Potential Hiring Trends for 2026

According to a Robert Half executive, there are likely to be five patterns to hiring in 2026: 

1. Hiring will be on the conservative side, more selective and less of a “free-for-all” than after the pandemic, more focused on specifically-needed skills; 

2. The likely focus will be in digital, HR and finance fields, all of which are important to implementation of AI; 

3. Processing applicants will become more difficult because of the use of AI to tailor resumes to job listings; 

4. Fake applicants are proliferating, adding to the workload; and 

5. Employers using AI to screen resumes must be cautious to avoid “favoritism” toward AI-generated resumes.