I’ve asked a few recruiters of late how 2024 has been for them, and comments have ranged from “worse than the GFC” to “f*ckin’ sh*te mate“. Thankfully, it is all but over. SEEK were kind enough to buy me a few beers and some lovely socks this week, and overall they’ve been about 20% down on ad volume this year. Novices may assume that our industry has therefore taken a 20% cut. Those who buy job ad packs will realise that the reality is much worse. With pre-purchased ads to use up, many of us recruiters have been “talent pooling” for a lot of this year – also known as posting ads for jobs that don’t exist in order to keep your boss off your back. Anecdotally, I’d suggest a lot of firms are 30-40% down on gross margin, which makes a whole load of us…unprofitable. Without wanting to be a doom-monger, this year (unless you’re that tone-deaf marketing girl from Campfire Digital) has been about survival. Survival for recruiters, survival for candidates, and survival for agencies. Thankfully, my Indian Spirit Guide has informed me that next year will be better, so I’m signing out with a quick recap of the year that never was.
March:
We’ll start here shall we, as in time-honoured tradition, no one does anything in January and February in NZ. March saw the Accordant Group’s revenue decline 9% YTD, and their Government revenue drop 15%. This was due to Jackson Stone being 15% down, Madison 20% down, and Absolute IT 15% down. Of course no one was surprised by this, with many agencies being hit even harder. Those who were once excited about being on the AoG panel are now wishing they’d become hair stylists.
May:
Fast-forward to May, and that chap with the funny name at Randstad Digital has a Michael Douglas/Falling Down moment on LinkedIn, and subsequently gets the boot. Actually, everyone gets the boot, but more on that later. This coincides with at least two other government agencies following Auckland Council in their intention to have a “sub-panel”: a panel with even lower rates. Wellington, already like a dog who’s been beat too much, have no choice but to drop their pants and touch their toes.
May (again):
A busy blogging month, but as mentioned, Randstad Digital make it official and make everyone redundant. I say “everyone”, but the high-billing Finite recruiters are allowed to stay.
June:
On a more positive note, we released some data around recruiter salaries, which were surprisingly high. We actually got the data from some cool software we built, which we subsequently won a SARA for. So when people tell me that they lost their job in 2024, I can also be tone-deaf and tell them that “it hasn’t all been negative“.
June:
June saw a groundswell of recruitment GMs questioning the legitimacy of SEEKs “variable pricing“. The astute amongst you noticed that, in a market where candidates were everywhere, SEEKs ad price never seemed to go down. This was not what was suggested when this product was launched – no matter what SEEK retrospectively claim. Recruitment GMs got their knickers in various levels of twist, and I just rode it out for some blog copy.
July:
This marked the one year anniversary of the AoG “TAS” contract and the ninnyhammers at MBIE marked the occasion asking us to provide them with a reduction in rate. They did this by automated email, and for those who didn’t reply, another automated email was sent. This is how services are negotiated now that no one works for government agencies anymore. Well no one except MBIE.
September:
Spring saw more AoG misery (are you spotting a theme here?), with the decision that it was fair to interpret the initial contract in a way that no temp-to-perm fees could be charged in year 2. Somehow missed by every legal firm and recruitment agency up until this point, it meant that there was no real value in running contractors past month 12. At this point, the Wellington market signs up to plumbing night school en masse.
November:
With a year plagued with redundancies, November sees Robert Walters shutting up shop in Christchurch, with 7 on the scrapheap just before Christmas. In perhaps an error of judgement, RW then went on to excitedly post about a “significant senior appointment” within their organisation a few weeks later. 2024 is most certainly the year to be tone-deaf, or perhaps they had an ulterior motive? RW actually approached me to recruit for them last year, and I politely declined. 2024 vindicated that decision.
Anyway, that’s it for me this year. Thank you for being a regular or occasional reader. As fun as it can be writing this thing, it’s not always easy to churn something out week-after-week. It’s the occasional comment and messages that I receive which motivates me to do this on a hangover. Have a good break, as 2025 is going to be the best year ever. You heard it here first folks.
^SW
