What to Expect in HR for 2026: An Agenda for HR Leaders

 

Building on our 2025 reflections — what’s next, what to watch, and how HR can lead the way.

In our 2025 retrospective, Key HR Learnings from 2025 — What’s Next & What We Learned, we highlighted the major shifts taking shape across HR: AI adoption, skills-based hiring, workforce agility, hybrid/flexible work, embedded HR, wellbeing, and more.

In 2026, these trends won’t simply continue — they’ll intensify, evolve, and demand sharper strategic focus.

Below are six key trends HR leaders should be preparing to act on in 2026, each connected to what we learned last year and translated into practical action steps.

1. From Adoption to Integration: AI & the Human–Machine Workforce

In 2025, HR teams accelerated AI literacy and adoption. In 2026, the focus shifts from “trying tools” to integrating AI into workflow design, governance, and workforce architecture.

What’s happening

• AI transformation remains a top priority for CHROs, closely followed by redesigning work for a human–machine era. Gartner predicts “With an HR-focused AI strategy in place, CHROs will evolve their HR operating models to unlock new strategic capabilities. Most organizations and vendors are still experimenting, but CHROs need to be open to reimagining work, processes and talent to truly harness AI’s value.”
• HR tech budgets continue to increase, particularly for AI-enabled platforms.
• Ethical, transparency, and trust challenges remain — including growing research highlighting the risks of poorly designed AI on wellbeing.

What HR should do

• Build a Now–Next Talent Strategy: Define what the workforce needs today, and what capabilities will be required over the next 1–3 years in a blended human + AI environment.
• Upskill HR & business partners: Build the capabilities needed to redesign roles, workflows, and decision-making in an AI-enabled workplace — including the skills to manage responsible and transparent AI governance.
• Establish ethical frameworks: Ensure clarity on where humans remain in the loop for high-impact decisions.
• Pilot and iterate: Start with targeted use cases — internal mobility engines, skills-matching, performance analytics — and scale once trust and value are proven.
• Monitor impact on culture and wellbeing: Integration should enhance, not erode, the employee experience.

2. Skills-Based Everything Deepens

Our 2025 theme “Skills Over Credentials” now evolves into skills-based architectures, internal talent marketplaces, and dynamic capability mapping.

What’s happening

• More HR platforms now include skills taxonomies, skills intelligence, and marketplace functionality.
• Credentials still matter in regulated fields, but adaptability and learning agility dominate talent strategies.
• With many organizations facing tight salary budgets, development, mobility, and opportunity become major engagement levers.

What HR should do

• Refresh or build a skills taxonomy: Identify critical skills for the next 2–3 years and map gaps. In a Forbes article, Gianna Driver (CPO of OpenTable) underscored the importance of strengthening human-centered capabilities as AI and workplace dynamics continue to evolve. As she explains: “As we head into 2026, I advise leaders to double-down on the human skills and competencies that will allow our employees to flourish in an ever-changing world of AI and polarizing politics: empathy, agility, communication and compassion.” “These four skills will matter more than hard technical skills. Empathy fosters stability, agility drives innovation, communication leads to clarity and compassion builds trust.”
• Create an internal talent marketplace: Match employees with projects, roles, and learning based on skills and interests.
• Tie skills to mobility and rewards: Make skills development visible in movement, recognition, and growth.
• Communicate clearly: Help employees understand when credentials matter — and where skills are the driver of opportunity.
• Use analytics to track impact: Monitor mobility, retention, and performance outcomes.

3. Workforce Planning for Agility & Resilience

In 2025, many organizations still focused on short-term planning. In 2026, the mandate becomes agility, scenario planning, and long-range capability design.

What’s happening

• Rapid tech, regulatory, and global changes require adaptable staffing models.
• Leaders increasingly recognize that planning only for “business as usual” leaves them exposed to volatility.
• HR is being asked to explicitly connect short-term actions with long-term capability building.

What HR should do

• Introduce a 3–5-year planning horizon: Examine scenarios where AI adoption accelerates, talent supply tightens, or regulatory shifts impact workforce structure.
• Build internal “talent buffers”: Flexible roles, cross-functional assignments, and rapid redeployment frameworks.
• Use scenario planning models: Prepare for multiple possible futures, not a single forecast. Roger Philby the UK Head of Consulting and Global Leader of Korn Ferry’s People Strategy & Performance Practice suggests “the solution is to rethink job architecture with a focus on building sustainable leadership pipelines. That starts with clarifying what types of leaders your organization will need—creative versus operational, for example—and designing career paths that reflect those needs. Future executives may come from anywhere in the organization. “Build horizontal paths,” says Philby.”
• Link planning to skills mapping: Workforce planning must be capability-based, not headcount-based.
• Ensure HR is embedded in business strategy: Planning should be co-created, not downstream.

