Creative work is cool (again) - particularly if you can create it in German.
The need to keep up with content demands - whether it's creating video assets to capture visitors' attention or taking photographs to capture a brand in one shot - has resulted in creative projects making up 50 percent of the top 10 fastest growing jobs on Freelancer.com in Q3 2016.
Photography jobs alone grew by 22 percent in Q3 compared to the previous quarter, indicating more businesses are stepping outside the stock photography search box. Jobs related to German language skills took second spot on Freelancer.com's list of the fastest-growing jobs (also with a 22 percent increase from the previous quarter). What gives?
Freelancer.com credits "Brexit" as a likely reason for the increase, because Germany is reportedly trying to lure businesses from the UK to its country. Not as exciting from a political standpoint, video editing falls third on the list of fastest-growing jobs on the network with a 19.2 percent increase.
One of the most surprising findings in the report, however, is around the dramatic reduction (-37 percent) in computer security jobs. Unless everyone is moving this critical role in house and in a permanent, full-time position, then that figure should worry us all considering many factors, like the fact that chip technology used at the point of sale is reportedly increasing online fraud because of the chip's effectiveness - and, of course, there was that massive outage we'd be wise not to forget.
A surprising finding that is somewhat gratifying is that jobs related to "Algorithms" is down 42 percent, which gives us hope that people are understanding that if the user experience they provide their Web visitors is satisfying, then people will buy, stay, share, socialize - all of which the search engines reward. Perhaps, however, numbers could have been inflated in this industry thanks to "Mobilegeddon" and other past updates.
To make conclusions for yourself, take a look at the Fast 50 list below (to zoom in, click on the image):