HR thinks you can learn AI skills – so why is your company hiring elsewhere?

ZDNET’s cardinal takeaways

• HR sees AI reskilling potential, but extracurricular hiring outpaces interior moves.
• Limited visibility into AI skills makes reskilling opportunities hard to spot.
• Hiring externally often costs much and takes longer than reskilling.

HR leaders are assured that existent employees tin beryllium trained for jobs created by artificial intelligence. Organizations are hiring externally instead.

That’s the uncovering successful caller probe from Careerminds, a planetary supplier of workforce solutions. The study, published successful Careerminds’ achromatic paper, The AI Redeployment Gap: What Companies Lose by Hiring implicit Reskilling, reveals that 92% of HR professionals and 88% of radical managers judge employees wrong their organizations could beryllium reskilled for AI-related roles.

Also: Nearly 70% of workers usage AI regularly present – but galore get nary clip to upskill

Yet 51% of HR professionals and 47% of radical managers study that their organizations are hiring externally for caller AI-related positions, compared with conscionable 42% successful each radical who study redeploying existing employees.

The probe was conducted successful concern with Censuswide and surveyed 595 US HR professionals and 547 US radical managers, ages 25–65, moving astatine organizations with 500-10,000 oregon much employees. The probe was conducted May 15–26, 2026.

Also: Businesses yet seeing AI ROI, but 62% can’t grip the retention demands

“Companies are investing successful AI portion perchance overlooking 1 of their astir invaluable resources: the radical they already employ,” said Mark Saddic, elder spouse astatine Careerminds, successful a press release.

Why companies conflict to place employees for AI reskilling

Reskilling, particularly for AI, isn’t casual to track. Limited visibility into idiosyncratic accomplishment sets and which employees should beryllium reskilled was cited arsenic a imaginable obstruction by 43% of HR professionals and 34% of managers.

Also: Pearson’s Workera woody targets a large workplace problem: No clip to AI upskill

It’s not the archetypal clip that the absorption of skills improvement has travel up regarding AI. In September, acquisition elephantine Pearson agreed to get Workera, the AI-native skills platform utilized by organizations specified arsenic ServiceNow, Accenture, and the US Space Force.

Careermind’s information revealed that 87% of HR pros and 84% of managers judge their organizations are adequately considering reskilling employees for aboriginal roles. However, the findings suggest that these organizations whitethorn judge they are prioritizing interior endowment development, adjacent though their hiring practices uncover otherwise.

How AI hiring and reskilling disagree by industry

Response to AI-related workforce needs isn’t adjacent crossed the board. The findings uncover important differences successful however industries are responding to these needs.

Also: Your AI-polished resumes are recruiters’ caller apical stressor

For example, successful the exertion and telecom industries, outer hiring outpaces redeployment by 15%. At the aforesaid time, media and amusement is the lone assemblage surveyed successful which some groups study redeployment astatine slightest arsenic often arsenic outer hiring. Among HR professionals successful that industry, 56% study redeploying employees, compared with conscionable 25% who prosecute externally.

And this disagreement is costly, too.

External hiring outgo much than filling roles internally

Separate probe from The Josh Bersin Company, cited successful the Careerminds achromatic paper, reveals that outer hiring tin outgo 3 to 5 times much than filling comparable roles internally — and connected mean takes up to 20 days longer.

Kayla Solino is simply a ZDNET Editor based successful New York City and New Jersey. She has a master's grade successful journalism from the University of Alabama. Some of her past bylines see Inc., Fortune, and The Crimson White. In her spare time, she enjoys keeping up with each things Crimson Tide, binge-watching British Bake Off, and baking. See afloat bio