Seek reveals the 25 trends that define the way Australians work

A lot has changed in the employment landscape since brothers Andrew and Paul Bassat and their friend Matt Rockman came up with the idea for Seek, an employment platform for job seekers, from a St Kilda garage in 1997.

At the time, just 19 per cent of Australian households were online – but by the time the trio launched Seek in March 1998, (with over 7,000 job ads, BTW) the way Aussies looked for work was changed forever.

“In the 25 years since, Australians have weathered a global financial crisis, multiple natural disasters and the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to great change in the way we work, live and plan for our futures,” says Seek managing director Kendra Banks.

The trends defining a national workforce

The Seek team have unpacked the trends they have seen across the Australian workforce over the past 25 years with their report 25 trends that defined the way Australians work.

Amongst the top trends, revealed are:

• What Australians want in a job – the trending search terms onsite at SEEK give an insight into what is on Aussie’s minds when it comes to work.
• More change, more often – how the average tenure of Australians at work has shortened over time.
• Show us the money – the journey of Australian wages over the past 25 years.
• Working on wellbeing – the increasing importance of wellbeing support in the workplace, as told by Seek job data.

“The adoption of the internet and social media, wireless technology and AI, a growing population and domestic business landscape that is increasingly online, plus the introduction of new multinational corporations to our shores … have greatly altered our working lives,” says Banks.

“From the fundamentals of how and when we commute and where and when we work, to the practical details of work life, including desk essentials, work wardrobes and perks … In retrospect, the evolution of our working lives can seem both astonishing in its breadth (was the average retirement age really 41 for women only 25 years ago?) and surprising in how little has changed (at this pace, we will only reach gender pay parity by the late 2040s),” Banks comments.

So, how has working life changed?

To give a full picture of how Australian working life has been reshaped over the past 25 years, Seek has broken their data down into sections: Technology at work, Australian working life, What workers want, Industries and skills, plus Wages and economy.

The ’90s saw the dawn of the dot com era, with a period of massive internet adoption that revolutionised the way Australians live, socialise and work – and how we hire and apply for jobs. Classified job ads and help wanted posters have become a thing of the past. Finding work – or workers – has largely shifted online.

Online job ads, including those on SEEK.com.au, are the leading method for recruitment in Australia. There were 7,000 jobs on SEEK when it launched in March 1998, and now over 250,000 job ads are posted per month.

Tech driving jobs growth

Technology has also become a key driver for employment. As the tech sector has evolved, so too have technology jobs – and technology use has spilled into almost every sector.

According to Seek, job ads in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) have for many years been one of the greatest by volume. But the need for technology skills are no longer confined to roles in the technology industry. Job ads that mention technology continue to climb, with roles across management, logistics, marketing and more all requiring a technology skill set.

As the demand for tech skills increases and AI and machine learning improve productivity, jobs that were once in-demand are now on the decline. More time intensive, repetitive tasks have been taken on by automation, allowing people to shift into roles that place greater focus on instinct, relationships and creativity.

While automation undoubtedly poses some challenges to the labour market, it also presents rich opportunity. It’s forecast that an additional 1.2 million new technology jobs will be created by 2034, thanks to further automation developments.

What workers want

Burnout. Boundaries. Balance. They’ve all become commonplace work terms as the push for prioritising wellbeing at work has become more mainstream.

This is taking place as public awareness and conversation around mental health keeps growing. More than two in five Australians aged 16 – 65 experience mental ill-health at some point in their lives. And in response, there’s not only been a shift in day-to-day conversations in the workplace around boundaries, but workplaces are also taking more responsibility for the mental wellbeing of their people.

Employee support is growing within business – the market size of the Employee Assistance Program Services industry in Australia increased almost six per cent on average per year between 2018 and 2023.

This is evident in SEEK data that shows that mentions of mental health and wellbeing support in job ads have tripled in the past six years, with 25 per cent of job ads now giving a nod to support being available.

Remote work is here to stay

In the lead up to 2020, the number of Australians working from home averaged just four per cent (average across four Census years) and had been in gradual decline since the late ‘90s. This, of course, changed as the world was upended in March 2020.

In 2021, 21 per cent of Australians worked from home. Even those states that did not have stay-at-home mandates at the time of the Census, such as Queensland and South Australia, still recorded a considerable increase in Australians working from home.

Today, for many industries the ability to work from home some of the time remains an expectation among employees. Research for SEEK shows more than a quarter of Australian workers consider it a must-have when looking for a new role.

Work perks

Phones, cars, discounted health insurance, gym memberships, free merchandise – in the late ‘90s and early 2000s these were among the top perks used to attract people to jobs.

But in recent years – and especially during the pandemic recovery where job ads boomed and job seekers gained bargaining power – there has been a notable shift. We saw the focus move from these unrelated-to-work perks, to benefits that support employees to do their work on a more fundamental level.

Today, Aussies find the option to work from home, or flexible working practices the most desirable perk when looking at career prospects.

More jobs, more often

Aussies are staying in jobs for shorter times. The idea that a job is for life is long passed its hey day. And while short stints in jobs are associated with the younger generation – people under 25 spend on average one to two years in a job – older workers are beginning to also follow this trend.

At the end of the last century people aged over 45 spent approximately ten years in a role but today, the average tenure for this group is 6 years and 8 months.

SEEK research shows that people now consider three to four years the optimum time to stay in a role. This works out to around three jobs per decade. This means someone starting out at 18 years of age could have 17 different jobs in their lifetime.

There has also been a shift to part-time jobs over the past 25 years, with the ratio of part-time jobs continuing to climb steadily. Part-time employment in Australia more than doubled between 1980 and 2020, and despite a short plateau during the mining boom, has grown to make up almost 30 per cent of the workforce. Currently, part-time jobs make up 11 per cent of total jobs ads posted on Seek. And for 15 per cent of Australian workers, the ability to work part-time is a must-have when looking for a new role.

You can find out more about the trends impacting the way Australians work here.

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