My ‘Land a Dream Tech Job’ webinar is intentionally now, not New Year 2026

Right now, it’s that time of the IT job-search season when technology job board professionals, like Free-Work users, should start thinking about 2026.

And with ‘thought,’ should come ‘action:’

• Job Application Upgrade: Perhaps careful planning to strengthen your next online tech job application?

• Tech Position Protection: A few quick moves to safeguard your tech career before the November 26th budget potentially hits hiring budgets?

• Optimal Job Outreach: How about some shrewd steps, ahead of the usually quieter IT recruitment month of December, to get closer to your dream technology job?

Before I explain with stats, studies and a summary of 2025, why 2026 risks being too late to start to take charge of your IT career, join my Thursday webinar if your New Year 2026 resolutions list will include:

“Land Dream Tech Job”

I’m Matt Craven, founder and career expert at The CV & Interview Advisors (CVIA).

During my 20 years of effectively handing out ‘maps’ to candidates to help them better navigate the technology job ‘maze’, one thing has been almost constant:

The start of a New Year sees a surge in technology job applications

Here is an overview of studies from January 2024 spelling out that truism, almost word-for-word!

Yet this year (by which I mean ‘2026’), there’s a rub.

This incoming New Year surge in the number of applicants per IT job advert comes at a time when candidate availability is already at a historical high.

Don’t take just my word for it.  

Candidate availability is at its highest since 2020, and surged in October 2025

Figures released by the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) on November 14th 2025, showed candidate availability as being at “the highest [level] seen since late 2020.”

And in October 2025 (the latest month for which REC data are available), the REC further warned that “steep upturns were seen for both permanent and temporary staff availability”.

Still want to wait until the New Year tech job ‘bun fight’ begins to take charge of your tech career?

No, good choice, I didn’t think that you would!

Instead, join my Thursday ‘dream tech job’ webinar to get ahead of the hordes

Next, let me make an autumn-winter acknowledgement.

I know that it’s easy to put these things off, especially when your office is colder, the days are shorter, and the distractions are many.

Whether you join me on Thursday (N.B. webinar attendees can ask their own question about how best to land their own dream tech job), I want to cite more than just stats and studies to prove why waiting until 2026 to upgrade your IT job-search strategy would be a mistake.

The torturous tale of tech job-seekers in 2025

Cast your mind back to how 2025 unfolded for many IT job board users.

Regardless of whether they were ‘on-contract’ or in active employment, a fair chunk of job board users would say that, this time a year ago, they had anything ranging from a keen eye to a half-open eye on the IT jobs market.

But after Christmas 2024, January arrived with the usual throng of job-searching activity, including the astonishingly high 42% of candidates who were either already looking or planning to find a new job in 2025.

Then ‘Blue Monday’ hit, and soon afterwards, thankfully (finally!), jaded January was over.

I heard wannabe IT contractors and aspiring technology staff telling themselves that in both February and March:

“Things Will Pick Up”

For some tech job candidates, not just online-only ones, a few weeks of proactivity followed.

Yet soon it was Easter, then a bank holiday weekend, and subsequently the tax year-end. All are excuses to postpone any major career decisions until early summer.

Two months later, summer indeed arrived.

Positively, the weather improved. Around this time, many folks — no longer just tech folks — worked from home.

Despite still being stuck in their non-dream IT job, many techies convinced themselves:

“Life Isn't All That Bad”

Based on enquiries to us around this time (and more specifically, responses that my team received when we chased those enquiries), we know that this justification was used by some to delay their tech career moves, further putting off IT job-search strategies until the autumn.

Autumn 2025 duly arrived, offering its never-ending, still ongoing stream of depressing headlines, relating to wars, protests, and government embarrassments.

Waiting for the other Autumn Budget 2025 shoe to drop

Next up, it’s now - November - and the talk is of the impending ‘nuclear’ Autumn Budget 2025.

So technologists have found cause to pause again, waiting for the other shoe, that is, our current chancellor’s second budget, to drop. I’ve heard at least a handful of techies and tech hiring managers say:

“Let’s See What Rachel Reeves Has to Say and Make Decisions Afterwards.”

