Uptick in hiring activities in October

With economic activities gathering pace post easing of lockdowns across the country, hiring activities in most sectors have shown significant recovery in October over the previous month, says a report.

On yearly basis, however, the overall hiring was down by 17 per cent in October, according to the Naukri JobSpeak Index for October' 2020.

The Naukri JobSpeak is a monthly Index that calculates and records hiring activities based on the job listings on Naukri.com website month on month.

IT-software and services sector grew 7 per cent in October over the previous month as the pandemic pushes for a virtual and digitally enabled world, the report said.

Hospitality, travel and retail sectors, which were reeling under the impact of lockdowns, have started showing recovery with a 33 per cent and 12 per cent growth over last month on the back of festive cheer, it said.

"With consumption on the rise in the market, we also see an uptick in the hiring activities in consumer durables (4 per cent) and advertising and PR (14 per cent) sectors.

“Key industries that declined marginally in hiring include BPO (5 per cent) and BFSI (4 per cent); while the education and teaching and auto and ancillary sectors were flat versus last month," the report added.

The demand for professionals in the ticketing, travel, airlines and hospitality sectors saw an incline of 35 per cent and 28 per cent, respectively in October versus last month.

Additionally, hiring for professionals in the entertainment business especially TV and film production (17 per cent) as well as web and graphic designers (17 per cent), finance (7 per cent) and sales and business development (6 per cent) roles saw an uptick sequentially, the report stated.

Bengaluru (8 per cent) and Chennai (6 per cent) led the sequential recovery amongst key cities followed by Kochi (9 per cent) and Coimbatore (5 per cent from the tier-II city cluster; while Kolkata (4 per cent) and Ahmedabad (6 per cent) declined in hiring in October versus last month.

"October sees slight improvement in year-on-year hiring activities due to lower bases last year on account of festivity. Interestingly, key sectors such as IT, BPO/ITES and BFSI are showing improvements in hiring sequentially.

"Sectors like travel and hospitality (33 per cent) and retail (13 per cent) have also shown positive signs of growth sequentially given the festive cheer and better Covid recovery rates," Naukri.com chief business officer Pawan Goyal said.

Meanwhile, the report stated that hiring activities in October witnessed a decline by 17 per cent compared to last year.

The slight improvement in the hiring activities in October compared to the same month of 2019 is owing to lower bases last year on account of Diwali, it added.

Further, the continued Y-o-Y growth of the chemicals and petrochemicals sector (30 per cent in October) indicates manufacturers are adding new jobs as industries have started functioning with more capacity, it said.

"In a clear sign of recovery, we see Y-o-Y growth rates turning flat in the medical and healthcare sector in October," it added.

With slight decline, industries such as insurance (2 per cent), pharma and biotech (6 per cent), BPO/ITES (9 per cent) and auto and ancillary (7 per cent) remained less impacted in Y-o-Y hiring activities.

In spite of monthly recovery, the decline on a Y-o-Y basis, hospitality and travel (58 per cent), retail (37 per cent) and IT-software (23 per cent) sectors continued to be the most impacted in October.

The demand for professionals in banking and insurance (10 per cent) and purchase and logistics (6 per cent) roles saw an uptick in October compared to the same month of 2019.

Given the fluctuating intensity of the pandemic in metros, the recruitment activities in metros declined more than the national average in October, the report said.

Mumbai with 28 per cent, Hyderabad (26 per cent) and Chennai (24 per cent), led the decline in hiring in metros.

Hiring in Chandigarh saw an uptick of 13 per cent Y-o-Y, while it remained flat in Kochi at just 1 per cent growth, it said.

Recruitment across the board declined at varying experience levels with the entry-level experience bands (0 to 3 years) witnessing the sharpest decline of 21 per cent in October compared to last year same time, it added.