In 2013, the telecom and tech industries were much closer in their levels of employment. The telecom industry employed 817,000 workers, while tech companies employed nearly 844,000 workers. Fast-forward a decade, and the tech sector employs over 2.5 times the number of telecommunications workers.

One primary reason the telecommunications industry has shed workers is that companies within this sector have changed how they use technology. Workers once used equipment to operate networks, but now automation, software, and cloud-based tools do the same work more efficiently with fewer people.

That's not to say that telecom employment is in freefall—the skillset has just shifted. Telecom companies no longer need as many employees at headquarters to do administrative and management roles, Sean McDevitt, partner at telecom consulting firm Arthur D. Little, told fiercetelecom.com.

However, they do need crews who build and deploy fiber and broadband networks. This was particularly apparent during the pandemic as work-from-home employees sapped the bandwidth of home-based networks, requiring telecom companies to make upgrades. Demand for field crews is still high, as companies need these workers to strengthen their network capabilities.

In the technology sector, job growth started increasing in 2011 after a rough decade following the dot-com implosion, which decimated the industry. It took until 2021 to replace all of the jobs that had been lost, the New York Times reports. During that time, companies like Zoom and Slack grew from nothing—they launched in 2011 and 2014, respectively—to become vital workplace tools keeping employees connected. Cloud computing changed how companies store and access data. Social media platforms like Snapchat soared while others crashed. (Remember Google+?)

In 2023, digitalization and AI are key technologies driving employment growth in the tech sector, CIO.com reports. Digitalization uses technology to process a company's data to new insights and find opportunities for growth and change. Of course, workers need to create these tools.

AI may take over what entry-level and low-level employees currently do. Automating low-level tasks, including coding, is changing job functionality across industries and within the tech sector itself. AI also enables more automation and allows employees to be more productive, meaning workers will have to know how to leverage AI as well as be able to manage higher-level tasks.

This is affecting employment among software engineers, Vox.com reports, normally a job that's continually in demand in the tech industry. Although the software publishing sector gained 351,000 jobs from April 2013 to April 2023, it has declined since September 2022, losing 7,900 jobs.

While there is no predicting how career headwinds will shift in the tech industry, skilled professionals ready to stay flexible and adaptable will likely be best positioned for what lies ahead. 

Story editing by Ashleigh Graf. Copy editing by Kristen Wegrzyn.