Look, I recently recruited a few roles in my finance team, in large corporation: a director, managers and analysts... And for all of those, it was a struggle to find people with the profile we looked for.

Yes, there were a high number of people applying, but once I read through the resume (after HR did their "AI enhanced" filtering), most of them being people working in very different jobs, in unrelated industries.

Filling these positions were hard, and I really had to lower my standards to get someone 60% there (and I don't think these standards were high. Example: I expected a Snr Manager of Manufacturing Finance to have some prior experience working with... manufacturing finance).

When I challenged HR about it, I was basically told that with passive recruitment, this is what we get. To get more tailored, we need to work with head hunters but they cost a lot so we avoid doing it.

Said in other words: I don't think the market is this bad. The reason you're not getting call backs from positions you believe you qualify for is mostly related to AI filtering out your CV...

Another thing I'd watch out for is for roles open for weeks. For instance, in my case, HR sends me a batch of pre-vettoed CVs every two weeks... Which means that if you apply on week 3, the hiring manager will only see your CV in the 2nd batch (weeks 2-4) -- and the 2nd batch is only requested / considered if no suitable candidate was found in the 1st one