Which companies are hiring technologists right now? 

For the answer, we turned to Burning Glass, which collects and analyzes millions of job postings from across the country. As it turns out, some of the nation’s biggest companies are hiring despite the COVID-19 pandemic—especially ones in vital areas such as e-commerce, cloud, and defense. Take a look at the chart, which is based on job postings over the past 90 days:

There are some interesting tidbits here. For example, Boeing is on the list, even though it recently announced plans to lay off 12,000 workers due to the combined effects of the pandemic and the grounding of the 737 MAX. IBM, yet another ranking firm, has likewise confirmed that it will enact layoffs (possibly in the thousands, according to news reports, although the company has yet to confirm). 

Other companies on the list have seen their business spike during the pandemic, including Amazon and Facebook (although in Facebook’s case, the surge in demand for its services hasn’t necessarily been met by increased ad revenue). These firms need a variety of technologists from data analysts and cloud architects to sysadmins and cybersecurity experts, to build, maintain, and secure their platforms. Moreover, companies of this size often have the funds to survive adverse economic conditions much longer than smaller startups. 

Financial institutions, defense companies, and healthcare firms are also demanding that technologists join their ranks. Many banks, hedge funds, and other finance-related companies have spent the past several years trying to cast themselves as “tech firms,” aggressively embracing cutting-edge technologies such as machine learning and cloud infrastructure. Healthcare firms have proceeded along similar lines, exploring many of the same technologies in hope of saving costs and accelerating research. That’s the kind of hiring that often endures despite a pandemic. 

If you’re on the market and applying for new jobs, remember to craft your application materials in light of the current moment. That means emphasizing your remote-work capabilities and skills. Show that you’re efficient with budgets, and that you can even create new lines of business that produce revenue. Now’s the time when companies are looking for especially impactful candidates.