What does 2022 hold for recruiting in the Australian Cyber industry?

I'll bet I'm not the only one that is completely unsure about this, though I will have a few guesses based on trends I am seeing and hearing in the market.

Normalising of salaries

2021 saw some huge jumps in junior - mid level salaries. Contributing factors to this include shift to remote first working, lack of migration, headcount freezes and in some cases project work being on hold.

It was indeed a perfect storm due to this combined front.

If as a hiring manager you have been feeling a bit like Marky Mark and George Clooney above, fear not as I don't believe this will continue this year.

I expect the growth in those junior and mid level salaries to balance out if it hasn't already done so. On the flip side, if you are a junior or mid level candidate, it is not realistic to expect a 20-30% jump every time you change roles.

Migration affecting candidate supply

This one is more a hope than a prediction, we saw such a low amount of skilled migrant visas approved last year (statistics here). I would estimate a very small percentage of these people were cyber talent also.

Hopefully, the re-opening of borders will also mean we have a bit of an influx of skilled talent into Australia.

The search trend below is for google searches on "working visa Australia", there is an up tick over the last month, so hopefully this translates into some green shoots in approved visas and talent into the local market.

I know basically every hiring manager would welcome an additional couple of highly skilled candidates for their open roles.

Continued growth in SME consultancies

Due to the sheer volume of work available to all security consultancies, I expect there to be a number of newer offshoot style consultancies. I noticed a heap of these businesses pop up offering everything from boutique pen testing, SOC, GRC to AppSec based services.

The market has perhaps never been so buoyant with work, so I expect there to be some challenges for consultancies hiring talent due to a huge amount of additional competition.

Retention of staff will be tough

The shift to remote working has meant there is less of a team feel and the word loyalty perhaps doesn't exist anymore.

I've had it mentioned by senior executives how as an industry it's incredibly difficult to hire when you don't only want to steal the talent from the company next door.

I guess the best way to avoid your team getting poached by your competitors is to offer them mentoring, industry training, appropriate salaries AND have conversations about what will keep them engaged in the role.

Personally I worked with many underpaid juniors who attempted to shift company only to be offered a significant raise to stay, this is a short term play but might buy you an extra 6-12 months with them in your team.

In person events are back!

(Well soon I hope) This is well overdue and depending on which state you live in, the effects of this are more significant.

Personally I can't wait to attend as many events as possible as the lack of networking is a huge negative for everyone in the industry.

The photo here is from bSides Canberra last year which unfortunately won't be on this year - fingers crossed the Sydney one runs.....

I'd be keen to hear your thoughts on this, alternatively reach out to me directly to have a more details conversation about it.

* Data sourced from Google Trends, Images from Google Images and my personal bSides collection.