Are your feet getting itchy under your work desk or on the shop floor? Think carefully before you get caught up in January's moving mania, a recruitment specialist has warned.

Data from LinkedIn shows more people move jobs in the first month of the year than any other – between December 2016 and January 2017 the number of people changing jobs spiked from around 42,000 to almost 105,000.

Rebecca Headden, director at Norwich recruiter RThirteen, said the urge to find something new in the New Year had been a trend throughout her 20 years in the sector.

'Back in the day it was difficult to track from an analytics perspective but now we have many more online resources and they have seen a huge upswing,' she said. 'LinkedIn allows you to put on your profile if you are considering new job opportunities and they see a massive increase at the start of the year.'

She added: 'For us it is about having those conversations now, so that when people are seeing their friends and family over the Christmas period with worries about their job we are at the forefront of their minds.'

But she cautioned those who had become dissatisfied with their current role in the run up to the festive period from making rash decisions.

'We try to support candidates to find out why they are dissatisfied. Sometimes they will feel that way but don't know why, or it may be a dissatisfaction with the current company that can be resolved.

'If it comes down to money or working hours we can coach candidates on how they can approach that with their current employer.

'You could have that conversation and realise there are problems that cannot be rectified – you may want to move to a different sector or may not like the working culture.'

She added job dissatisfaction could be linked to the time of year, if the pace of work increased or decreased dramatically over the festive season.

RThirteen Recruitment has been operating in the city for four and a half years. It placed more than 200 candidates in 2017 and hopes to increase that this year, with a recruitment drive under way to grow its seven-strong team.

In the New Year it plans to launch a referrals scheme, offering benefits to people who recommend candidates or new business clients to the firm if it subsequently secures business with them.