The year 2024 started dynamically: the labor market saw an increase in the number of job seekers, which led to increased competition. Employers responded by increasing salaries and requirements for candidates. Find out what else has changed in the labor market in the Work.ua study.
What the January statistics tell us
Starting a new life with the new year seems to be the strategy followed by job seekers in the labor market in January 2024. After all, competition for vacancies has increased significantly after the traditional New Year’s Eve drop. Employers, on the other hand, are not yet as active – the number of job offers on the market is lower than last month. However, both trends are normal seasonal phenomena.
In January, the upward trend in wages continued. The average salary in Ukraine is now UAH 19,500. However, along with remuneration, the requirements for job seekers are also growing – employers are increasingly mentioning expectations for English language skills in their job postings.
The labor market has recovered by 93%.
In January 2024, according to Work.ua, employers published 91,021 vacancies. This is 6% less than in December 2023 and 7% less than in January 2022. This means that the labor market has now recovered by 93% in terms of the number of job offers. But, as before, this recovery is uneven.
Compared to pre-war figures, the number of vacancies has increased the most in the following regions: Zakarpattia (155%), Ivano-Frankivsk (146%), Khmelnytsky (125%), Lviv (123%), Vinnytsia (120%), Rivne (118%), and Chernivtsi (116%).
The leading regions in terms of the absolute number of job offers remain unchanged: Kyiv (30,913 vacancies), Lviv (8,473), Dnipropetrovs’k (8,452), Odesa (5,752), and Kharkiv (3,347). These regions account for 63% of all vacancies.
English language skills are required in almost every tenth vacancy
In December, the number of job offers decreased in all leading categories:
“Working specialties, production” – 14,923 vacancies, -14% compared to December;
“Service sector” – 14 674, -13%;
“Sales, purchasing” – 13,090, -1%;
“Retail trade – 10,809, -11%;
“Logistics, warehouse, foreign trade – 9,096, -10%;
“Administration, middle management – 8,340, -2%;
“Hotel and restaurant business, tourism” – 7,591, -16%;
“Transportation, automobile business – 7,214, -3%;
“Accounting, audit – 6,752, -2%;
“Medicine, pharmaceuticals – 6,326, -2%.
But in 7 categories, on the contrary, the number of jobs increased. The largest increase is seen in the category “Security, safety”, where vacancies are posted by the Defense Forces of Ukraine. You can learn more about them at work.ua/zsu/.
In terms of individual professions, the demand for the following specialists increased in January:
● Estimator (+21% compared to December, 138 vacancies)
● Correctional teacher (+20%, 147)
● Press secretary (+20%, 139)
● Service engineer (+20%, 324);
● massage therapist (+18%, 267)
● Financial analyst (+16%, 342);
● Turner (+16%, 200);
● graphic designer (+15%, 188);
● Florist (15%, 267);
● Project manager (+15%, 651).
In absolute terms, the labor market has the most job offers for sales consultants, sales managers, accountants, drivers, cashiers, cooks, loaders, account managers, administrators, sales representatives, and storekeepers.
The January drop in the number of vacancies affected almost all types of jobs. For example, the number of remote work offers decreased, and there were fewer vacancies for students and people without experience. Instead, employers are increasingly indicating that their vacancies are open to veterans (+6% compared to December, 6,194 job offers) and pensioners (+1%, 4,033).
Compared to December, the requirement for English language skills appears in job postings much more often. In January, this requirement was found in 7,990 vacancies, which is 19% more than in the previous month. In total, 9% of job offers require knowledge of English.
One third of job seekers want to work in Kyiv region or remotely
In January, job seekers updated or created 350,858 resumes on Work.ua. One third of all resumes indicated Kyiv region or remote employment as their preferred region of work.
Compared to December, the number of resumes increased by 24%. Obviously, job seekers have taken the idea of “new year, new job” seriously. So now employers have a better chance of finding qualified specialists. The increase in the number of candidates has also affected competition – it has increased by 42% compared to December.
In December, employers in Kyiv, Vinnytsia, Volyn, Lviv, and Kharkiv regions received the largest number of responses to their vacancies. The most difficult situation with candidate responses was in Kherson, Zakarpattia, Chernivtsi, Cherkasy, Mykolaiv, and Chernihiv regions.
