Digital Nomadity Labour Market Trends Research Now Available in English

• August 26, 2024
• admin

Digitalisation has now reached all spheres of economic and social life and has become an integral part of the everyday lives of people and businesses. While Hungary performs well (above the EU average) in some areas of the digital ecosystem (e.g. digital infrastructure), it has been lagging behind the EU in other components for many years.

In terms of overcoming the disadvantage, it is particularly worrying that Hungary is significantly below the European average in the field of digital readiness of employees and small businesses, and the proportion of those with high-level IT skills is also low.

As a result, IT and digital labour shortages are now one of the main limiting factors threatening the development of the digital economy in Hungary, causing increasingly serious problems for multinational enterprises present on the domestic and Hungarian markets.

In addition, the proportion of jobs requiring a high level of digital readiness on the demand side of the labour market is projected to increase further in the coming years, while on the supply side the number of skilled workers falling short of market expectations will increase, i.e. labour shortages will continue to increase.

As a side-effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, many businesses (IT and non-IT) have enabled their IT and digital workers to work remotely (home office), opening up the prospect of working as digital nomads for many. This trend threatens to increase the number of domestic IT professionals choosing to work abroad for financial reasons or for other reasons
(e.g. career goals, environmental change, etc.), thus further increasing the shortage of IT professionals in Hungary.

The aim of the research was to explore the extent to which teleworking, including working as a digital nomad, has become widespread among Hungarian IT professionals and its impact on the IT labour market, especially in view of the employers’ home office practices in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. We would also like to understand the extent to which the high availability of jobs for foreign employers from home poses a threat to the domestic labour market.

Conclusions

The international literature and the primary research carried out within the framework of the present research have also shown the radical spread of various forms of teleworking (e.g. home office, digital nomadity), while formerly traditional office work in whole or in part is declining both globally and in Hungary.

Looking ahead, these trends are expected to increase further, as confirmed both by respondents’ expectations and their plans for their own future, with 93% of respondents saying they would work remotely in an ideal world and only 3% preferring to work exclusively in an office environment.

The spectacular spread of various forms of teleworking (including digital nomadity) already entails the risk in the short term that an increasing proportion of domestic IT professionals can work abroad or from home abroad, which may further increase the already aggravating IT shortage in Hungary.

Download today and get acquainted with the English version of the research prepared by Századvég for the Governmental Information Technology Development Agency in the framework of the project GINOP-3.1.1-VEKOP-15 “Encouraging and supporting cooperation between educational institutions and ICT enterprises”, in short “Programme your future!”