Seeing double: Radiology job seekers twice that of postings

Based on the ACR Jobs Board, there are twice as many people searching for radiology jobs as there are job postings, according to a study published online Jan. 13 by the Journal of the American College of Radiology.

“Monitoring the status of the radiology job market is important for planning the future of our specialty. Although the ACR Jobs Board represents only one mechanism by which radiology jobs are made available, several important conclusions can be drawn from the data provided by this resource,” wrote lead author Anand M. Prabhakar, MD, of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and colleagues. They therefore designed a retrospective study to evaluate data from the ACR Jobs Board in order to analyze trends in the radiology job market from October 2010 to June 2013.

Prabhakar and colleagues specifically examined the number of new job seekers who signed up for ACR Jobs Board accounts, the number of new jobs posted, and the total number of times job postings were clicked each month over the 33-month period. The researchers then defined a competitive index using the ratio of new job seekers to new job postings in a given month. Additionally, the number of clicks on job postings was used as a measure of the job seekers’ overall activity.

The study’s result demonstrated a generally stable supply of new job postings over the course of the research. The average number of new job postings monthly was 84, while the mean number of job seekers per month was 168. Job competitiveness was highest in the fall of 2010 and 2011 and lowest in the winter and spring of 2011 and 2012. The researchers found no significant difference in the competitive index between 2011 and 2012. In 2011, the mean number of clicks on the job postings per month was 69,046. This number significantly increased to 153,558 in 2012. The clicks peaked in January 2013 at 290,472.

The study was limited by several factors, including the researchers’ inability to differentiate between new and reposted jobs, use of the blanket label “new job seekers” for all who registered for accounts, and the assumption that every job seeker was a new graduate.

“Obtaining a job in radiology is arguably one of the most important and daunting tasks new trainees in the profession face,” wrote the study’s authors. “Expansion of the data collected by the ACR Jobs Board will better allow researchers to secondarily leverage this valuable resource to positively guide and shape the radiology job market for radiologists in future years.”