In December 2023, the Work.ua service launched the possibility of attracting specialists to the Defense Forces of Ukraine. A list of departments and their vacancies was collected on a separate page. After several months of operation, the service summarizes the first results of this initiative.
The first results of the project on recruiting specialists in the Defense Forces show that it is effective. In December 2023, i.e. the first month of project implementation, 146 units posted 821 vacancies. Already in January 2024, the number of departments with job offers reached 286 (+95% until December), and vacancies – 1586 (+93%). Vacancies in the defense forces make up slightly less than 2% of the total number on Work.ua.
Departments that had more job offers:
- Marine Corps of the Ukrainian Armed Forces (93 vacancies),
- Military unit A4085 (52),
- 104th Obr of the TrO Forces (45),
- Military unit A4759 (39),
- Recruiting Center of TRO Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (38).
Units post job offers in different categories because the military needs different professions: both combat and non-combat. In January 2024, the most vacancies were in the following categories (note that one vacancy can be placed in several categories at once):
- 1206 – “Protection, security”;
- 250 – “Transport, auto business”;
- 196 – “Telecommunications and communication”;
- 180 – “Medicine, pharmaceuticals”;
- 145 – “Work specialties, production”.
Today, job offers from the Defense Forces of Ukraine cover almost all categories — 23 out of 28 possible. For example, there are jobs for lawyers, marketers and even directors.
For the most part, candidates who do not have work experience can respond to vacancies from the Defense Forces – 73% of such offers. Accordingly, in 27% of vacancies applicants are expected to have experience. This situation is contrary to the general trends of the labor market, where 35% of job offers are suitable for newcomers, and 65% for people with work experience.
In January, on the Work.ua website, units of the Defense Forces received 20,519 responses from applicants, which is twice as many as in December. Therefore, Ukrainians are interested in vacancies in the army, because the competition for these positions is not lower than the average in the labor market.
However, it is quite uneven. Most often, job seekers respond to vacancies in the following categories:
- “Culture, music, show business” (only a few vacancies were posted, which caused higher competition for these positions);
- “Secretariat, office management”;
- “Finance, bank”;
- “Personnel management, HR”;
- “Accounting, audit”.
But the lowest competition is in the categories “Transport, auto business”, “Medicine, pharmaceuticals”, “Agriculture, agribusiness”. In general, labor professions and medical specialties are currently the most scarce in the labor market.
The gender balance in military recruiting differs slightly from the general situation in the labor market, where the share of men and women is 40% and 60%, respectively. But for the vacancies of the Defense Forces, the shares of applicants responding to vacancies are almost equal: 51% of men and 49% of women. At the same time, mostly women respond to vacancies for doctors, paramedics, accountants, and clerks. Men most often respond to positions such as electrician, dog handler, grenade launcher, sapper, chaplain, unit commander, drone repair engineer, and driver. Approximately the same number of applicants of both sexes responded to the vacancies of web designer, military cook, psychologist, and deputy chief of staff.
Among men and women, people aged 35 to 44 respond most often. But among men there is a tendency that the majority of candidates are people older than 45, while among women we see more activity from young people aged 18-24. It is also interesting that there were several dozen people under the age of 18 among the active applicants.
The distribution of applicants responding to military professions by region of residence is practically no different from the similar distribution of applicants responding to any vacancies on the labor market. This difference remains within the limits of statistical error – does not exceed 1%. For example, residents of the Kharkiv region make up 5% of all applicants active on the labor market, and 4.5% in military recruiting.
