Top 5 Hiring Trends for 2025
November 14, 2024 – Whether you’re planning your talent acquisition goals or headcount forecasts, it helps to know the latest hiring trends. For instance, labor market dynamics shifted in employers’ favor in 2024, with workers more willing to remain in their current roles, strengthening talent retention, according to figures from LHH. But LHH’s research suggests this change in employee sentiment is fragile and conditional , which means organizations must strategize while familiar with the hiring and talent acquisition trends in 2025 and beyond.
LHH provides a look at five trends that may impact recruiting and hiring over the next 12 months.
Trend #1: Engaging Passive Talent will Become a Key Talent-Acquisition Skill.
Earlier this year, data shared in LHH’s The Great Potential identified a large ‘passive talent pool’ of workers taking a wait-and-see approach to their careers, at least in the short term. More recent survey data from the firm’s parent company, The Adecco Group, has confirmed this pool is growing, preferring the stability of their current role, but at risk for attrition as the market improves. LHH continues to advise employers to meaningfully address these workers’ needs around progression and development, among other factors, to reignite their enthusiasm and support employee retention.
Additional research from LinkedIn suggests the results of this shift will play out in 2025 and beyond. When LinkedIn asked which recruitment skills will become more important in the next five years, the top answer was ‘engaging passive candidates,’ given by 83 percent of recruiting professionals.
“Your organization’s passive talent pool represents a passive candidate pool for competitors and recruiters,” the LHH report said. “Employers that fail to engage their passive, or not actively looking, employees should expect others to reach out to them next year and beyond.”
Jamie Lupo, VP of strategy for LHH recruitment solutions, suggests that “as the job market heats up, snagging passive talent will be a game-changer. These folks often have the skills and experience needed but aren’t actually looking for a new job.”
Ms. Lupo gives the following advice for employers to engage passive talent:
- Proactive Outreach: Keep a talent pipeline warm with regular, personalized communication.
- Employer Branding: Make your company irresistible by showcasing your culture, values, and growth opportunities.
- Employee Referrals: Leverage your current team to tap into their networks for potential candidates. (Caution, over-reliance on employee referrals may create affinity bias or an overly homogeneous team.)
Hiring Trend #2: Salaries will be a Vital Recruiting Tool.
Resignations might be down, but workers are keeping their options open—and salaries are the main reason. When LHH asked participants why they were considering changing jobs in the next 12 months, ‘I want a better salary’ was the most popular answer by far (the next most common answer was six percentage points behind). “The impact will be twofold,” the LHH report said. “On the one hand, recruiters and hiring managers will use salaries to tempt top talent away from the competition. But to counteract this, employers will use raises as a retention tool. This could generate upward pressure on salaries that will be difficult for some organizations to address.”
Ultimately, though, they will have to. LHH research shows that 85 percent of upcoming and recent graduates won’t apply for a job without salary information. As this cohort becomes a bigger proportion of the workforce —Gen Z are forecast to comprise around 30 percent of the U.S. workforce in 2030—successful employers will adapt to meet their needs and expectations.
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LHH explains that employers that fail to recognize this trend in preferences will become increasingly unattractive to this growing segment of workers. In recognition of the positive impact salary transparency has on reducing wage inequality, a growing number of states, cities, and localities have enacted laws or are currently legislating it. Check with your legal counsel to determine requirements.
Hiring Trend #3: Organizations will be Energized by Right-Skilling.
Skills-based hiring has been growing in recent years as employers recognize that formal qualifications aren’t always the best way to assess whether someone has the skills for the job, according to a report from McKinsey. In short, employers are increasingly focusing on the human angle, on the person rather than their qualifications.
Predicting Talent Acquisition Trends for 2025
As organizations navigate the post-AI boom and the shift to skills-based hiring, many are experiencing analysis paralysis, but now is the time to act with purpose. Korn Ferry recently surveyed over 400 talent acquisition professionals and consulted with more than 40 of its experts to uncover five key hiring trends shaping 2025, including the critical importance of skills and the evolution of employee value propositions.
