Ilya Brotzky is the Founder and CEO of VanHack, the fastest way to hire tech talent.
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Covid-19 will permanently wipe out between 6.2 million and 8.7 million jobs in the U.S. by the end of the year. In my home country of Canada, we are still 1 million jobs short of our pre-Covid employment levels. Due to this grim outlook, many are asking: Who’s hiring and what are they looking for? Some innovation-driven sectors are adapting and actually growing a lot during this time which provides signs of hope.
The move to remote work means digitally-skilled talent is in demand and those with these skills can land roles in growing sectors, even if they don’t live near headquarters or in the same country. What is, perhaps, most exciting about these trends? A 6-month course can get almost anyone into tech — as one former truck driver recently showed in the U.S. — so while many firms are scrambling to fill essential roles, they can also be proactive by building skills internally.
Global firms like Amazon and PwC have already pledged to invest in reskilling their workforce, ensuring their employees will keep up with digitization. The World Economic Forum suggests that “We need to reskill more than 1 billion people by 2030,” and estimates that “133 million new jobs in major economies will be created,” by 2022. So with these trends in mind, what are some of these sectors that are fervently hiring? As the founder and CEO of a tech hiring platform, we’ve seen a growing demand for talent in e-commerce, e-learning, telehealth and fintech as these industries continue to boom due to the pandemic.
E-commerce: Turning Online Shopping Into Magic
As more people shun physical retail stores and turn to online shopping, the talent behind the scenes who make e-commerce experiences magical — the developers, product managers, business analysts, marketers and more — is in huge demand. In Canada, for example, retail e-commerce sales have increased by over 70% since last year, which is fueling a hiring spree. The easiest player to spot hiring like mad in e-commerce is the behemoth Amazon, having just pledged to hire 33,000 employees for corporate and tech jobs in the U.S. this fall, with an average salary of $150,000, and another 800 of the same jobs in Canada. Similarly, Shopify will soon hire over 1,000 new employees on the east and west coasts of Canada.
Additionally, we’re seeing growth in a particular e-commerce subsector: direct-to-consumer companies. Companies in the food and grocery delivery business, exercise equipment, home furnishing and fashion are increasingly selling products directly to customers and they are paying big bucks for the talent behind the scenes.
E-learning And Ed Tech: From Remote Work To Remote Schools
It’s not just students and universities who are embracing online learning because of Covid-19. Increasingly, many corporations are investing in “upskilling” programs. These initiatives help employees become digitally-skilled and move up to better and different technical roles.
With the current need for online education, the global market for e-learning is expected to grow to $305.3 billion by 2025. Coding camps, technical schools and even schools for soft skills are turning online to help job seekers upskill quickly without going to expensive colleges with lengthy degree processes.
With these trends, there is not only a growing need for online teachers and coaches and more funding for course creators but also an increasing demand for engineers, marketers, sales professionals and former professors who can help develop and scale ed tech companies.
Telehealth: Help A Doctor Out
Telehealth isn’t just meeting your physician on a video call. Some other innovations include remote monitoring of patients and administration of their medication, on-demand urgent care for emergencies and virtual home health services, and according to some research, the U.S. telehealth market, which is already worth $3 billion, could grow to $250 billion post-Covid. The Canadian healthcare system faces similar challenges related to social distancing, so we are seeing a similar boom here as well. One virtual care company recently went from hosting 1,000 online physician consulting sessions each day to 4,000 practically overnight because of Covid-19. This means that trained health professionals can join the tech economy. For example, a few years of experience within patient care can help you land a role as a telehealth nurse.
Fintech: From Traditional Finance To Cryptocurrency
The global financial technology sector as a whole, consisting of banks, major firms and startups, is expected to reach $305 billion in the next five years, according to a recent report. Canadian fintech companies are similarly growing fast and they’re being recognized for it.
So what skills and roles are in demand in fintech? Not only developers and engineers but also professionals from traditional finance who understand regulatory compliance for sales and financial services. Similarly, we’ve seen cryptocurrency companies hiring like mad. These companies serve a global customer base and whose teams are distributed around the world. These companies tend to offer among the highest salaries in tech.
Converting Your Skills
Even in a pandemic, there are job opportunities — for those with the necessary skills. For HR professionals, it’s important to study what skills you and your team could learn to succeed in the new economy. For jobseekers, consider how your skills from your current field could be leveraged digitally and watch the doors open.
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