In January, the competition for remote work was 5 times higher than average: Ukrainians continue to want to work online the most. The number of responses from candidates for the most competitive remote positions increased several times more. These positions include front-end developer, coder, web designer, tester, Android programmer, video editor, Python programmer, and Java programmer.
The most difficult to find are blue-collar professionals and doctors. The list of positions with the lowest competition in January included a diesel locomotive driver, train assembler, stone processing specialist, miner, oncologist, endocrinologist, otorhinolaryngologist, gastroenterologist, and hirudotherapist.
On Work.ua, not only do candidates submit resumes, but employers can also offer job openings to job seekers. In terms of the ratio of the number of offers to the number of vacancies, the most active employers were those looking for housewives, realtors, police officers, contact center operators, development managers, sales managers, customer service managers, English teachers, sales consultants, and promoters.
The number of women in the labor market is growing
In January, job seekers updated or created 350,858 resumes on Work.ua. Among them, 60% are women and 40% are men. Compared to previous months, the share of women in the labor market has increased. However, there were no significant changes in the distribution of job seekers by age and work experience.
In January, the number of candidates for the following professions increased: embroiderer (+107% compared to December), SMM specialist (+99%), molder (+72%), insurance agent (+68%), office manager (+68%), nutritionist (+67%), tour guide (+67%), draftsman (+66%), psychiatrist (+66%), and event manager (+64%).
Vacancies in the Defense Forces are among the leaders in terms of salaries
The trend towards a gradual increase in wages, which began in 2023, continues. In January, the average salary increased by 3% to UAH 19,500. Among the leading regions, wages increased in Kyiv (+150 UAH to UAH 21,000), Lviv (+230 UAH to UAH 19,230), Odesa (+500 UAH to UAH 18,500), and Dnipro (+500 UAH to UAH 18,500). In Kharkiv region, however, the salary did not increase again and has remained at UAH 17,500 for the third month in a row.
In January, salaries of employees in some categories also increased:
● Insurance – UAH 22,000, +10% compared to December;
● Security and safety – UAH 17,500, +6%;
Agriculture, agribusiness – 21,000, +5%;
Real estate – 36,500, +4%;
Retail trade – 16,000, +3%.
In the ranking of positions with the highest salaries (except for executives and IT), we see positions of specialists for the Ukrainian Defense Forces: drone pilot, rifleman, grenade launcher, mortar operator (over UAH 70,000). To join the ranks of the Defense Forces of Ukraine, please apply for the vacancies posted at work.ua/zsu/.
Among civilian professions (except for executives and IT), the highest salaries in December were as follows:
● 47,500 UAH – media buyer
UAH 45,000 – international driver
UAH 42,500 – ceramist;
UAH 40,000 – a straightener;
● 37,500 UAH – endodontist, supermarket manager, realtor;
● UAH 36,250 – dental technician.
The labor market continues to develop according to an optimistic scenario: in April, as in previous months, the number of published vacancies increased and reached almost 82,500, which is 9% more than in March, according to the April labor market research from Work.ua.
“For the first time after the full-scale invasion, Kharkiv region broke into the top five in terms of the number of proposals and ranked fifth, overtaking Ivano-Frankivsk region. In turn, Dnipropetrovsk region overtook Lviv and ranked second,” the company said.
According to its data, now the labor market is almost at the level of April 2021, while in April 2022 there were only 16,050 vacancies.
The largest increase in vacancies in April was demonstrated mainly by the frontline regions: Kharkiv (up 26%, 2,795 vacancies), Sumy (up 17%, 735 vacancies), Chernihiv (up 16%, 883 vacancies), Kherson (up 14%, 136 vacancies), Zaporizhia (up 14%, 1,415 vacancies) and Kyiv region (up 13%, 25,717 vacancies).
As for the areas, the largest increase in vacancies compared to March was recorded in the areas of security and safety – 21%, hotel and restaurant business and tourism – 20%, services – 16%, construction and architecture – 15%.
The largest increase in employers’ demand occurred for the vacancies of a cleaner – 911 vacancies (up 33%), a security guard – 1,088 vacancies (up 32%), a bartender/barista – 1,768 vacancies (up 30%), a waiter – 1,382 vacancies (up 26%) and a picker – 1,549 vacancies (up 25%).