I shall now reach for the crystal ball, because we’re not yet in December, but next month is perhaps even easier to outline.

It’s the month of Christmas. A festive feeling descends and has the effect of confirming that, despite 12 passing months, another year has gone by with very little changed.

Oh, and then brace yourself for January when HMRC will be on at contractors to complete self-assessment returns! Some tech workers may even face a tax bill that decimates any disposable income.

With this summary of 2025, I didn’t mean to come across  all ‘doom and gloom.’

But the above is a cautionary tale, oversimplified, yes, but based largely on the last 12 months in the eyes of tech job-seekers. And that period should tell you in no uncertain terms:

“The Tech Job World Waits For No One.”

To that end, I implore IT job-seekers - even if you’re sitting pretty with a good rate, or a nice technology employer on your CV - run a SWOT analysis of your career.

At the very minimum, run this shorter ‘job board user-friendly’ version of a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats (SWOT) analysis

1.    Assess your IT job security.

2.    Score yourself, honestly, in the tech career strategy stakes.

3.    Pinpoint what may be on the horizon for your sector, employer, skills, etc.

Ask yourself the big AI/Automation question before 2026…

As to what’s on your horizon as a tech job board user, have you thought about AI and what it means for your profession or role?

Have you considered how automation might reshape your industry or skills offering in the next few years?

What about your own employer’s SWOT? Are they financially strong?

Are redundancies being discussed in a dark room somewhere, or, if you’re contract/temporary/freelance, are renewals likely to be fewer and far between in Q1 2026?

These are uncomfortable questions, but important ones to ask and answer.

Who in tech will get blindsided in 2026?

The people who get blindsided are usually the ones who assumed stability would last forever.

This is why planning is so important. A bit of foresight can prevent a sticky wicket later.

With that in mind, here are three main areas I’d encourage all technology careerists to focus on before 2026 bites.

1. Career Planning

Career planning is often talked about but rarely done well.

Most people only start thinking strategically about their career when they are forced to, which is the worst time to make decisions.

Good planning starts long before you reach a point of urgency.

Begin with a straightforward SWOT analysis, or the three-part one above.

Four things to answer to gauge tech job stability  

Either way, make sure you have the answers to four things:

1. Whether your role feels secure.

2. Whether your organisation/employer/customer is stable.

3. Whether your industry is shrinking.

4. Whether automation/AI is likely to reshape your job.

The autopilot test

If you can honestly answer these four IT-centred career questions, you can pull yourself out of ‘autopilot.’

And you’ll know that you’ve successfully switched off ‘autopilot’ if you can cite and detail some external pressures that might hit your IT role or position.

Once you have this clarity, build a Career Autobiography ©.

What is a Career Autobiography©?

A Career Autobiography © is a working document — a log, if you will, that contains every skill, project, achievement, task, and strength you possess.

It is more detailed than a CV (think of it as a spreadsheet with at least 50 case studies in it), because it is not written for anyone else but you.

When you compare this document to the requirements of the next technology role(s) you might target, you will see skills ‘gaps’ emerge.

These ‘gaps’ (i.e. a gap emerges where the role is asking for an attribute or skill which your Career Autobiography does not list) provide you with a steer on what development you need — in New Year 2026 and beyond —  before you’ll land such a dream job.

2. Personal Branding

In the context of career self-appraisal with a view to upgrading your tech assignment, personal branding is about the professional ‘footprint’ you present.

The two most important personal branding tools for technology job applicants are your CV and LinkedIn profile. If either of these is weak or unclear, your chances of being hired for any tech job (let alone your dream tech job) are suffering.

LinkedIn as a tech job hopeful, a close-up:

A solid LinkedIn profile makes a difference to your tech job prospects.

Tech recruiters search for people who match the titles, keywords, skills, experience, and track record they need. If your LinkedIn profile does not reflect the roles you want, you will not show up in searches.

CV as a tech job hopeful, a close-up:

An IT job hopeful’s CV is just as important.

