Study Finds Employers Optimistic About Hiring for Remainder of 2023

The job market for the rest of 2023 looks positive and employers feel good about hiring, according to a recent survey from The Harris Poll commissioned by Express Employment Professionals.

The study’s results found 80% of companies feel positive about the hiring outlook, including hopeful (45%), optimistic (42%), and confident (41%). That positive sentiment is up from 75% in late 2022. Three out of five hiring managers (62%) said their company plans to increase the number of employees through the end of the year.

Companies said they were hiring, in part, to manage increased volumes of work (52%), fill newly created positions (48%), fill open positions due to employee turnover (42%), and handle expansion into other categories or markets (28%, down from 34% in late 2022).

Of note, while many companies plan to increase their employee count, 28% report planning to stay at about the same number or make no change to the number of employees in the second half of 2023. Just a small number of companies (7%) said they plan to reduce their employee count in 2023, citing reducing costs (59%), aligning with the decline in demand at the company (31%), and outsourcing certain functions (26%). Perhaps not surprisingly, 1 in 6 (16%) said they were reducing employee numbers because of the increasing use of automation/technology.

The survey was conducted online between June 13 and June 26, among 1,010 U.S. hiring decision-makers.