Top four workplace trends for 2025

The 2025 Hays Salary & Recruiting Trends guide, which distils insights from a survey of over 1,150 Irish professionals, lifts the lid on various world of work topics to help people understand what challenges and opportunities are on the horizon for the year ahead, and how organisations can plan accordingly. Read on for the top four workplace trends for 2025.

Finding and keeping talent tops list of expected challenges

Our research shows that organisations are expecting to face a range of varied challenges in the coming months. Being able to recruit the right talent tops the list of external challenges predicted for 2025, followed closely by rising costs for businesses and the economic environment. Internally, talent retention is the biggest expected challenge that employers think they will face, alongside managing change effectively and skills shortages.

The rise of the ‘great dissatisfaction’

Findings from our guide show that a quarter of professionals changed jobs in the last 12 months, and a further 38% considered doing so. Their main motivation for moving? A lack of career progression.

Employee positivity about their career progression prospects in their current job has plummeted over the last year as workers experience the ‘great dissatisfaction’ – 42% feel there is no scope for progression compared to 27% in 2023. This, in turn, could result in employees moving for jobs with better career prospects – our findings show that 61% of professionals plan to change jobs in 2025, rising from 52% who said the same last year.

86% of employers are planning on hiring in the year ahead, so if you’re thinking of changing jobs in 2025, there will likely be plenty of job opportunities available.

Hybrid working is here to stay

The return to office debate continues to make headlines with some well-known organisations already requiring their remote-working staff to be in the workplace more often. However, according to our research, these organisations appear to be the exception to the rule. 62% of employers say they offer hybrid working to staff, and 74% expect their organisation’s hybrid working offering to stay the same over the next 12 months.

This is a key decision as hybrid working is a crucial consideration for many workers – more than half say it’s the most important flexible working option to them when considering a new role, 38% are planning to find a new role in 2025 that is more of a mix of hybrid working, and 51% wouldn’t even consider accepting a job in the future that didn’t have hybrid working as an option.

AI skills crisis looming

The uptake of artificial intelligence (AI) tools and technologies looks set to steadily increase within the world of work. 36% of employers are currently recommending the use of AI in their workplace and 27% of employees are currently using it in their job. Looking to the future, this figure rises to 70% of employers who expect their staff will be allowed to use AI tools.

However, this uptake could be negatively impacted by a widening skills gap. 45% of employers say they don’t currently have access to the skills they need to make the best use of AI tools and technologies. Despite this, more than eight out of ten employees say they have not received any training or support from their employer when it comes to using AI technologies at work. Positively, employees appear to be on board with learning how to use AI – 80% would be willing to upskill or reskill to adopt AI tools and technologies at work. Implementing training programmes will therefore be crucial for the year ahead to enable organisations and employees to reap the benefits that AI can bring.

There are lots more employment insights in our 2025 Salary & Recruiting Trends guide – request access to find out more.