As the COVID-19 pandemic took hold during 2020, and we were all – at best – experiencing a prolonged period of remote working, one might be forgiven for thinking that it wasn’t the best time to be thinking of changing jobs. We have, however, experienced a higher-than-expected demand for our services amongst our clients, and we have been able to help a high number of job seekers to explore their options and secure new roles since the pandemic changed everyone’s working lives. Many of the roles we have been instructed on include the prospect of long-term home working, which many job seekers are now coveting as a means to address their work/life balance.

As we’re now into 2021, and hopefully some light at the end of the tunnel with the start of the mass vaccination programme in the UK, we are expecting an increase in the number of job seekers looking for alternative work, as those who stayed put last year decide now is the time to make a move, in addition to the usual New Year increase in activity. In this article, we explore how job seekers’ requirements have changed due to the events of 2020, what employers are offering in reaction to this, and just how you can change jobs when the majority of people are still working from home.

A Change in Job Seekers’ Requirements

Over the last few years, we have seen an increase in the number of job seekers looking to take more control over their work/life balance – seeking roles offering, for example, part time hours, flexi-time, and the option for some degree of remote working. Whilst some have been able to find positions offering what they were looking for, it had still not become the norm for employers to offer such flexibility, or not to offer it to a new employee at least. With the coronavirus pandemic changing the way we worked in 2020, many employees have experienced remote working for the first time, and this has had a profound impact on what they would be looking for from a future position, and their requirements as and when they do decide to seek a new job.

Those who were already seeking the flexibility that working from home provides, may now find themselves in the position where this is an absolute must from a new position. Even people who had never previously worked from home, or even thought that is something that might benefit them, have enjoyed their lack of commute to the office and the extra time at home that this has afforded, and would now be thinking about their requirements from a new job in a different light.

Employers’ Offerings

Whilst it may be obvious that anyone taking up a new position will have started their new job working remotely from their new colleagues, it has been noted by our consultants that the prospect of longer-term working from home is something that is more routinely being offered by clients in relation to new vacancies that have become available. The vast majority of employers now have the infrastructure in place to set up a new employee to work remotely with relative ease, even if this may have caused a headache in the past. In addition to this, where there may have been some reluctance towards home working from some employers previously, now that everyone has seen first-hand how successful this style of working can be, even the most stiff attitudes towards remote working have softened to the extent that is it something that can be discussed as a benefit for employees going forward.

About Dawn Ellmore Employment

Dawn Ellmore Employment was incorporated in 1995 and is a market leader in intellectual property and legal recruitment.