In April, applicants created and updated 18% fewer resumes than in March. In distribution by gender: 55% of candidates are women, 45% are men.
According to the resource, competition for jobs has continued to decline since March 2022 (69 responses per vacancy) and is now at the minimum – approximately 12 responses per vacancy in April against 15 in March 2023.
Labor market continues to demonstrate positive growth dynamics: the number of vacancies in March increased by 14% compared to February and reached almost 75.6 thousand.
These are the main results of the regular labor market survey presented by Work.ua on Thursday.
“The number of vacancies in the category of hotel and restaurant business and tourism has increased rapidly. Jobs and candidates are returning to frontline areas,” the study said.
According to it, the number of vacancies relative to the 2022 prewar level is almost 75%, when compared to the 2021 figure of 91%.
It is noted that the top five countries by number of vacancies are the Kiev region – nearly 22.8 thousand (+14% compared to February), Lviv region – 7.52 thousand (+9%), Dnipropetrovsk region – 7.2 thousand (+12%), Odessa region – 5.46 thousand (+22%) and Ivano-Frankivsk region – 2.43 thousand (+21%).
It is indicated that with the advent of spring a record for the growth of job offers, according to the system of recruitment management (HMS) from Work.ua, was the category “hotel, restaurant business and tourism” – 7.22 thousand vacancies, which is 29% more than a month earlier. The most popular position in this category is a bartender: 1.37 thousand job offers, which is 40% more than in February. And the greatest trend was for barbecue cook vacancies with 95 offers, up 94% from February’s numbers.
In contrast to job openings, which are increasing each month, job seeker competition continues to decline, down 13% from February, with fewer than one person per day responding on average now, down from close to 3.5 in March-April 2022.
“The March 2023 competition is four times lower than it was at the beginning of the full-scale invasion in March 2022,” the materials said.
The highest competition is in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Vinnitsa, Odessa and Volyn oblasts. The lowest – in Zakarpattya, Chernivtsi, Kherson, Ternopil and Kirovograd regions.
“With regard to positions with high competition of applicants, which usually falls into the position of digital specialists with the ability to work remotely and the administrators of beauty salons, if you compare with March 2022, the number of those wishing to work as an administrator beauty salon in 2023 decreased by 10 times, and, for example, wishing to work Front-end programmer and Java programmer – increased by three or four times,” – says the study.
This may be a consequence of the optimization taking place in the IT-sphere.
At the same time, according to Work.ua, in general, the influx of applicants to the market is still growing: in March there were 7% more candidates than in February. Among them are sales consultants, sales managers, administrators, drivers, office managers, accountants, bartenders, waiters, customer service managers and cashiers.
The top three positions with the largest increase in applicants were Dietitian – +327% (64 candidates), Excavatorist – +115% (58), and .Net Programmer – +102% (105).
The largest increase of new candidates in March compared with February was observed in the frontline regions: Sumy region -22% (848 applicants), Mykolayiv region – 15% (859), Donetsk region – 14% (146), as well as Odesa region – 16% (more than 4 thousand applicants) and Kyiv region – 10% (17.6 thousand).
Speaking about the salaries, Work.ua experts noted a slight increase of 500 UAH in the Odessa and Lviv regions – respectively up to 15.5 thousand UAH and 16 thousand UAH.
In general, in the first month of spring the average salary in Ukraine amounted to 16 thousand UAH.
According to the resource, by sectors the salaries in insurance increased most of all – by 9%, medicine and pharmaceuticals – by 4%, business, hospitality and tourism business, security and safety – by 3%.
The top most paid jobs in non-managerial positions was headed by media buyer – 52.5 thousand UAH, international driver – 40 thousand UAH, business analyst – 32.5 thousand UAH and rebuilder, rickshaw puller and realtor – 30 thousand UAH.
As before, the lowest salaries are offered to cleaners – 8 thousand UAH, dishwashers – 9 thousand UAH and nurses – 9 thousand UAH, which in March increased by 500 UAH against February.
It is reported that most of all candidates with more than five years of experience enter the labor market – nearly 83 thousand (+7% vs. February). The second largest category is without experience, almost 80 thousand candidates (+7%). The third group has two to five years of experience: 40,200 people (+5%). More women than men enter the labor market – 56% against 44%.
