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Ireland Q4 Employment Outlook Report - Just Released

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โ€‹Irish Tech Companies Return to Optimism in Q4 - +29% Overall Growth in Jobs

  • Ireland Net Employment Outlook of +29% signals a return to significant growth in jobs

  • IT sector hiring confidence rebounds with a Net Employment Outlook of +39%

  • Hiring optimism is driven by demand for specialist roles like AI specialists, rather than volume hiring for generalists

  • More than half of Irish employers reveal they expect AI to create more jobs than it replaces over the next two years

Irelandโ€™s Information Technology sector expects a resurgence in hiring confidence following consecutive quarters of stagnant recruitment, according to the latest ManpowerGroup Employment Outlook Survey. The sectorโ€™s Net Employment Outlook has increased to +39%, up from +6% last quarter. This marks the highest level of optimism since the post-pandemic hiring boom.

Download the ManpowerGroup Ireland Q4 2024 Employment Outlook Report

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Despite this, hiring at volume is expected to remain subdued, with high-skilled roles like AI specialists, data engineers, cloud architects, cybersecurity specialists, and developers igniting tech sector hiring. This follows findings that 51% of employers say they expect AI adoption to lead to increased headcounts over the next two years.

โ€œFollowing a period of redundancies and hiring freezes made in response to economic turbulence and post-pandemic over-hiring, the tech sector is now looking to the future with a sense of cautious optimism.โ€ said Jonny Edgar, Managing Director, ManpowerGroup Ireland. โ€œBusinesses have restructured with sustainable headcounts, and mounting confidence in the growing economy together with a surge in demand for specialist tech skills is fuelling positive hiring plans.โ€

โ€œEmployers feel confident about the potential of AI to create more jobs than it replaces, and thereโ€™s a growing appetite for specialists in generative AI and machine learning. However, we know itโ€™s going to be a mixed picture, and it remains to be seen whether businessesโ€™ optimistic attitude is reflected in the reality of hiring trends over the coming years.
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The Information Technology sectorโ€™s revived confidence is most pronounced in Dublin, home to many of Irelandโ€™s tech multinationals. Here, IT employers report a Net Employment Outlook of +41%, a marked increase on the -20% in Q1 and +10% in Q3 of this year. Employers in Dublin also reported the highest levels of AI adoption at 41%.

Large Enterprises, businesses with more than 5000 employees, also report a rebound in hiring optimism, with +38% intending to hire in the fourth quarter. This is an increase of 22 percentage-points on last quarter and up 23 percentage-points year-over-year.

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