As AI tools are leveraged by more and more employers and HR pros rush to understand what skills are needed for the workforce of the future, the AI tools themselves are beginning to offer talent acquisition (TA) teams—and their learning and development (L&D) colleagues—a new opportunity to reimagine how skills are understood and how skills competency is demonstrated and grows.

According to Tigran Sloyan, cofounder and CEO of AI-powered skills platform CodeSignal, AI poses both a challenge and a solution to an aging talent problem, especially when it comes to skills.

“There’s not a job you can’t name where there isn’t a certain set of inputs that the person starts with, set of work activities or work tasks that they complete, and then a certain set of outputs that they’re expected to deliver,” he said. To succeed in the rapidly evolving AI-enabled future of business, companies need to rethink and use AI to grow skills.

For more on how recruitment teams are rethinking skills as a result of AI, keep reading here.—AD

Big Tech led the way in astonishing employee perks: ping-pong tables, beer taps, and on-site dry cleaning and laundry services. Then, these same tech companies led the way in a wider roll back of employee benefits as execs began to reorganize amid a changing economy and wider AI transformation.

Consulting appears to be the next domino. Even the largest professional services firms are recalibrating their people strategies in today’s economy and labor market. Deloitte plans to roll back some benefits for a segment of its US workers, according to reporting from Business Insider.

According to the report, Deloitte plans to reduce parental leave, PTO, pension contributions, and other family-planning benefits for employees in its “center” talent model. These roles are related to internal operations like IT, finance, and admin.

For more on Deloitte’s plans to cut benefits, keep reading here.—AD

While attacks on DEI led many companies to change their programming in the summer of 2024, some had started to cut their budgets as early as 2022. Now, one in four HR professionals report their teams are getting by with less, and often without a chief diversity officer.

As right-wing politicians began speaking out against DEI programs in 2022, and companies looked for ways to cut costs in a slow economy, many turned to DEI programs and professionals. Anti-DEI pressure campaigns ramped up in 2024, leading dozens of companies to rollback or eliminate programs, HR Brew reported previously.

Companies that continue to do DEI work are often left with smaller budgets and teams. While 63% of respondents to HR Brew’s survey reported that their organization’s DEI investments have not changed in the last year, 25% said there was a slight to significant decrease. In terms of staffing, 24% of respondents said that the size of their organization’s DEI team has stayed the same, while 12% said it decreased and 3% said it was eliminated. Another 3% said the team grew. The majority (53%) said their organization does not have a DEI team.

For more on the cuts facing DEI teams, keep reading here.—KP

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