unique insights about the economies SEEK operates in.
Blair’s economic analysis and forecasting skills have been honed across both private and public organisations including ANZ, Deloitte Access Economics, the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and the
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). While at the RBA, he was their representative on the ABS’s Labour Statistics Advisory Group for several years.
Blair holds a PhD in Economics from Johns Hopkins University where his studies concentrated on macroeconomics and labour. He completed his undergraduate studies at Monash University, where he majored in Economics, Econometrics and Accounting.