Whether you’re an employer looking for talented staff or a candidate seeking a new opportunity, you can’t have failed to notice that demand for developers has skyrocketed over the last year.
It’s like the Wild West out there, with employers fighting it out and making offers and counter-offers faster than you can say High Noon.
Given the nature of the developer role and its particular suitability for remote working, it’s easy to see how the pandemic and the rapid move to digitalisation has helped to fuel demand. As the UK economy suddenly switched to a bigger emphasis on online models, and flipped the workforce to mainly work from home, smart developers suddenly found themselves the stars of the jobs market.
Here at Concept we’ve seen a trend for salary levels to rise sharply, with candidates benefitting from a significant jump in salary with every career move, often involving five figure sums.
Increased demand is not just at senior level either, a quick look at our Latest Jobs page will show you roles from Scotland and Newcastle to London and the South East, and at all skill levels, from graduate developers up to heavyweights.
As an employer it can be maddening to be pipped at the post for that perfect candidate. But understand it from the candidate’s perspective. Many of them tell us that as soon as they post their CV up their phone goes mad with calls and interview offers, and it can be very stressful going through a massively accelerated tech test and interview process, and having to decide between several offers in a very short timescale.
When it boils down to it, while a competitive salary definitely helps the decision-making process, the majority of candidates are simply looking to work on decent technology, in a cool environment, on interesting projects and with nice people. The reality is that it’s a candidate’s market, and if you’re an employer and someone ticks 75% of your boxes, our advice is to offer them the job pretty sharpish, before a competitor moves in on them. In these times, the employer who gets in first and highest wins. You snooze, you lose.
As well as offering a competitive salary, make sure you emphasise all the benefits, career opportunities and any sweeteners you can offer, such as the chance to work on a big juicy client account or a high profile project. For more tips about how to attract talent, take a look at our blog on what benefits candidates rate the most highly. Don’t discount job seekers outside your immediate region either. Lots of southern-based organisations are now employing staff further up country, where outside the big cities the salary scale can be slightly more flexible.
With the market so buoyant, and developers lurking in the shadows for fear of being trampled in the rush to recruit them, you need all the help you can get. You’re unlikely to find your next employee on LinkedIn or other business information platforms, as employers tighten up on allowing staff to have online profiles, wary that they will be poached. This is where working with a great recruitment agency who know where the talent base and who might be looking can really make a difference.
If you’re looking to add to your developer team but can’t seem to attract the right candidates or you find them slipping through your fingers, don’t sit there watching the tumbleweed roll past. Give our team a call and see how we can help.
