February’s Eye on ESI Illustrates an Exploding ESI Job Market

This month’s Eye on ESI featured Michael Quartararo, president of ACEDS, Jared Coseglia, founder and CEO of TRU Staffing Partners and special guest Rose Jones, partner at Hilgers Graben law firm. Coseglia began the discussion by informing the participants about where the trends and data discussed during the webinar originated from:

Coseglia: We have a wealth of data to share with everyone today. I want to everyone to know that the market is shifting very quickly and it’s starting to look the 2021-22 ESI job market. We’ll discuss the huge increases in demand, compensation, volume of jobs, acceleration of skillsets, reinvention, etc.

These are the hot jobs the TRU recruiters are seeing and as you can ee from the slide below, there are still a lot of jobs in the middle of the marketplace:

Also, we’re seeing salaries and the number of jobs accelerate because litigation demand is through the roof.

TRU Trends from February

Coseglia: Since December, the TRU recruiters have seen a three times growth increase in the volume of available ESI jobs. Rose, do you agree that this is an industry trend everywhere in the US?

Jones: The industry is growing significantly. I’m surprised it is only three times higher since December. We are seeing a significant bump in litigation. It’s growing much faster than I expected.

Coseglia: That flows right into the next bullet point. The speed of hire is accelerating rapidly. The chart below shows a dramatic shift in the timeline to staff up. We’re seeing jobs for management and high-level executives and how the speed to hire is accelerating as the need grows more urgent. We’ve cut the speed to hire more than in half since Q3 of last year.

In the midmarket range, the timing has also been cut in half from 65 days to only a month from first interview to offer acceptance. Because the jobs have increased, the competition has also increased. We find that 87% of the placements we make come in the first wave of candidates we send. This means that the clients are making deliberate choices and are feeling confident about making decisions in less than a month.

The slide also shows how fast the contract market is moving.

It takes less than a week to select an experienced contractor for urgent open roles. Rose, who do you compete for speed?

Jones: You need to be sure you are working with the right partner who brings the talent to you. In this hiring market, you need to move quickly. You need to handle the interview process expeditiously. I want the right culture fit and to ensure the candidate has the right skillsets we require.

Coseglia: I would add that you also need to look for the outliers in the interview process. Sometimes there is a stakeholder who delays things a week or two that causes the entire interview cycle to potentially derail. We are 100% moving into a candidate’s marketplace now with the number of open roles available.

Speed of hire ties into another [pint on the Trends slide: the likelihood of offer acceptance . As the job market gets more competitive, the number of offers increases. In Q4 of last year, there was a 75% likelihood that a candidate would accept the first offer.

However, now the market is heading back to where we were in 2022. I predict we’ll see those types of numbers soon. It will demonstrate how important being first matters. So for the next 60-90 days being first and being fast gives the hiring manager a competitive advantage. I expect the second and third quarter job market to be explosive.

Back to the trends slide, we’re up to the third and fourth bullets. First, there is a shift happening on the corporate side of business where loyalties are aligning with individuals and not brands. See the slide below. In this quote of mine, I reference the new rainmaker in the Am Law 200.

We’ve got one on the call today. Second, what makes Rose so special is her skillsets around innovation and what corporations now require of their outside counsels. Rose, can you help us break down the hottest ESI skills in demand?

Jones: So many of us have tried to change the narrative of what defines an ESI professional. In the past, they may have been seen as less important contributors. We are showing corporations how valuable ediscovery pros and the folks they partner with. Second, we’ve done a good job of building the story with the new ESI beginners who are becoming the corporate in-house counsel who are making key decisions. That’s important because they are ones trying to figure out how to work with ediscovery in the new world. They have a better understanding of what it takes to execute a document review with these new technologies. Therefore, Corporate America now understands what it means to have unique data sets and how to extract it. And therefore you become very valuable.

Coseglia: What we’re seeing on the staffing side is that people will pay a premium for candidates with that expertise. For example, a hiring manager I’m currently working with will pay more for a candidate with Relativity aiR experience. Rose, tell us specifically about GenAI experience.

Jones: Relativity aiR for review, privilege or case strategy is just the beginning. I think it is necessary for ESIers to understand the technology and where they fit in and in what roles. GenAI is available to everyone in the world, so people know what it can do. You need to be able to apply it to every area of ediscovery.

Coseglia: Next trend: fully remote work is mostly contract work. Most of these jobs are still leaning toward law firms. Law firms want their people in the office at least two or three days a week.

Then, while burnout is currently still the number one motivator for candidates to enter the job market, I believe that will change soon to be compensation. People now want more money because of the increased number of available jobs. Also, people want the jobs dealing with GenAI if they have the skills.

It’s important to note on the next point that vendor hiring has increased but has not yet surpassed law firm hiring.

Lastly, salaries have jumped up for offers accepted in January by more than 10%. That’s big shift from last year where the average bump was around 8%. People are getting those increases because there are more jobs, increased competition and we haven’t seen the counteroffer war yet.

Jones: I am so happy to see that because folks in our industry deserve to be paid more. As an industry we bring a great deal of value and bring an enormous amount of talent forward.

This slide speaks to the compensation increases. We’re seeing the range of jobs between $150k to $200k increase by 6% just this year. We’ve also increased leadership opportunities by 5% to 15% from last year. Right now, we’re seeing nothing below $100k. There is nothing much available for entry-level people. We do need to increase this because the industry must grow.

The slide below shows that middle-market salaries went up about 10% to 20%. We’ve organized this by tiers now instead of location because the market has become more democratized now. First tier is big cities, second tier medium markets, etc.

On the vendor side, we put a big red X through Technician because we haven’t placed a role in that area in a year. We’re missing a generation of talent.

These trends are changing quickly as the ESI job market quickly evolves. Be sure to reach out to TRU Staffing Partners if you are considering entering the market as either a candidate or a hiring manager. We can help you find the person or opportunity to fit your needs.