Hiring activity dips by 15% in April amid second Covid-19 wave: Report

Amid the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic which forced state governments to impose lockdown-like restrictions, hiring activity has dipped by 15 per cent as compared to March 2021. As per job search website Naukri.com, the current impact on the job market is less severe than what we saw in April 2020 given the lack of a strict nationwide lockdown.

“The disruption caused by the second wave of COVID-19 has impacted the hiring activity however, the current impact is less severe than what we saw in April 2020 where the Naukri JobSpeak index declined by 51 per cent month-on-month. This could be attributed to the lack of a strict nationwide lockdown being announced this time and the economy remaining open,” said Pawan Goyal, chief business officer, Naukri.com.

Incidentally, the increased requirement for healthcare and life insurance has had a less impact on hiring in sectors such as insurance (-5 per cent), pharma/ biotech (-9 per cent), and medical/ healthcare (-10 per cent) in April 2021 over March 2021. The IT-Software (-12 per cent) sector, which remained shielded and drove robust hiring over the past few months, declined less than the national average sequentially.

Other sectors such as FMCG (-15 per cent) and telecom (-15 per cent) declined in line with the overall hiring trend in April-2021 vs March-2021.

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The retail sector that grew in March 2021, experienced a sharp decline of 33 per cent in April 2021 due to restricted operating hours or closure owing to lockdowns in many parts of the country. Sectors such as hospitality and travel (-36 per cent), banking/ finance (-26 per cent) and teaching/ education (-24 per cent) remained highly impacted in hiring activity in April 2021 vs March 2021.

The jobs market across metro and non-metro cities saw a downfall, barring Kolkata that remained flat. The aggressive surge of cases in Maharashtra directly impacted hiring trends in Mumbai, which saw a sequential decline of 20 per cent in April. While Delhi/NCR (-18 per cent) also remained impacted sequentially, Bangalore (-10 per cent), Chennai (-10 per cent) and Hyderabad (-4 per cent) were less impacted.

The shutdown of schools, hotels, and non-essential offices led to a sequential decline in demand for professionals in the teaching/ education (-32 per cent), hospitality (-32 per cent) and marketing/ advertising (-26 per cent) domains in April 2021.

Hiring activity across experience bands saw an average decline of 13 per cent in April 2021 vs March 2021 with the 0-3 years’ experience band (-19 per cent) being the most hit. Interestingly, the 13+ years’ experience band (-9 per cent) remained the least impacted in sequential hiring as organisations are preferring experienced professionals.