Well that didn't take long.

Crude prices have only shown signs of a slight improvement since May, but the job search site, Indeed, reports that listings for oil field workers have already jumped 50 percent since hitting bottom in August.

"Job losses continued nearly unabated until early 2016 when oil-related postings stabilized briefly before notching small gains going into the second half of the year," Indeed economist Daniel Culbertson write. "It is encouraging to see oil producers willing to invest in hiring once again after such a long layoff."

While the number of listings is higher, we're still talking relatively small numbers when compared to the heyday of 2014, when there were twice as many oil field job listings.

Higher oil prices have also sent more job seekers looking for listings with the word oil in them.

"This could suggest that idle oil workers or those that may have found work in other fields after the price collapse have seen encouraging signs in the oil labor market and are seeking to return to the industry," Culbertson says.

All of this makes sense when oil executives say they are confident that the worst of the oil bust is behind us. OPEC is also leading a global effort to cut production in order to rebalance global oil markets at between $55 and $65 a barrel. The current price is just below that range.

Lower global production should help drain the enormous inventory of crude sitting in storage around the world over the next year. Once the tanks are back to historic averages, oil companies will need to have wells online to meet the demand and prevent a shortfall.

That's why the companies with the strongest balance sheets and the most productive leases are rehiring. The can afford to be on the cutting edge.

Those companies, though, are few and far between. Companies with middling finances and resources will need more time to pay off debts, and see even higher crude prices, before they can drill again. But OPEC is unlikely to allow prices to rise so high that we see another boom like we did from 2012-2014.

So yes, Indeed's job listings are the green shoots of a job recovery, but don't expect the industry to turn on a dime. No one is expecting prices to top $100 a barrel like they did in 2014.