Highlights of Tech Recruitment in the year 2021

1. It was definitely a candidate’s market! The quarantine restrictions in Hong Kong and the strong preference for hiring PRs/Citizens in Singapore meant that only local talent was available to recruit. This has resulted in salary increases beyond expectations for skilled candidates.

    
   

2. Architects, Full Stack Developers, SRE Engineers, and IT Security professionals were most in demand throughout the year among several sectors including Finance, Insurance, and High Tech.

    
   

3. The key trends we observed in 2021 were digitalization (large-scale programs continuing to move to the mobile/internet domain), increased hiring by crypto firms both in Hong Kong and Singapore, and an increase in the demand for contractors as banks were starting to prepare for an expansion in 2022 while hedging against an unforeseen downturn in the market.

    
   

4. The recent news of the Log4j vulnerability has been a concern for many in the IT community ranging from leaders to IT security professionals.
   

Overview of some of the sectors

1. Finance Technology
   

   1. Banks have been finding more creative ways to lure candidates. Many have chosen to pay the quarantine costs to hire from overseas while others are offering to pay for any vacation-related quarantine costs as part of staff benefits.
      

   2. We noticed a high turnover rate both within the banking technology and the virtual banking space during Q4. The reasons behind this ranged from movement within senior leadership roles and emigration of skilled candidates into countries like the UK, Canada, and Australia. 
      

   3. Banks have been hiring at all levels including roles within Senior Leadership, Security, Core Banking, E-Banking, Data Engineers, and Infrastructure.
      

2. Insurance Technology 

   1. Insurance companies were hiring very actively to fill roles within various ongoing transformation projects. While many of them hired from their competitors, we also observed them hiring from banks, and other tech firms.
      

   2. InsurTech has also been broadly absorbing software developers, BA/PMs, and Data Scientists.
      

   3. The roles in demand in 2021 across insurance firms include roles within Senior Leadership, Architecture, BA/PM, Digital, Cloud, Data, and Analytics.
      

Hope you find this information useful. Wish you a Happy and Prosperous 2022!

Best,

Vince Natteri, Managing Director 

(on behalf of the Pinpoint Asia Recruitment Team)