Professionals and tradespeople across Australia’s design and construction industry have significant opportunities in 2026 as employment remains steady and candidate shortages persist.

During a recent interview, Sourceable spoke with Austin Blackburne, Senior Regional Director ANZ at recruitment firm Hays about current employment market conditions across the nation’s architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) sector.

The discussion also covered strategies that workers and employers can adopt to achieve positive outcomes over the year.

Several themes stood out.

(1) Hiring has steadied, but candidate shortages remain

According to Blackburne, hiring activity has steadied following a soft period in the first half of last year.

However, markets remain active compared with historic levels and candidate shortages remain.

This is occurring as the completion of large engineering projects particularly in Melbourne is being offset by strong demand in other states and work in new growth sectors such as data centres.

All this is creating steady market conditions across roles such as engineering, construction management and project delivery.

Turning to architecture, Blackburne says that conditions are more mixed and more subdued. Even here, however, recruitment is picking up in niche segments such as high-end work.

Blackburn’s description of current market conditions is consistent with recent data.

All up, the seasonally adjusted number of people who are employed across Australia’s construction sector in November stood at 1.352 million, according to detailed quarterly data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

This is virtually unchanged compared with the same period one year earlier in November 2024 (1.355 million) but remains fourteen percent or 167,000 above pre-COVID levels of 1.185 million in November 2019.

Meanwhile, data from Jobs and Skills Australia shows that vacancies across key engineering and construction occupations remain elevated despite having eased from recent peaks (see chart).

(data source: Australian Bureau of Statistics)

Blackburne says that this data is consistent with Hays’ own data.

“Our data (Hays’ data) is showing that it’s (hiring activity in design and construction) steady and potentially slightly accelerating,” Blackburne said.

“It’s steady, not surging. Our trends (in Hays’ data) are matching the ABS data. Employment is sitting at 1.352 million as at November 2025 (in the ABS data).

“So it’s flat year-on-year, but it’s still above pre-COVID levels.”

Furthermore, Blackburne stresses that candidate shortages remain.

Pointing to Hays’ own data in the most recent edition of its Hays Salary Survey, he says that 84 percent of employers across the construction sector are reporting skilled worker shortages.

(2) Several activity hotspots

According to Blackburn, hotspots of employment activity are evident across several areas.

Of these, the most significant is data centres – a sector in which new project announcements continue to add to a massive pipeline of work.

This will create opportunities for those who can perform large-scale, concrete warehouse types of construction. This includes not only architects and engineers but also those involved with HVAC, technical work, building services and electrical work.

Another area is modular housing. This is increasingly becoming a sector to watch as several overseas manufacturers now operate in the market.

Finally, niche roles are opening up for those with skills in design for climate resilience and neurodiversity.

(Austin Blackburne. Image via LinkedIn)

In terms of locations, Blackburne says that:

• The biggest candidate shortages are in South Australia, where activity is being driven by work on renewable energy, defence and civil infrastructure projects such as the final section of the North South Road upgrade.
• In Queensland, a market which is already active on account of population growth and residential expansion is likely to expand further this year as works progress on Olympic Games venues.
• Across both New South Wales and Victoria, vacancy activity remains active as ongoing infrastructure work continues to draw labour from other sectors such as housing.
• In Western Australia, existing skills shortages are likely to continue as work associated with mining, energy and resources draw upon engineering and trade skills. This, Blackburn says, was not so much the case in the first half of last year but is coming into its own this year.

(Data centre image: Ai via freepix)

Further tightening in 2026

Moving forward, Blackburne expects the market to tighten further this year.

This will be driven by the volume of work in the pipeline.

In data centres, Blackburn says that the pipeline of activity is massive, with around $20 billion worth of project announcements in Victoria over the past month alone.

Whilst Sydney and Melbourne remain the focus of data centre development, benefits are likely to spread as data centres are planned on the Gold Coast, in Tasmania and even in regional Victoria.

Added to this are a significant number of defence projects, a growing pipeline of residential work demonstrated by rising building approvals, grid-related energy projects such as new battery construction (along with energy/water infrastructure that is needed to accommodate data centre requirements) and even recovering office building approvals in New South Wales.

“The pipeline is such that it’s (design and construction work) going to be a very in demand market in coming years,” Blackburne said.

(Ai image of workers using a forklift to lift a battery pack into position. Image via freepix.)

More women needed

In terms of strategies, Blackburne says that employers need to attract more women into their workforce.

To do this, they need to invest in training, provide attractive career pathways, adopt flexible work practices and develop a culture in which parents are encouraged and supported in terms of tasks such as school drop offs and pickups.

Already, there are promising signs.

Over the past ten years, aforementioned ABS data indicates that female participation in Australia’s construction workforce increased from 11.3 percent (one woman for every 7.8 men) in November 2015 to 13.2 percent (one woman for every 6.6 men) in November 2025.

“I know a lot of switched on organisations that are trying to align themselves with being employers of choice for women and are trying to make the industry one that women would consider and to identify associated industries where there might be transferable skills,” Blackburne said.

“Smart employers are looking at flexibility, they are looking at skills shortages and they are looking at how they can invest in a support mechanism for recruiting women into the sector.

“How do we find (for example) another 20,000 electricians nationally? We’ve got to look at 50 percent of the population (who are women). They are more than capable of doing the work. You’ve got to attract them, you’ve got to train them.

“I think that needs to be a focus and is a focus of a lot of our clients.”

(image via freepix)

Gain experience in growing areas

For workers, Blackburne encourages people to consider gaining exposure to the high growth areas.

“It’s pretty clear what the emerging trends will be,” he said.

“So if you were, say, an electrician, and you hadn’t had exposure to a data center or an AI project, joining an organisation that has some exposure to that is probably a smart thing to do.

“The same applies if you see modular housing as an area that’s going to expand and you’re a chippy. Joining an organisation or having a view to what that is and understanding how to get into that sector is probably not a bad strategy.”

(Gaining experience in sectors such as prefabrication can help engineers and skilled tradespeople to capitalise on opportunities in emerging sectors. Image by DC Studio via freepix)

When deciding upon this, Blackburn stresses the need to carefully consider what this entails. This is particularly the case with sectors such as renewable energy where much of the work is in regional areas.

“With energy and the associated infrastructure that goes with energy, you’ve probably got to travel,” Blackburn said.

“A lot of these battery farms etc. are in remote or regional areas.

“So is that possible? Have you made an allowance in your life to be able to do that?

“That’s where the trend is. And if you have to do a year on a project to get that skill, to then be able to utilise it and expand your career horizons, these are things you need to think about.

“So what would you have to do to work on a battery farm outside of Bendigo? What would it mean for you and your family?

“And would you pull that off? If you did, it would give you that critical renewable grid experience as a trade.”

Overall, Blackburne says that the forward outlook is bright.

“On the face of it, I think that we are seeing a better start to the year this year that we were last year,” he said.

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