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10+ HR Technologies We’re Watching Closely: HR Tech 2026 Roundup
As our team gears up for the HR Technology Conference in Las Vegas this October, we’ve been busy talking with some of the innovative providers of platforms and systems in the industry. Across our research, Awards programs, regular briefing schedule, and more, we talk with nearly 300 companies a year across the HR tech space. But there’s always a gravity in the fall when we attend this event and speak with 50+ in just a few days onsite.
The Leadership Impact: When People Feel Seen, Performance Follows
I once watched a leader walk into a team meeting after a particularly difficult quarter. The numbers were not where they needed to be, the team was tired, and frustration had begun to affect the way people were working together. Everyone in the room expected the conversation to begin with the missed goals, the performance gaps, and what needed to change. Instead, the leader started with the people.
The Human Side of Work: Don’t Lose Millions of Dollars Making This Mistake
The results are in. After multiple real-world experiments, we’ve seen that the future of work is a human one. Companies are going all-in on AI and are losing millions of dollars because they do it the wrong way. Here are some real examples from Ford, Klarna, and IBM. Company Workers Replaced The Problem / Result The Outcome Klarna ~700 customer service agents Pushed too aggressively for cost savings over quality.
A look inside the 2026 RPO Buyer Trends Report
Research by Lighthouse Research & Advisory, in partnership with the Recruitment Process Outsourcing Association The Recruitment Process Outsourcing market is evolving. The 2026 RPO Buyer Trends Report is the fourth edition of this annual research and the largest sample we have ever collected. It draws on survey data from 998 employers, including 454 active RPO users, gathered in Q1 2026 from organizations across North America, EMEA, and APAC.
EOR Provider Wants to Build the Infrastructure for Global Talent Markets
EoR solutions are in a hurry to build and buy their way to “all-in-one” HR platform status. One provider is consciously taking a different path. Will it work? In the grand scheme of things work-wise, payroll is like your local power utility. Pretty dependable, a bit boring, and any disruption is an absolute nightmare for the customer. “When payroll fails, it’s not a support ticket. It’s someone’s rent. It’s someone’s hospital bill.
HR Isn’t Cooling Off This Summer: 4 Workplace Trends That Will Separate Great Organizations from Everyone Else
Summer often brings a slower pace in business. Vacations are scheduled, calendars become lighter, and many organizations use the season to prepare for what comes next. HR doesn’t have that luxury. If anything, this summer is revealing which organizations are building a workforce ready for the future and which are simply reacting to today’s challenges. The conversations happening around leadership tables are no longer just about hiring or compliance.
HR Summer School Is Back - And the Timing Couldn’t Be Better
There’s a particular kind of exhaustion that HR professionals know well. It’s not the kind that comes from running a marathon. It’s the kind that comes from running a marathon every single week, with the finish line always moving. The compliance shifts. The hiring pressure. The employee relations conversations that never quite fit the flowcharts. The technology landscape that rewrites itself every six months. If that sounds familiar, you’re not alone. And that’s exactly the point.
The Real Competitive Advantage in Business Is Purpose Alignment
The conversation around purpose is often dismissed because leaders struggle to quantify its ROI. But the organizations outperforming today understand something powerful: Purpose is not a “soft” initiative. It is a strategic performance driver. When employees know what they do, it creates production. When employees know why they do what they do, it creates transformation.
TA vs AI: The Truth About AI Recruiting Mistakes
Most AI failures in recruiting aren’t AI failures Most of the writing on why AI underperforms in recruiting starts with a guess. Blame gets directed at the vendor, or the technology, or a market that moved too fast for anyone to keep up. These explanations are hard to disprove and easy to repeat, which is probably why they circulate so widely. We went and looked at the data instead. Our 2026 Talent Acquisition Trends Study surveyed nearly 1,000 TA leaders.
Transform 2026: Strategy Is the Expectation, Alignment Is the Challenge
In today’s business environment, the gap isn’t whether HR is strategic; it’s whether strategy can actually be executed at the speed the business demands. This was one of many incredible conversations I got to be involved in at my first-ever Transform Conference. It didn’t just feel like another industry event; it felt like a reset. Across dozens of conversations with HR leaders, executives, and partners like HiBob, one truth became clear: HR is not just being asked to become strategic.
The 2026 Lighthouse Tech Awards: Recognizing Technology That Delivers Real Result
In our daily work with talent leaders, HR executives, and solution providers, we see extraordinary innovation happening across the market. The technology available to employers today can transform how they hire, develop, engage, and support their people. But innovation alone is not enough. What matters most is measurable impact.
Mythbusting: 4 Lies About Work in 2026 Recap
HR Summer School Special Session Recap The way we work is changing fast, but not always in the ways we think. In our recent HR Summer School Special Virtual Event, Mythbusting: 4 Lies About Work in 2026 (Click to watch on-demand, 2.5 HRCI|SHRM Credits), we brought together HR leaders, business executives, and industry experts to challenge some of the most common (and costly) misconceptions shaping today’s people strategies.
2025 HR Tech M&A Activity: Mega-Deals, Agentic AI, and the Learning Shakeup
2025 was a year of big swings in HR technology M&A. Private equity wrote checks measured in billions. Platform vendors went on acquisition sprees. And the learning technology market saw consolidation that will reshape how organizations think about skills development for years to come. For instance, through Q3 2025 alone, Drake Star recorded 650+ HR Tech transactions globally with $22.3 billion in disclosed invested capital. Safe to say the market is not slowing down. A few things stood out this year.
