In a rare twist, none of the roles announced in Ireland this week were in Dublin, as Ulster romped to victory in job creation.

Good news for jobseekers this week as there were 800 positions announced on the island of Ireland, spread across an array of industries and locations.

Yet many will be surprised to learn that not one of the new roles this week was announced in Dublin as Ulster emerged as the real winner on the jobs creation front.

In general so far this month, Dublin’s performance in terms of jobs is actually much meeker than normal, with only 110 confirmed Dublin-based positions announced since the start of July. However, it will also receive an unconfirmed portion of the 40 jobs announced by Paradyn (shared with Cork) and could see a potential slice of the 520 roles announced at EY.

Meanwhile, there have been 780 roles announced in Ulster since the beginning of the month, 710 of which were announced just this week.

Life sciences giant Abbott Laboratories revealed plans to expand its presence in Donegal with the creation of 500 new positions that will be recruited over the next few years. This will more than double the current headcount (400) at the Donegal site. The plant, which is based in Lurganboy near Donegal town, was opened in 2006 to manufacture the company’s worldwide supply of FreeStyle and FreeStyle Lite brands of blood glucose test strips.

In Tyrone, advanced manufacturing firm Mallaghan Engineering unveiled a new five-year expansion plan, which will see it invest millions and recruit 210 staff in Dungannon, primarily in the areas of engineering and manufacturing.

Munster was also blessed with some jobs fortune this week, namely with 90 roles to be filled over the next year that were announced in Cork by home technology firm Smartzone.

Also this week in Careers, we gained an insight into emerging career areas that are worthy of consideration, such as blockchain. To work in Deloitte’s blockchain lab, you don’t need to have specific experience (as if anyone could be reasonably said to have a wealth of experience in such a nascent technology) but there are a few key distinguishing traits that will make you well poised to take up a role with the firm.

Do you want to master a career in UX design, perhaps? If you do, you’ll probably find our chat with Gerard Fitzgerald, in which he details how he got into the UX design industry, edifying.

We also heard from eShopWorld’s Corey Murphy, who was able to successfully travel around the world while never compromising on his career progression.

For more on any of these stories, check out the above links.