But hiring is only one part of this puzzle as organizations adapt to shifting skills needs. LHH’s Outplacement & Career Mobility 2024 Trends Report revealed two new entrants in employers’ top five reasons for conducting layoffs. Around 30 percent of surveyed HR leaders named ‘releasing individuals for poor performance’ and ‘releasing employees who don’t have the right skill sets,’ as motivations for layoff decisions. This shows employers are open to using layoffs to right-skill their organization.
However, (59 percent) workers in the same research agreed that ‘I would like to develop new skills to propel my career, but I don’t know what to pursue.’ An even larger majority (82 percent) of HR leaders said they’d considered redeployments as an alternative to layoffs. In 2025, employers will begin to see real benefits from right-skilling. LHH note that the winners will:
- Hire based on hard and soft skills;
- View layoffs through a skills lens; and
- Empower their people to develop new skills and seek related internal opportunities.
Hiring Trend #4: Development will be an Increasingly Key Part of the Hiring Offer.
LHH has written before about the key role of development in a sustainable talent strategy. In 2025, the firm expects professional and personal development to be a core element of the hiring process on both sides. “With tech changing so fast, companies need to decide whether to reskill current employees or hire new ones,” said Ms. Lupo. This is a perfect opportunity to leverage the total talent solutions LHH offers, from recruitment, to skills and leadership development, to career transitions and mobility.”
So how do you make reskilling and development part of your employer brand? Ms. Lupo suggests:
- Reskilling Programs: Develop programs to help employees transition into new roles.
- Strategic Hiring: Focus on candidates with transferable skills who can adapt quickly.
- Blended Approach: Combine reskilling and external hiring for a balanced workforce.
What does this mean for hiring? “The most promising candidates will increasingly want to know which skills they will be able to develop in the role and how the organization will help,” Ms. Lupo said. “Recruiters and hiring managers will be more interested in a candidate’s potential to develop new skills than in their past achievements.”
Trend #5: Recruiters will Adopt Augmented Recruitment with Transparency About AI.
The Great Potential report showed that candidates are pretty relaxed about the use of AI and other technologies in the hiring process. The majority said they expect companies to embrace AI to speed up recruitment (51 percent) and that they’re comfortable with automation if it speeds up the process (54 percent. On the other hand, even larger majorities said they value the human expertise of a recruiter to see their true potential beyond skills and experience (64 percent) and that, as a candidate, they want to know whether they’re dealing with a human or AI (65 percent).
“As concern grows about potential bias and errors in automated tools, employers will become more transparent about their use of AI,” the LHH report said. “An augmented recruiting model will emerge, where AI supports human recruiters. After all, an AI cannot yet relate to a person’s individuality. It takes a human recruiter to make a meaningful connection with a candidate. It takes a meaningful connection to truly assess the vibrant mix of experiences, values, and unique human possibilities each candidate offers.”
“AI in recruitment is on the rise, no doubt, and candidates should have the transparency and fairness they want. The key, incumbent on employers, is to balance efficiency with the human touch,” said Ms. Lupo. She recommends:
- Transparency: Be upfront about how AI is used in the hiring process. Explain which parts are automated and how decisions are made.
- Bias Mitigation: Regularly audit AI algorithms to reduce bias and ensure fairness.
- Human Oversight: Keep human recruiters involved in the final decision process.
These predicted trends are based on LHH and the Adecco Group’s research in the past 12 months. “From the organizational need to right-skill to individuals’ desire to develop, skills have emerged as a common theme across our research, and we expect this to be felt in hiring during 2025 and beyond,” the LHH report said. “From the recruiter’s perspective, this means they must be prepared to talk confidently about skills throughout the recruitment process. Top candidates will expect nothing less. Salaries (and benefits) will likely remain the most significant factor in a candidate’s decision to join an organization, but employers that present a compelling skills offer will find they have more space to negotiate.”
Related: Use AI to Elevate Talent Acquisition
Contributed by Scott A. Scanlon, Editor-in-Chief and Dale M. Zupsansky, Executive Editor – Hunt Scanlon Media
