There has been plenty of discussion about when the New Zealand employment market will finally turn, but I’m not convinced there will be one defining moment when we can confidently say the difficult period is behind us. What we are seeing instead is a gradual but steady improvement, with more hiring activity, projects coming back online and organisations beginning to make decisions that had previously been put on hold.
There are encouraging signs in the wider market as well, although they need to be viewed in context. The latest Stats NZ employment indicators show filled jobs increased in both May and June, with 14,327 more filled jobs across New Zealand in June than at the same time last year. That is positive, but confidence has not returned at the same pace, and the improvement remains uneven across industries and regions.
That is very much reflected in what we are seeing at Beyond Recruitment. Hiring across Professional & Corporate Services strengthened through the first half of the year, particularly across temporary, contract and fixed-term appointments, while IT, Transformation & Digital has continued to recover as transformation programmes restart and organisations invest in business-critical technology initiatives.
What we have now is a market with more movement, but also one where both employers and candidates are making decisions much more carefully than they did several years ago.
More Candidates, Same Challenges
On paper, this should be an easier market in which to recruit. Candidate availability is healthier than it was during the tightest parts of the market, application volumes remain high and salary expectations have become more realistic across some disciplines. Yet when we speak with hiring managers, many are still finding it difficult to secure the person they actually need.
Part of the reason is that the requirements have changed. Employers are being much more specific about the capability they bring into their organisations and, with every appointment receiving greater scrutiny, there is less willingness to compromise on experience, sector knowledge or the ability to contribute quickly.
Our Professional & Corporate Services Market Insights illustrate this particularly well. Sales, Marketing & Communications vacancies in Auckland can attract more than 100 applications, while Customer Service and Administration & Business Support roles can receive more than 200 within only a few days. Despite those numbers, experienced, job-ready professionals with the right specialist capability remain in much shorter supply.
The same tension exists elsewhere. Human Resources & Recruitment job advertisements were up 26.6% year-on-year in the April data included in our report, while experienced Payroll, Procurement, Engineering and Finance professionals continue to be sought after. Across IT, Transformation & Digital, demand remains concentrated around transformation, cloud, data, AI, cyber security, automation and platform modernisation, with organisations increasingly looking for specific technology, sector and delivery experience rather than broad technical capability.
This is why I would be cautious about describing the current environment simply as an employer’s market. There may be more people available, but that does not necessarily mean there are more of the people an organisation needs.
Changing Expectations
It would be impossible to talk about the employment market in 2026 without discussing AI, although I think we need to be careful that every workforce conversation does not become an AI conversation. What interests me more is the broader shift underneath it and how quickly expectations around individual roles are changing.
Employers increasingly want people who can make better use of the tools, systems and information available to them. That could be an Accountant who can work across finance systems and interpret data, an HR professional who understands how technology can improve processes, a Marketing professional who can demonstrate commercial outcomes, or an IT professional who can translate a technical decision into something meaningful for the wider organisation.
AI is accelerating that shift, but it did not create it.
Our own research shows employers across Professional & Corporate Services placing greater value on professionals who can confidently use AI-enabled tools while still applying judgement, critical thinking, adaptability and commercial awareness. Within IT, Transformation & Digital, the conversation has already moved beyond pilots in many organisations, with investment increasingly focused on practical applications including customer service automation, enterprise search, workflow automation, software development, document processing and cyber security monitoring.
This is supported by PwC’s 2026 AI Jobs Barometer, which found that AI-related job advertisements in New Zealand increased from approximately 3,900 in 2024 to 9,600 in 2025. The more interesting question for businesses now is therefore not simply which roles AI might replace, but how existing roles will evolve and what organisations need to do to ensure their people evolve with them.
The Value of Experience
While there is understandably a lot of focus on emerging skills, one of the more interesting developments we have seen this year has been renewed demand for highly experienced and later-career professionals. Employers are taking a broader view of the value that experience can bring, particularly where specialist knowledge has become difficult to replace.
This is evident across both of our latest Market Insights reports. Within Professional & Corporate Services, organisations are valuing people with deep sector expertise, leadership maturity, legacy systems knowledge and proven delivery experience. Within IT, Transformation & Digital, experienced professionals with legacy systems knowledge, specialist technical skills and a strong track record of delivery continue to play an important role in long-term transformation programmes.
