September 2026: What we're seeing across the UK Tech & Digital hiring market

Welcome to the first of our monthly updates from Stockford Recruitment.

With the launch of our new website, we wanted to start doing something a little more regularly around what we're actually seeing in the market.

Not just another recruitment blog telling businesses how to interview people or candidates how to write a CV.

Every month, we're going to share some of what we're seeing and hearing from the businesses and candidates we're speaking to, some of the wider trends across the market and a bit about what's been happening at Stockford Recruitment.

So, what has September looked like?

Is the market starting to pick up?

There are definitely some more positive signs out there.

The latest KPMG and REC UK Report on Jobs showed an increase in permanent staff appointments during August for the first time since September 2022. Temporary billings also increased for a fifth consecutive month.

That doesn't mean the market is suddenly flying again.

ONS figures still show around 702,000 vacancies across the UK between June and August 2026, which was slightly down on the previous quarter.

From our side, though, September has been busy.

We've picked up new roles across Software Engineering, Infrastructure, Digital Marketing, Sales, Operations and Project Management, and we're having more conversations with businesses about hiring plans for the rest of this year and into 2027.

What has changed is how businesses are hiring.

Companies are still prepared to invest in good people, but they're thinking much more carefully about who they bring into the business.

We're seeing fewer hires for the sake of adding headcount and much more focus on what that person is actually coming in to achieve.

Tech hiring is still moving

Despite everything that's happened across the wider employment market, there is still plenty happening within Technology.

REC data released in September showed around 85,000 active IT job postings during August, more than 22% higher than the same period last year.

Experis' latest Tech Talent Outlook also found that 73% of UK Tech and IT employers surveyed were struggling to find the skills they need.

That probably sums the market up quite well.

There might be more people available than there were a couple of years ago, but that doesn't necessarily mean the right people are easy to find.

We're seeing this ourselves.

Clients aren't necessarily struggling to get applications. The challenge is finding somebody who has the right experience, can demonstrate they've actually done what the business needs and is genuinely right for the environment they're joining.

That's where the recruitment process needs to go further than matching keywords on a CV.

One thing we're hearing a lot - ownership

This has probably been one of the biggest themes from our client conversations in September.

Businesses want people who can take ownership.

We've worked on everything from developers and Linux infrastructure engineers through to digital marketers, salespeople, project professionals and senior operational hires this month.

The roles are completely different, but a lot of the conversations have been surprisingly similar.

Can they work things out for themselves?

Can they communicate with different people across the business?

Can they spot a problem and do something about it?

Can they take responsibility for something rather than waiting to be told what to do?

It's particularly important within startups, scaleups and smaller technology businesses.

If you're joining a smaller team, there isn't always another department to pass something over to.

Of course the technical ability still needs to be there, but we're finding that how somebody works is becoming just as important as what they know.

AI is becoming part of the job

Obviously, we can't talk about the technology market in 2026 without AI coming into it somewhere.

There is still huge demand for specialist AI skills. PwC's latest AI Jobs Barometer found specialist AI job postings in the UK had increased significantly, while we're also continuing to see growth in AI-focused engineering roles.

But something we're finding more interesting is how AI is creeping into jobs that aren't actually AI jobs.

Developers are using it.

Marketers are using it.

Sales teams are using it.

Recruiters are definitely using it.

Businesses are starting to look at whether somebody understands how to use these tools properly to make themselves more productive, rather than simply whether they've got "AI" written somewhere on their CV.

We don't think everyone suddenly needs to become an AI specialist.

But knowing how to use it well is quickly becoming another useful skill to have.

A CV only tells you so much

This is something we've put a lot of work into ourselves over the last six months.

A CV tells us what somebody says they can do.

Our job is to find out whether they can actually do it.

Before we start searching on a role, we're spending more time with clients agreeing what really matters.

Not a job description with 20 bullet points where half of them aren't actually essential.

We want to know the five or six things that will determine whether somebody will be successful in the job.

Then we screen against them.

We ask for examples. We dig into the experience. We look at motivations, salary, availability and all the practical things that can derail a process later on.

We've also introduced scoring into our submissions so clients can see how somebody has performed against the criteria we've agreed.

It doesn't replace their interview.

It just means that when a hiring manager gives up an hour of their day to meet somebody we've introduced, they should already have a pretty good idea why we're recommending them.

Remote, hybrid or five days in the office?

We're seeing all three.

We've got clients hiring fully remote positions.

We've got businesses asking people to come in once or twice a week.

And we've got clients who want their teams onsite five days a week.

There doesn't seem to be one model taking over.

What we are seeing is businesses being much clearer about what they want.

And that's fine.

A five-day onsite role isn't impossible to recruit for. You just have to accept that you're working with a smaller pool of people and make sure the opportunity stacks up for somebody travelling into that office every day.

Likewise, we're still speaking to plenty of candidates who actively want to spend time with their team rather than working from their spare bedroom five days a week.

There's no one-size-fits-all answer.

What's been happening at Stockford?

September has been another busy month for us.

We've been working with businesses across Software Engineering, Infrastructure, Digital Marketing, Sales, Operations and Project Management, from growing technology companies through to established digital agencies.

We've also been putting a lot of work into Stockford Recruitment itself.

The new website has been a big part of that.

We've wanted to properly reflect where the business is today, the markets we work across and the way we actually recruit.

We've continued developing our candidate screening and scoring process, improving how we present candidates to clients and looking at how we can use technology to make the recruitment process better without losing the human side of it.

Because ultimately, recruitment is still about people speaking to people.

Technology should make that process better, not replace it.

Heading into the final quarter of 2026

We're positive about what we're seeing heading into Q4.

We're not going to tell you the recruitment market is suddenly booming, because it isn't.

There is still uncertainty out there and businesses are still watching costs.

But companies are hiring.

We're seeing new requirements coming through, we're having conversations about future headcount and there are some encouraging signs in the wider market too.

If there is one thing we'd take from September, it's that businesses are being more considered with their hiring.

And candidates are doing exactly the same when choosing their next employer.

That means both sides need more information before making a decision.

For us, that's where good recruitment should come in.

Understand the business.

Understand the person.

Ask the right questions.

And hopefully make sure the two are right for each other before an interview even takes place.

We'll be back next month with another update on what we're seeing across the market.

If you're hiring across Technology, Digital or Go-to-Market, or you're starting to think about your plans for the rest of 2026 and into 2027, feel free to get in touch.