As of January 2024, LinkedIn reports that there were twice the number of applications to remote roles than there were remote roles available. But despite the enormous interest by prospective talent in remote work, remote roles are getting harder to find. LinkedIn cites a dramatic drop in remote role availability: remote job postings are down 23% from this time last year. It is important to note that the report does not use the terms "remote" and "hybrid" interchangeably.
Josh Graff, managing director of EMEA/LATAM and global VP at LinkedIn, shared some insights behind the numbers — and paints an interesting picture of the supply and demand for flexible work in the job market.
"While remote job postings in Europe have fallen since the end of the pandemic, the appetite for them remains incredibly high," says Graff. "They are among the most competitive jobs; if you look at the U.K., 9% of jobs are fully remote today, but they are attracting 18% of applicants." In the U.S., only 10% of posted roles are fully remote, yet received 46% of all applications.
Many people are currently looking to make a change at work. According to the report, job seekers' search activity is up year-over-year, with the largest increases in the average number of applications in France (18.2%), the United Kingdom (13.9%), Germany (11.8%), and Ireland (10.3%). If workers can't find the roles that they want, will they stick it out in their current positions that are unfulfilling or inflexible?
The answer to that question is likely "yes." A 2022 study by FlexJobs asked thousands of people why they quit their jobs, and while the number one reason people gave for quitting was a toxic company culture, not allowing remote work wasn't far behind. In that study, 43% said they would quit if there weren't remote work options. "While it's hard to predict anything with certainty, we know professionals' desire for flexibility has grown since the pandemic," says Graff.
Given the high demand for remote work, it should be an obvious and easy decision to provide environments that enable fully remote positions. Job seekers in the U.K. say that the number one thing they care most about in a job after compensation is flexible work. Yet, many employers continue to scale back remote postings — despite overwhelming evidence that office-based workers are not more productive than their remote counterparts.
For example, this study linked working from home with large gains in productivity. It found that for each extra day a firm's average employee works remotely, that firm's productivity is around $20,000 higher. In another study, when asked how many days a week working from home would be best for their mental health, the most popular response was five days a week. In other words — fully remote.
Given this strong data that remote work boosts productivity and well-being, why do some companies continue to scale back remote postings? "I suspect that challenging economic conditions have prompted employers to cut down on the post-pandemic flexible work that they had previously offered," Graff surmises. "Organizations are trying to minimize disruption wherever they can, and they're reverting to what they know. And what they know is office-based work."
Graff predicts that in the next few years, market dynamics will lead to a healthier balance in supply and demand for remote work. Until then, many companies are still trying to navigate what makes sense for them and their employees.
"The reality is that most companies in the world had hundreds of years of experience with onsite working, and many of them were forced in the pandemic to go hybrid or remote. We've only had two short years to navigate through this great experiment. And I think the experiment is arguably working better than anyone expected."
Perhaps part of the hesitancy of offering remote work is around labels such as "remote" and "flexible." These could wrongfully imply that people are working less or working less hard. "I like the word hybrid," says Graff, "and it's important to have clear parameters around remote, hybrid and in-person. Flexibility could be misinterpreted, but ultimately, it's about the policies that employers put in place to guide their employees on what their approach is. The devil is in the details."