4. Retention & Experience: From Reaction to Proactive Design

In 2025, we highlighted the shift from reactive retention to prevention. In 2026, HR must embrace employee experience design, personalization, and proactive interventions.

What’s happening

• Salary budget increases remain modest (~3.5%), forcing value beyond compensation.
• Employee expectations continue to evolve — flexibility, personalized benefits, internal mobility, and meaningful work.
• Companies with strong, personalized employee experiences have a measurable advantage in retention.

What HR should do

• Design employee journeys: Intentional onboarding, mobility, development, and exit experiences.
• Personalize benefits and flexibility: Allow employees to choose how they grow, where they work, and how they contribute.
• Use predictive metrics: Watch for early markers of disengagement, stagnation, or “micro-exits.”
• Equip managers: Give managers tools and training to design meaningful, flexible team experiences.
• Emphasize growth and purpose: Compensation is important — but not the sole driver of retention.

5. Hybrid, Flexible & Inclusive Work Models

In 2025 we wrote about a shift from “remote vs. office” toward flexibility. In 2026, that shift expands into equity, inclusion, and outcome-driven work design.

What’s happening

• The conversation is now about how work gets done — collaboration, accessibility, documentation, and fairness.
• Modular teams, asynchronous norms, and outcome-based roles are becoming more common.
• Remote and hybrid environments create real equity challenges — visibility, access, and advancement risks.

What HR should do

• Audit your model: Check whether remote or hybrid workers face disadvantages in promotion, visibility, or development.
• Define outcomes clearly: Roles should be measured by results, not location or hours.
• Embed inclusive norms: Documented decision-making, asynchronous collaboration, bias-free criteria.
• Revamp manager capabilities: Leading distributed teams requires new skills — communication, trust-building, culture-stewarding.
• Track equity metrics: Mobility, performance, and development access across work modalities.

6. Embedded HR, Culture & Ethical Governance

Our 2025 blog stressed “Embedded HR & Business Partnership.” In 2026, this expands into HR as a strategic, data-driven, ethics-anchored force inside the business.

What’s happening

• HR is increasingly co-creating strategy within business units.
• Governance pressures are rising — pay transparency, AI fairness, and regulatory oversight. Robert Half writes “As AI becomes embedded in everyday HR workflows, AI governance is shifting from a technical function to a leadership priority. HR professionals now help define ethical standards, ensure fairness, evaluate tools responsibly and build cross-functional trust. This shift is also opening new career pathways in governance and ethical AI oversight. Organizations that invest in AI governance today will be better prepared for evolving expectations tomorrow.”
• Culture and psychological safety remain competitive differentiators as tech intensity grows.

What HR should do

• Embed HR business partners deeply: Involve HR early and consistently in business planning.
• Develop data & analytics strength: Tie HR initiatives to measurable business outcomes — internal mobility, capability development, time-to-productivity, innovation.
• Establish governance frameworks: Clear structures for AI, pay equity, mobility, and inclusion. theHRDIRECTOR argues “A strong 2026 business plan should therefore include a regulatory readiness framework – identifying where compliance exposure exists today, and how technology, process, and training investments can mitigate that risk.”
• Operationalize culture: Promote psychological safety, learning, and “fail fast, learn fast” norms.
• Communicate consistently: Build trust by making HR’s impact visible, transparent, and outcome-aligned.

Final Thoughts: From Reflection to Action

In our previous blog, Key HR Learnings from 2025 — What’s Next & What We Learned, we outlined the major lessons from 2025 and the foundation they set for the future. In 2026, the mission shifts from reflection to intentional action.

To make 2026 a year of meaningful HR impact:

• Choose 2–3 must-win priorities — e.g., AI integration, skills architectures, hybrid equity.
• Build a Now–Next–Later roadmap: Short-term action, medium-term buildout, long-term vision.
• Measure relentlessly: Connect HR strategies to business outcomes, transparency, culture, and growth.
• Prioritize trust and transparency: AI can accelerate progress, but it’s not a cure-all. Communicate your goals clearly and ensure employees understand how AI supports — not replaces — their work. Trust, clarity, and human connection remain essential for both employees and customers, even as digital tools expand.

As HR becomes increasingly data-driven, accurate and compliant employment data — like the verification services provided by QuickConfirm — will play a foundational role in building trustworthy workforce systems.

2026 will reward HR teams that act boldly, build intentionally, and measure impact consistently. Now is the time to move from reflection to execution — and QuickConfirm is here to help you do it with confidence.

If you’re ready to streamline verifications, reduce risk, and give your HR team back valuable time, connect with QuickConfirm today and see how seamless compliance can be.