It’s been a bumpy ride for HR & Admin professionals in Southeast Asia this year, with the demand for talent in this sector showing either negative or stagnant growth across three key markets.

After experiencing months of decline, job postings for HR professionals are still reporting negative growth at -1% in Malaysia between August 2015 and August 2016, according to the Monster Employment Index (MEI). Despite still being a year-on-year drop, this is a slight improvement from the -9% recorded for July.

Demand in the Philippines is still growing at 4% year-on-year, however, there is a significant drop from the 25% registered in July.  In Singapore, online hiring activity of HR professionals has remained in stagnant negative growth at -8% year-on-year, thus indicating only a minor change from the previous month.

The MEI is a monthly record of multiple industries and occupations that shows the highest and lowest growth in online recruitment activity in Singapore, Malaysia and Philippines.

HR & Admin jobs:

“HR & Admin professionals are still necessary hires for businesses in Malaysia and the Philippines – although the occupation has dropped significantly in the latter, where it was the top growth job in July, according to the MEI,” said Sanjay Modi, Managing Director at Monster.com – APAC and Middle East.

“This decline is likely due to an evening-out of the sector, which has seen some tremendous growth in the Philippines, thanks to the overall rise in employment in the country. Malaysia is seeing some increasing hiring activity across the IT, Oil & Gas and Manufacturing sectors, which could have bumped up the need for HR professionals to better manage this recruitment and demand for talent. On the other hand, Singapore’s HR landscape remains rather stagnant in comparison, even though industries like IT and Hospitality are experiencing a real boom.”

Singapore Highlights

• Singapore reported zero change in online hiring activity in August 2016
• The IT, Telecom/ISP and BPO/ITES sector reported the steepest growth in online hiring activity at 14% year-over-year, followed by Hospitality at 13%
• The BFSI sector reported the steepest decline in hiring, at -5
• Professionals in Software, Hardware, Telecom jobs are in the greatest demand

Malaysia Highlights:

• Malaysia experienced a -3% decline in e-recruitment activity in August 2016
• The IT, Telecom/ ISP and BPO/ ITES sector had the strongest annual growth at 10%, while the BFSI sector reported steepest annual decline at -13%
• Sales & Business Development roles reported the biggest annual growth in hiring at 16%, while Customer Service talent were the least in demand at -34% year-over-year

Philippines Highlights:

• Online recruitment registered 4% year-over-year growth in August 2016
• The Education and Logistic, Courier/ Freight/ Transportation, Import/ Export, Shipping industries remain the fastest-growing job sectors, with 27% and 23% overall year-on-year growth in hiring activity respectively.
• The IT, Telecom/ ISP sector saw the greatest decline at -4% year-over-year.
• Purchase/ Logistics/ Supply Chain talent are in high demand with 23% growth annually, while Customer Service roles saw the steepest decline at -5%.

The Monster Employment Index is a monthly gauge of online job posting activity, based on a real-time review of millions of employer job opportunities culled from a large representative selection of career websites and online job listings across Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines. The Index does not reflect the trend of any one advertiser or source, but is an aggregate measure of the change in job listings across the industry.

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