Hiring
Two of Britain’s largest professional recruiters reported this week that their U.S. businesses grew in the quarter ended Sept. 30, and both credited construction. The gains stood out against continued declines in Germany, France and the U.K., and neither company described a broad recovery in U.S. white-collar hiring.
Hays published its quarterly update on Oct. 12 and Michael Page followed with its third-quarter trading update on Oct. 13. Both statements cover the three months to Sept. 30, 2026. Because the two companies measure growth differently, the figures below are kept on each firm’s own basis.
Michael Page: U.S. up 7%, construction up 12%
Michael Page said group gross profit was £190.5 million in the quarter, up 1.5% in constant currency and 1.4% as reported. The company called it its first quarter of growth since the fourth quarter of 2022.
The Americas region produced £41.1 million of gross profit, up 8.9% in constant currency. In the United States, which the company said was its second-largest market in the quarter, gross profit grew 7%, which it described as two years of consecutive quarterly growth. Construction, its largest U.S. discipline, rose 12%, and manufacturing grew again. The company added a clear limit: it is “yet to see a broad-based recovery with tough conditions in most other disciplines.”
Elsewhere, Germany, the group’s largest market, fell 7%, France fell 11% and the U.K. fell 5.5%. Michael Page ended the quarter with 4,851 fee earners, 63 fewer than at the end of June, and kept its expectation of roughly £29 million in 2026 operating profit.
Hays: U.S. net fees up 8% on a like-for-like basis
Hays reports net fees on a like-for-like basis, which strips out currency moves and businesses it has closed or sold. On that basis, group net fees fell 3% in its fiscal first quarter. Permanent placement fees fell 7% on a 12% drop in volumes, while temporary and contracting fees slipped 1%. Its September net fee growth rate was minus 2%.
In the Americas, net fees rose 9%, which Hays attributed to “strong growth in Construction & Property,” new outsourcing contracts coming on stream and higher consultant productivity. U.S. net fees grew 8% and Canada’s 12%. Reuters, reporting on the company’s investor call, tied the U.S. strength to construction demand in the data center and energy sectors. Hays’ construction and property business also grew 28% in Germany, where the company cited infrastructure and energy work, even as total German fees fell 6%.
Hays cut consultant headcount by 9% from a year earlier, excluding businesses it is exiting, and said it expects “stable market conditions in the near term.”
Why it matters for job seekers
The two reports point in the same direction: in the U.S., recruiter demand is strongest for construction and related project roles, while most other professional specialties remain soft. For candidates in construction-related fields, that is consistent with employers still paying for outside help to fill roles. For job seekers in most other professional specialties, Michael Page’s own description of “tough conditions” suggests no broad turnaround yet.
Both firms are also running with fewer recruiters. Hays said it is steering consultants toward higher-salary roles and that its average permanent placement fee rose 5%, which points to recruiter attention concentrating on senior and specialist searches rather than volume hiring.
The catch
These are company results, not labor-market statistics. Gross profit and net fees reflect what clients paid each firm for placements and contractors; they are not counts of job openings, hires or payroll jobs, and the U.S. is a minority of each company’s business. Neither company gave a U.S. figure in dollars or a count of placements, and neither broke results out by state or city, so the reports say nothing specific about Atlanta or Georgia. The two firms also use different measures, gross profit in constant currency at Michael Page and like-for-like net fees at Hays, so their percentages should not be compared directly.
Sources
- Michael Page PLC (RNS via FT Markets), “Third Quarter 2026 Trading Update,” October 13, 2026. https://markets.ft.markitdigital.com/data/announce/detail?dockey=1323-17832048-37SVA2FOILVHGVRMH2FEJ99U99
- Hays plc, “Quarterly update for the three months ended 30 September 2026,” October 12, 2026. https://www.haysplc.com/~/media/Files/H/Hays/results-centre/FY27/HAYS%20Q1%2027%20IMS%20-%20web.htm
- Hays plc, “Investor Call Script – Q1,” October 12, 2026. https://www.haysplc.com/~/media/Files/H/Hays/results-centre/FY27/Q1%2027%20Script.pdf
- Reuters via Global Banking & Finance Review, “Hays quarterly net fees beat forecasts on US, Asia growth,” October 12, 2026. https://www.globalbankingandfinance.com/british-recruiter-hays-tops-quarterly-net-fee-forecasts/
Featured photo: Steel framing of the Boston University Center for Computing & Data Sciences under construction, seen from the BU Bridge between Boston and Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Sept. 26, 2021. Representative image; not a site connected to Michael Page or Hays. Photo: Chris Rycroft, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0). Cropped from the original.
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