PETALING JAYA: The number of job vacancies advertised online posted an increase of 3.5% in the first quarter of 2023 (Q4’22: 7.5%) to 211,509 (Q4’22: 204,420), according to the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DoSM)
During this quarter, there were 23,339 new establishments offering job vacancies compared with 12,256 establishments in Q4’22. On a year-on-year basis, the number of job vacancies registered a double-digit growth of 32.9% compared with 7.3% in Q4’22.
On a monthly basis. most of the job vacancies were posted in March 2023 with 96,688 vacancies which comprised a share of 45.7% in Q1’23. In the meantime, there were 65,297 and 49,524 vacancies in February and January 2023, respectively.
As for job vacancies by occupation category, almost half of the vacancies were concentrated in the professionals with 47.9% or 101,214 vacancies. This was followed by technicians and associate professionals (17.5%), managers (13.8%) and clerical support workers (8.7%).
The hottest jobs during the quarter with higher demand were advertising and marketing professionals, managing directors and chief executives, accountants and auditors, administrative associate professionals and software developers.
Looking at the job vacancies by overall economic sector, more than half were largely in the services sector, accounted 54.9% or 116,163 vacancies in Q1’23.
Concerning the analysis of job vacancies by economic activity, the highest number was posted by wholesale and retail trade (35,956), followed by manufacturing (21,499), professional, scientific and technical activities (13,852) and financial and insurance/takaful activities (13,326).
Popular jobs offered in the Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) category was advertising and marketing professionals occupation which registered the highest number of vacancies (17,409). This was followed by administrative associate professionals (8,261) and software developers (6,528).
In contrast, the highest demand jobs for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) category were technician (2,005), project manager (1,667) and software engineer (1,643). As for the critical occupation list (COL), the top three jobs were advertising and marketing professionals (17,409), managing directors and chief executives (9,335) and accountants and auditors (8,605).
In terms of job vacancies at the state level, Kuala Lumpur continued to record the highest job vacancies at 62,727 during the quarter. This was followed by Selangor and Johor which registered 39,990 and 12,150 vacancies respectively. Labuan recorded the lowest number with 125 advertisements.
Pertaining to the most in-demand skills in the labour market, having a valuable skills and competencies can increase the success of an individual career path. Hence, according to these statistics, the most in-demand soft skills stated by the employers are English, communication, Bahasa Malaysia, marketing and planning.
Meanwhile, Mandarin, analysis, filing, Microsoft Office and project management were the top demanded hard skills during the period. Thus, in order to remain competitive in the labour market, jobseekers should equip themselves with the skills required based on demand by the employers.
