The findings reveal that in the week commencing 17th May, the number of job vacancies within the leisure and hospitality sectors actually fell by a sizeable –11.4% compared to the previous week, despite the fact that customers are raring to get back to normal.
Interestingly, this caution wasn’t matched by candidates as the number of job applications continued to increase by 3.9% week-on-week, signalling that job seekers are confident that lockdown restrictions will continue to ease as planned throughout the summer months.
Lee Biggins, CEO and founder comments: “At first glance these statistics may be concerning, as a drop in job vacancies is never ideal. However, this is a pattern that we have seen before. After record levels of job postings in the weeks before COVID restrictions were lifted, the retail sector also witnessed a drop in vacancies in the first week post-lockdown.”
Indeed, when looking at the monthly data, the picture looks far more positive as the number of job postings in the leisure, tourism and hospitality sector has risen by a staggering +52% in the month immediately preceding the 17th May.
Biggins continues: “The retail sector has continued to grow since those initial results and we fully expect the leisure and hospitality sectors to follow suit. We predict that businesses will see how they fare with their current staff and will look to onboard more team members as the holiday season opens up .”
