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Explore our Demand for Skilled Talent report to see what specializations employers need most.
The demand for skilled talent remains high in 2025 among Canadian HR leaders. At the end of December 2024, Statistics Canada reported an unemployment rate of 2.7 per cent for the profession.
Low unemployment among skilled HR professionals isn’t the only obstacle Canadian companies face. Other challenges include personnel budget constraints, declining employee engagement, and technical debt.
Meanwhile, the rapid evolution of workplace technology and shifting employee expectations have created additional complexities for HR departments. Organizations must invest in new systems while managing hybrid work arrangements and demonstrating measurable impact on workforce performance, employee engagement and talent retention.
To meet their hiring goals, Canadian companies must continue finding innovative ways to attract and retain both long-term and short-term HR talent. Approaches such as offering above-average compensation and engaging recruiters to help you tap into the pool of passive job seekers are more important than ever.
Top trends in the Canadian HR job market
Companies focused on running leaner HR organizations are hiring strategically and are depending more on the staff they already have to keep up with compliance demands and other duties. What does that mean for HR job seekers? Firms value HR generalists who can handle a wide variety of responsibilities. Hiring managers who want to add staff are still facing a tight hiring environment, with 91 per cent of HR managers saying it’s challenging to find skilled professionals today.
Canadian HR leaders are faced with navigating talent shortages and limited headcount due to budget constraints, but that shouldn’t deter HR specialists from the job market in 2025. We are seeing more blended roles as a solution for some businesses, such as an HR position that handles both payroll and health and safety. Another solution employers are turning to are HR contract professionals that can assist with key areas of the business such as talent recruitment, training and updating internal employee databases.
In addition, attracting skilled talent is increasingly about how well a company can provide a healthy work/life balance, including being willing to adapt to the desired work styles of high-caliber professionals. According to the 2025 Canada Salary Guide From Robert Half, many of these professionals value flexibility and feel underpaid – and in-demand professionals who feel undervalued or underpaid are quick to seek new opportunities. As more employers implement return-to-office (RTO) policies, companies that can offer adaptable work schedules, including hybrid or fully remote options, are particularly poised to distinguish themselves in the talent market.
Visit the 2025 Canada Salary Guide From Robert Half for more HR hiring trends.
2025 Human resources trends: what HR managers are looking for
Here’s a snapshot of HR managers’ hiring plans and the challenges they face:
45 per cent are focused on hiring new staff for permanent roles.
49 per cent need to backfill permanent roles that have become vacant.
91 per cent are grappling with the challenge of finding skilled talent, underscoring the competitive nature of the HR job market.
HR leaders’ strategic priorities for 2025
Human resources teams across Canada are focused on the following in 2025:
Training and development
Talent acquisition and recruitment
Strategic workforce planning
Employee engagement
Diversity, equity and inclusion
Compensation and benefits
More contract talent in the HR job market
42 per cent of HR managers plan to hire more contract professionals in the first half of 2025. These interim workers are mainly needed for:
Human resources
Training and development
Diversity, equity, and inclusion
Operations
Recruitment
Compensation and benefits
About the Demand for Skilled Talent report
The Demand for Skilled Talent report by Robert Half is an authoritative source providing essential insights into 2025's employment trends. This report has offered a deep dive into Canada’s hiring landscape for over a decade, spotlighting challenges and strategies to attract and retain talent in today’s job market. It explores what employees seek in their careers, identifies common recruitment errors and suggests solutions. The report spans sectors like finance, technology, marketing, legal and human resources, proving crucial for business leaders and managers.
Data methodology
The surveys cited were developed by Robert Half and conducted by an independent research firm. Results may not total 100% due to rounding or allowing for multiple responses. Respondents included executives, hiring managers and workers from small (10-99 employees), midsize (100-999 employees) and large (1,000-plus employees) businesses in private, publicly listed and public sector organizations across Canada.
Over 200,000 new positions from more than 5,400 unique job boards/company sites independent job boards and company websites are represented in this report, including 6,000-plus placements from Robert Half. Positions are categorized into more than 350 job titles within Robert Half’s Salary Guide using a proprietary mapping methodology that employs state-of-the-art large language models. This dataset includes roles across the finance and accounting, technology, marketing and creative, legal, administrative and customer support, and human resources professions.
