Valentina Akpan: Founder, Rellatech. Admin and technical virtual assistant for businesses and startups with teams.
· 3 min read
The National Federation of Independent Business released its June Jobs Report yesterday, and it tells a story I hear from clients almost every week. Small business owners are ready to grow their teams, and the people they need are proving very hard to find.
According to the NFIB report, published on July 2, 62 percent of small business owners reported hiring or trying to hire in June, which is up seven points from May. At the same time, 51 percent of all owners, which works out to 84 percent of those actually trying to hire, said they found few or no qualified applicants for the positions they were trying to fill. Nineteen percent of owners named labor quality or availability as their single most important problem, a jump of six points from May.
The report also shows owners getting more careful with pay. A seasonally adjusted net 28 percent reported raising compensation, which is down three points from May and the lowest reading of the year. Only a net 17 percent plan to raise compensation in the next three months. Owners want more hands on deck, but they are increasingly reluctant to win those hands with bigger paychecks.
The demand is real, and the supply is the problem
None of this is happening because the small business economy is shrinking. Payroll provider Gusto reported on June 30 that small businesses added an estimated 32,900 net new jobs in June, which marked the fifth consecutive month of positive hiring. Paychex reported the same day that its Small Business Jobs Index improved for the fourth month in a row and matched its highest level since August 2025. Businesses are growing and the work is there, and what is missing is qualified people willing and able to do it at a price a small business can carry.
When an owner cannot fill a role, the work does not disappear. It lands on the owner and on whoever else is already stretched. Invoices get chased late, the CRM drifts out of date, follow ups slip through, and the inbox becomes a source of quiet dread. The NFIB numbers describe a market where posting a job, screening applicants, and hoping a qualified candidate shows up can drag on for months while all of that operational work keeps piling higher.
There is a way around the hiring line
The part I want every stretched owner to sit with is this. Most of the roles behind these numbers are not specialized engineering positions. They are operational roles, which means inboxes, calendars, customer follow ups, CRM upkeep, invoicing, and the steady administrative work that keeps a business running. That is exactly the work our executive assistant services were built to take off your plate, without a job posting, without months of screening, and without adding a salary, benefits, and payroll taxes to your books.
A full time hire is a big commitment in a market like this one, and the NFIB data shows that owners know it, which is why compensation plans are cooling even as hiring intentions rise. A Rellatech monthly retainer gives businesses and startups with teams a trained assistant who starts quickly, carries the operational load, and grows with you, so the next time a report like this one comes out, the hiring gap is somebody else's problem and not yours.
Skip the hiring line
I run monthly retainers for businesses and teams who need an operator, not a typist. You can see how they are structured on the pricing page, or book a consultation and we will talk through what your version looks like.
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