Talent News Round-Up: Love Bombing, Halting Hiring, and People Analytics
Staying updated on the latest workforce trends is crucial for TA leaders and HR professionals. This week, we delve into three significant developments shaping the talent landscape and get SocialTalent CEO, Johnny Campbell’s first-hand takes on these pieces.
- MSN says that job seekers often experience ghosting or “love-bombing” during interviews, reflecting systemic hiring inefficiencies and potential organizational dysfunctions.
- HR Brew believe that employers, especially small businesses, anticipate a hiring slowdown in early 2025, shifting focus to upskilling staff amid economic and regulatory challenges.
- And finally, according to Josh Bersin AI is revolutionizing People Analytics by simplifying data analysis, enabling HR to align human capital metrics with business outcomes and solve strategic challenges.
Join us as we explore these pivotal insights and their implications for the future of work.
1. Most Job Seekers Say They’ve Been Ghosted or ‘Love-Bombed’ During Interviews
Source: MSN
Job seekers frequently face ghosting and “love-bombing” during interviews, leading to frustration and anxiety. Over 50% report ghosting—where communication abruptly stops—or excessive praise followed by low offers or rejection. Experts cite systemic hiring inefficiencies and unclear role definitions as key causes. These experiences often reveal deeper organizational dysfunctions. Candidates are advised to trust their instincts about red flags during the process, as they can indicate potential issues within the company’s culture and operations.
Johnny Campbell’s take on this:
“Two things struck me after reading this: 1.) Hiring teams are forgetting about the number one rule of candidate experience: set and meet expectations, and 2.) Hiring Managers (and likely the recruiters that support them) are still not establishing a clear hiring framework with clarity on what they are hiring for, who’s assessing what, and what the decision making process is. It’s the basics that get you every time!“
2. Employers Plan to Pump the Brakes on Hiring in Early 2025
Source: HR Brew
Employers are signaling a hiring slowdown for early 2025, with 45% planning to hire fewer workers than the same period in 2024, according to an HR Brew survey of 220 HR professionals. Small businesses are more likely to pause hiring entirely, citing regulatory uncertainty, economic pressures, and challenges in finding qualified candidates. Many plan to focus on upskilling existing staff instead. Key roles in demand include customer service, sales, operations, and engineering, particularly at larger companies.
Johnny Campbell’s take on this:
“This is interesting as it is NOT what I am hearing from the hundreds of Enterprises that I talk to. Then again, this seems to be a survey of smaller companies with the top end of the scale being the hiring of 30+ people in the quarter. Secondly, it does not take unplanned attrition into account and I think we’re sitting on a powderkeg of desire to find a new role. Let’s wait and see but in the meantime, I’d seek many sources before making a hard prediction about hiring in 2025!“
3. People Analytics, A Complex Domain, Is About To Be Transformed by AI
Source: Josh Bersin
People Analytics, traditionally underutilized in HR, is poised for transformation through AI. Despite workforce challenges and abundant data, only 10% of companies effectively correlate human capital metrics to business outcomes. AI tools like Visier, Galileo, and SAP Joule promise to simplify complex analyses, enabling systemic insights into recruitment, productivity, and retention. These advancements empower HR to act as strategic business partners, shifting from data cleanup to solving core business problems. Early adopters report significant payoffs in aligning HR with business objectives.
Johnny Campbell’s take on this:
“I was at an event with 30 TA leaders last month and we were talking about having tools like this for our recruiting data, instead of the dashboards that TA mostly uses today. The future is a conversational interface for reporting where you just ask questions and get the answers, without having to have a degree in data warehousing! Are you in the 10% that Josh is talking about? If so, I’d love to hear about how you’re using AI to get answers from your recruiting data!“