ZDNET’s key takeaways
- HR sees AI’s rekilling potential, but outside hiring is outpacing internal moves.
- Limited visibility into AI capabilities makes reskilling opportunities difficult to see.
- Hiring externally often costs more and takes longer than reskilling.
HR leaders are confident that current employees can be trained for jobs created by artificial intelligence. Organizations hire instead of external.
That’s the finding in new research from Careerminds, a global provider of workforce solutions. The study, published in the Careerminds white paper, The AI Redeployment Gap: What Companies Lose by Hiring over Reskilling, shows that 92% of HR professionals and 88% of people managers believe that employees in their organizations can be reskilled for AI-related roles.
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But 51% of HR professionals and 47% of people managers report that their organizations are hiring externally for new AI-related positions, compared with just 42% in each group who report retooling existing employees.
The research was conducted in collaboration with Censuswide and surveyed 595 US HR professionals and 547 US people managers, aged 25-65 years, working in organizations with 500-10,000 or more employees. The research was conducted from May 15-26, 2026.
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“Companies are investing in AI while potentially overlooking one of their most valuable resources: the people they already employ,” said Mark Saddic, senior partner at Careerminds, in a press release.
Why companies struggle to identify employees for AI rekilling
Reskilling, especially for AI, is not easy to track. Limited visibility into individual skill sets and which employees should be retrained was cited as a potential barrier by 43% of HR professionals and 34% of managers.
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It is not the first time that the management of skill development via AI has come up. In September, education giant Pearson agreed to acquire Workera, the AI-native skills platform used by organizations such as ServiceNow, Accenture and the US Space Force.
Careermind’s data revealed that 87% of HR professionals and 84% of managers believe their organizations are adequately considering changing employees for future roles. However, the findings suggest that these organizations believe they are prioritizing internal talent development, even if their hiring practices reveal otherwise.
How AI hiring and reskilling differ by industry
Response to AI-related workforce needs is not equal everywhere. The results show significant differences in how industries respond to these needs.
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For example, in the technology and telecommunications industry, external employers exceed redeployment by 15%. At the same time, media and entertainment is the only sector surveyed in which both groups report redeployment at least as often as external hiring. Among HR professionals in that industry, 56% report that employees are restructured, compared with just 25% who hire externally.
And this division is also expensive.
External hiring costs more than filling roles internally
Separate research from the Josh Bersin Company, cited in the Careerminds white paper, reveals that external hiring can cost three to five times more than filling comparable roles internally – and on average takes up to 20 days longer.