New all-time high: Around two-thirds of employees regularly think about changing jobs

• 64 percent think about changing jobs at least once a month - up from 53 percent in 2021
• 44 percent think job opportunities are better than in previous years
• More than one in two feel stress and additional workload due to labor shortage, 52 percent are less motivated

The desire amongst employees in Germany for a new job is growing: according to a new representative study of 10,000 respondents by The Stepstone Group. Overall 64 percent are currently thinking about a career change at least once a month - in 2021, the figure was 53 percent. At the same time, 44 percent see their current job opportunities as significantly better than in previous years. In 2020, the year that saw widespread Corona lockdowns, that number was 17 percent.

"People shortage is increasingly playing into job seekers' hands, and they are taking advantage of the opportunities available to them - job changes will therefore become more commonplace for us. The transformation in the labor market is here," says The Stepstone Group Labor Market Expert Dr. Tobias Zimmermann.

HR-managers evaluate their job opportunities particularly well

The widespread shortage of labor is causing HR employees in particular to lookat new prospects: They rate their chances of finding a new job in the next six months as particularly good (61 percent), but lawyers (58 percent), doctors (55 percent) and nursing staff (54 percent) are also optimistic. An analysis of jobs on Stepstone.de paints a similar picture: there are currently 208 percent more social services jobs, 177 percent more healthcare jobs and 56 percent more HR jobs advertised than just before the Corona pandemic began in January 2020.

"This is just the beginning. Demographic changes mean more and more workers will retire and fewer and fewer people will start working. In the future, job seekers will be more likely than ever to choose the employer that is a perfect fit for them. Of course, this poses challenges for companies. But ultimately, everyone benefits when people find the job they are best at. Because then they prefer to go to work and are more productive," says Zimmermann.

Stress and increased workload: employees feel the effects of people shortages

"If employees don't feel comfortable in their current job or simply want to do something else, they are likely to increasingly look for alternatives - also because they are increasingly feeling the effects of the staff shortage first-hand," says Zimmermann. More than half (58 percent) complain about increased workload and stress due to staff shortages in their company, and more than one in two people feel less motivated to go to work (53 percent). The greater pressure on the job is especially evident in nursing where seven out of ten respondents complain of stress and increased strain due to a lack of staff.

"We need to take the pressure off people - and automation is the key to this." says Zimmermann "This can also mean providing people with technical support for some repetitive, administrative tasks. After all, if time-consuming paperwork no longer has to be done by hand in nursing professions, for example, that would be a huge relief - and they can then concentrate on the tasks that are actually important: caring for people."

About the survey

How do people assess their job opportunities on the labor market now and in the future? How high is the willingness to change among employees and how strongly are employees themselves currently affected by the effects of the labor shortage? And how do HR managers view the current labor market situation? To answer these questions, The Stepstone Group surveyed around 10,000 people in July 2023 for the "Pulse Check Labor Market 2023" study. Among them were 1,700 executives and 1,100 HR managers. The results are representative of the working population.