The Hard Facts of Post-Pandemic Career Planning

All of our careers have been impacted by COVID19. Whether you're unemployed or have been working during the past 9 months, your career prospects or aspects of your job situation have changed. Simply put, almost everything has been subject to change, from how we shop, to where we eat, to where we work, to where we live, to how we meet, to whether or how we communicate, to how we educate, to how we parent, and on and on. All of these impact on jobs and how we will manage our careers into the future. 

We won't just go back to normal. Life in many areas will have changed permanently. Some jobs and careers will disappear, and others will emerge. So, almost a year into the pandemic and expecting at least another 6 months until we begin resuming normal activities, what can we predict on the job front moving forward? And how can this begin to help refocus career goals?

This article very briefly summarizes the most current information on post-COVID19 job market projections through 2029, compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and presented on December 17, 2020 but not yet published. It also draws from a detailed analysis of employment recovery in the wake of COVID19 published in December 2020 by BLS. We will then briefly look at how to start using this information now in refocusing on career strategy.

To incorporate reasonable adjustments to account for COVID19 changes, BLS has added 2 scenarios to their usual 10 year labor market projections. These are if the pandemic has a moderate or severe impact. Looking at either or both scenarios, the new data reflects 4 trends resulting from changes in consumer spending and business hiring practices due to the pandemic: increased remote work, increased  e-commerce; increased medical research; and decreased spending on leisure and hospitality. The remaining information in this article incorporates data from both BLS scenarios in helping to understand implications of the trends for short and long term career planning.

Industries most likely to be negatively effected, in descending order of impact through 2029 include accommodation and food services; arts, entertainment and recreation; retail trade; construction; transportation and warehousing; management of companies and enterprises; and real estate and rental and leasing.  More specifically, negative impact is likeliest in non-residential building construction; ground and air transportation; retail trade; food services and drinking places; and traveler accommodations (hotels).

As far as occupations, the overall largest declines from baseline projections* are likeliest in food preparation and related; and sales and related, followed by smaller declines in construction and extraction; office and administrative support; transportation and material moving; building and grounds cleaning and maintenance;  installation, maintenance and repair; arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media; management; protective services;  farming, fishing, and forestry; and business and financial operations. More specifically, negative impact may be seen among mainline food services workers such as bartenders, food servers, host staff, dishwashers, and food preparation workers in restaurants, but not so much fast food workers; some clerical workers such as cashiers, reservation clerks, receptionists, information clerks, and hotel/motel and resort desk clerks. 

Industries most likely to be positively impacted by COVID19 include information; and professional, scientific, and technical services. There will likely be positive impact on computer and mathematical occupations, including those with already high demand projections: information security analysts; software developers, quality analysts, and testers; computer and information research scientists; web development and digital interface designers; database administrators and architects; computer network architects; and network and computer systems administrators.

There will also likely be increased growth in research and development in physical, engineering, and life sciences, and huge impacts on pharmaceutical and medicine manufacturing. More specifically, stronger demand may exist for epidemiologists, medical scientists, biochemists, and biological technicians.

So what are some implications for late-pandemic and post-pandemic job and career planning? While we don't fully know how a recovery will play out, even with vaccines, we can reasonably project a few career related implications. First, more remote work is likely here to stay. That will fuel and be fueled by permanent increases in technology, telework and online commerce jobs. At the skilled and professional levels, and particularly for mid and late-career non-technical workers, this stresses the need to have have or develop intermediate level technology skills, particularly in light of the fast pace at which technology changes. Alison Doyle covers how to do this in an outstanding recent article. Telework not only requires job related software skills, it also requires knowledge of the hardware and software to do telework at home, including basic equipment repair and maintenance skills.

Many of us in the career field  have stressed to our clients how important basic technology skills are to remain competitive in a job search. But with the pandemic and increased demands of telework, that requirement can be stretched beyond basic skills. One review of 1000 occupations concluded that 37% of all jobs allow for full time telework. Most will be in higher paying skilled and professional level jobs. According to a Gallop poll in September 2020 when work at home had dropped to a low from peak levels due to the pandemic in April 2020, still 33% of workers reported they were always working remotely and 25% reported they were sometimes working remotely. It's reasonable to conclude that telework will continue at least partially in 50-60% of all jobs beyond the pandemic. Also, the types of occupations in which it can be done will require increasing technical skills and knowledge.

Second, when planning for a job search or a career change in declining industries and fields, it will be important to understand the trend in your industry and your geographical location, and to know how competitive it will be to get and keep a job, and advance in your career. Use that information to carefully target stable and growing segments of the industry and specific jobs by using your transferable skills. For example, you can be a cook in a local restaurant (declining employment) or shift your career to the food service operations of a major technology company (increasing employment). Or you could leverage your technology skills as an administrative assistant by taking short-term training courses to leapfrog to any number of newly emerging technology jobs. 

Finally, if you are not inclined toward learning new technology skills, yet you are in a higher paying field that will increasingly require that, competing for and keeping jobs will be a challenge. Planning for a new career, or gig work related to your current field are alternatives, although they may be lower paying. For example, less technical customer service, teaching, and government service jobs may be available working from home or in an office requiring only basic computer and internet skills.

In order to plan for changes, it's usually best to start with a thorough assessment of your skills, interests, and your best fit environment. Other articles in this blog, as well as my books/workbook and YouTube videos address these issues. Also, watch for an upcoming article in this blog reviewing new simple tools you can use for discovering occupations to which your skills transfer as well as to help determine your environmental fit with different organizations. As the post-COVID19 employment market changes, these actions will keep you ahead of the curve when planning the rest of your career and searching for a new job.

*Baseline projections are those done without consideration of the impact of COVID19.