I think that is an important counterbalance to some of the conversations we are having around technology and AI. New tools can help people work faster and give organisations access to information in ways that were not possible before, but they do not replace organisational knowledge, relationships, leadership judgement or the perspective that comes from having successfully navigated difficult situations before.
The challenge for employers is not choosing between emerging skills and experience but building teams that have the right balance of both.
A More Flexible Workforce
Contract, temporary and fixed-term recruitment has been one of the clearest areas of activity during the first half of the year, and while some of this undoubtedly reflects continued caution around permanent headcount, I believe there is a broader change taking place in how organisations think about workforce planning.
Businesses are becoming more comfortable looking at the capability they need rather than assuming every requirement needs to become a permanent position. A transformation programme may require specialist expertise for 12 months, a finance team may need additional support through a particularly demanding period, or an organisation may need experienced people quickly while it works through a longer-term restructure.
We can see that happening across the market. Within IT, Transformation & Digital, six-to-12-month contract opportunities have begun returning in Auckland, Waikato and the Bay of Plenty following a period dominated by shorter engagements, while fixed-term appointments are being used to support longer transformation programmes. Across Professional & Corporate Services, temporary and contract hiring is supporting everything from Finance and Payroll to Administration, HR and project delivery, and we expect that flexibility to remain an important part of the market throughout the second half of the year.
For leadership teams, I think this changes the workforce planning conversation. Rather than starting with how many permanent positions an organisation needs, it makes more sense to start with the capability required, how long it is likely to be needed and the most effective way of bringing that capability into the business.
Hiring with Confidence
It is entirely understandable that employers are taking more care over recruitment decisions in the current environment. Budgets remain under pressure, headcount is being closely managed and organisations want to know that a new appointment will genuinely add value.
However, there is a risk that caution turns into an unnecessarily long recruitment process.
While candidate numbers are higher overall, experienced professionals with specialist capability continue to have options. This is particularly evident across areas including Human Resources, Finance, Procurement, Engineering and specialist operational roles, where strong candidates can still receive multiple offers. Our IT, Transformation & Digital Market Insights tell a similar story, with experienced contractors and specialist candidates continuing to be secured quickly and lengthy recruitment processes increasing the likelihood that employers lose good people to another opportunity.
Being selective is sensible, but employers still need to know what they are looking for, have the right decision-makers involved and provide candidates with clear communication throughout the process. A considered recruitment process should give an organisation confidence in its decision without making the process unnecessarily difficult for everyone involved.
What’s next for the remainder of 2026
We are more optimistic about the New Zealand employment market today than we were six or twelve months ago, although I also think we need to be realistic about the type of recovery we are seeing. I do not expect us to suddenly return to a market where organisations are hiring at volume and competing for almost every available candidate, because businesses have learnt a great deal over the past few years about productivity, workforce structure and where they genuinely need permanent capability.
Some of these lessons will stay with us.
Across IT, Transformation & Digital, we expect activity to remain strongest around transformation, AI, data, cloud, cyber security, ERP and platform modernisation, particularly where investment can be connected to measurable business outcomes.
Across Professional & Corporate Services, we expect hiring to remain steady, with contract and temporary recruitment continuing to provide organisations with flexibility while specialist permanent capability remains important in areas including Finance, HR, Procurement, Engineering and Government & Policy.
For our Beyond Recruitment team, the most encouraging development is that there is more movement in the market and more organisations are starting to look ahead again. The market emerging from the past few years may look quite different from the market preceding them, but that does not necessarily make it a weaker market.
Explore the Full Insights
Our 2026 Professional & Corporate Services Market Insights and IT, Transformation & Digital Market Insights take a much deeper look at the trends we are seeing across New Zealand, including hiring activity, candidate behaviour, areas of skills demand and our expectations for the remainder of the year.
We are also currently gathering data for this year’s Beyond Employment & Labour Report (BELR), which will give us a much broader view of what New Zealand employers and professionals are experiencing. Once again, the report will include economic commentary from economist Shamubeel Eaqub, helping us put the employment trends we are seeing into the context of the wider New Zealand economy.
To request a copy of our latest Market Insights or speak with the Beyond Recruitment team about what these trends mean for your organisation or career, get in touch with us today.