As 2025 comes to a close, a good CV still needs to forensically but subtly match the job advert.

Your CV also needs corresponding achievements and should communicate a clear and compelling ‘value proposition’ (for more details, see the next, third area I recommend tech careerists looking to upgrade should focus on).

Oh, and forget the ChatGPT-written CV — another 200 people sent that exact same CV, making it the quickest way not to stand out in 2026.

Having a good CV and LinkedIn profile to hand right now, or being what I call ‘job market-ready,’ gives you an advantage. If someone contacts you about a tech role that pays more or offers better security than your current IT post, you want to be in a position where you can respond immediately.

In 2026, we’ll see the best computing, digital, and IT roles move quickly, meaning you won’t have two weeks to get your CV and LinkedIn profile in order.

3. Professional Awareness/Value Proposition

A surprising number of experienced IT professionals cannot explain their value.

This inability makes securing what should be their ‘standard’ IT job, quite apart from their ‘dream’ job, quite the challenge.  

Typically, such an IT professional knows their day-to-day duties, including their responsibilities, but they cannot articulate the outcomes they deliver.

When asked about strengths or achievements, these otherwise capable techies default to ‘soft skills,’ or resort to using tech-term-filled clichés.

How to create a value proposition: top 3 ‘must-haves’

To articulate a value proposition in pursuit of a standard or even dream tech job, candidates should be able to articulate three things:

1. The problems you solve

Employers, organisations, and other prospective customers want solutions.

They want someone who improves things, such as re-engineering processes, reducing risk, growing revenue, or strengthening delivery.

If you cannot explain these things, you will be overlooked.

2. The abilities that set you apart

Skills and experience are no longer enough.

Ability is what employers look for.

It is the difference between performing a task and performing it well. It’s all about impact, not just turning up and doing your job.

3. Achievements that prove that ability

Your CV should be at least 30% weighted towards outcomes.

Outcomes demonstrate your effectiveness in a way that no simple task could. Achievements show how you made a difference and show your commercial value.

What unemployed techies of 2025 will tell you…

In IT or other key sectors, your career is crucial to your happiness. It underpins your financial security and affects your mental well-being.

Remember, you spend a third of your life working (sadly, perhaps)!

So, when your job is good, life is good; but when your job is unfulfilling, unstable, or highly stressful, everything else becomes harder.

I would put it second only to health in terms of importance.

Speak to anyone in tech who is unemployed today, or anyone in the IT contractor jobs market who is ‘on the bench’ (combined; that’s everyone you’ll face competing with in the New Year IT job search ‘bun fight’), and most will tell you the same thing.

They’ll say they wish they’d been more proactive before becoming jobless.

Hindsight, of course, is a wonderful thing.

But right now, if you’re gainfully employed or on-contract, you can take heed and avoid sleepwalking into redundancy or a painful gap between contracts.

There is no substitute for being proactive.

There is no sense in waiting until New Year 2026 to be proactive.

Are you doing the same thing over and over, and expecting different results?

Rather, if you want 2026 to be different, maybe place more emphasis on planning your career and less on planning your next holiday. The money spent on a weekend away could be invested in a career coach. The time spent scrolling through social media could be redirected into learning how to strengthen your CV, building your personal brand, or planning your next tech career move.

To get started, here are the details of the webinar we’ll be running this Thursday, November 20th, exclusively for Free-Work users.

“How to Get Any Tech Job: A Comprehensive, Step-By-Step Guide”

Our Thursday webinar will provide you with a clear, structured approach to finding any tech job you’d like.

The midday webinar covers:

• How to assess your tech employment and IT career situation.

• How to identify your skills ‘gaps’ versus your target job’s requirements.

• How to build a strong CV.

• Where and when you can position yourself for the best IT roles.

• How to master tech job interviews.

My invitation as YOUR potentially new technology career coach…

If you want 2026 to be the year when you took control of your future as a technologist, instead of letting circumstances dictate and rival IT job applicants overwhelm you in the New Year, this webinar is a very smart place to start.