Covid recruitment impact report: Risk

The below is an excerpt from our mid-year risk recruitment update; you can download the full report using the form on this page.

Early signs indicated that 2020 was going to be a steady year for recruitment within risk. In the UK and US, businesses continued their growth agendas, whilst in Asia – despite civil unrest disrupting the market – organisations returned to their hiring plans that had been put on hold in the latter half of 2019.

As Covid-19 spread, companies tightened recruitment budgets and the urgency behind some hires subsided. Fortunately, the risk recruitment market is robust; hires continued in newly established businesses, for replacement hires and for positions that regulators suggested or indeed insisted be made.

The impact of the pandemic will, of course, be felt for a considerable time. In the latter half of this year, it’s likely that we will see a high number of corporate defaults. As their credit risks continue to rise and loans need to be restructured, we expect that the banks will look to strengthen and grow their restructuring teams.

Risk professionals looking for a new role should be encouraged by the fact that the financial services sector will continue to need strong risk managers. Although were not expecting the second half of 2020 to be a booming market, there will continue to be good options across a variety of seniority levels and types of financial services business (big, small, established and nascent) so it’s still worth registering your interest to consider opportunities.

Given there is a limited supply of roles in the market, now is actually a great time for businesses to be considering bringing external talent into teams. There is less competition and so a window of opportunity exists to access great talent which may be more difficult to engage when market conditions improve.

For advice on hiring strategies, your career or just to hear more about the market please do get in touch for a confidential discussion.