Mentorship as a Business Strategy, Not a Benefit
January is Mentorship Month, but for HR leaders, mentorship can no longer live in the category of “nice-to-have.” Our research reinforces a critical truth: mentorship is not just a development tool, it’s a cultural and performance accelerator. One of the strongest findings from our data is the link between belonging and participation.
Compensation is Changing: Here’s How AI, New Data Sources, and Skills are Evolving [New Report]
Since 2019, our team has analyzed the changes in compensation technology and data usage along with key trends that influence the near-term and long-term view of the compensation function. In all that time, no other trend or theme has seemed to have the same degree of potential as artificial intelligence technology. The emergence of this seemingly ubiquitous solution has changed facets of life and work in ways we could have never expected, and it’s one of the big themes in this year’s research.
Looking vs. Seeking: Why Intentionality Matters in Today’s HR Landscape
We’ve all been there. You’re looking for something: your keys, your wallet, maybe your favorite pen. It’s sitting right in front of you, but somehow, it’s invisible. But seeking? That’s a different experience entirely. When the TV remote goes missing minutes before your team kicks off, suddenly the whole house becomes a search-and-rescue unit. Cushions fly. Drawers open. You call in reinforcements. You are intentional. Focused. Determined.
New Research Highlights Core Elements of Employee Experience
In the 1980s, Hans Moravec and other AI researchers discovered a curious finding that we now know as Moravec’s Paradox. Essentially, AI can very easily learn to do things that are “hard” for humans, such as advanced statistics and analysis. On the other hand, things that are very simple for humans, such as identifying colors or recognizing faces, can be incredibly difficult for computers to do. In short: computers, algorithms, and AI are great at some things, but humans are better at others.
AI in Hiring: The Candidate Isn’t the Only One Using It
I recently sat in on a conversation with a hiring leader who shared a surprising story. They’d interviewed a candidate whose responses felt a little too polished, almost scripted. Later, the leader discovered that the candidate had been using AI to prepare for interviews and even generate tailored resumes. That moment was a wake-up call: the use of AI in hiring is no longer limited to employers.
The Candidate’s Lens: Redefining the Hiring Experience
Today’s hiring landscape looks very different, especially from the candidate’s perspective. According to our latest research at Lighthouse Research & Advisory, job seekers describe the process with words no employer wants to hear: stressful, slow, unclear, and at times, even scammy. This is not only a reflection of poor experiences but also a warning sign for organizations competing for top talent. Candidates are setting new priorities, and the message is clear: respect their time.
2024 HR Tech M&A Activity: A Year of Resilience and Growth
The HR technology market in 2024 was a story of resilience and growth amidst a rapidly changing global landscape. With the U.S. election dominating headlines and sparking conversations around the future of work, and consumer confidence rebounding from the challenges of prior years, the HR tech space has continued to demonstrate its vital role in shaping how organizations adapt to new demands.
How Learning and Skill Development Affect Business Agility, Employee Belonging, and Productivity [Report]
There’s an old proverb that essentially states “the shoemaker’s children have no shoes.” The more modern version is “the cobbler’s children have no shoes,” even though handmade shoes are mostly a lost art. However, the metaphor still has a profound message. Where we have expertise, we often use that expertise for the benefit of others, even if it means we go without the benefit ourselves. That’s true today in the context of learning.
HR Summer School Back 2 School Recap Original
As the back-to-school season has kicked off for our children, it’s the perfect moment to revisit the highlights of this year’s HR Summer School 2024! Since its inception amid the 2020 pandemic, HR Summer School has stood at the forefront of bridging the HR community, delivering unparalleled virtual learning, and fostering a sense of inspiration among professionals.
2024 Talent Acquisition Trends: What's New and What's Next [Report]
Every year I look forward to our team’s survey and analysis of the talent acquisition market, because it’s a space that moves quickly and has a tremendous amount of innovation both in the technologies as well as the practices that employers use to create successful outcomes. This year’s report is no exception, highlighting what is changing, what’s new, and what talent teams are doing to prepare for what’s next.
6+ Generative AI Applications in Talent Acquisition Today [Infographic] Original
Generative AI. It’s the topic in what seems like every conference agenda, presentation, and headline today. But so much of it is focused on things like ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini (formerly Google Bard). However, there are a few “flavors” of generative AI being used by talent acquisition and HR teams today: Off-the-shelf public systems like ChatGPT that are trained on large language models (LLMs) from the broader Internet.
RPO Buyer Study: Key Findings and Preferences [New Research]
Each year we partner with the RPO Association to produce a research study to examine and understand how the recruitment process outsourcing market is changing, what buyers expect, and the realities of the current landscape. Our latest report was recently released featuring findings from more than 500 RPO buyers, and it’s currently available at no charge. The video and other content below offer additional insight on what the report covers and what readers can expect.
2023 Recap: A Turbulent Year with Significant M&A Changes in the HR Technology Market
Our annual reporting on M&A in the HR technology space is one of our most popular pieces of content year after year (see our 2022 version here). We look at some of the many announcements that happen over the course of the year, flag some key ones, and identify any big trends that seem to appear across the landscape. 2023 was no different than recent years.
Fast, Fair, and Functional: A New Look at Structured Interviews [New Research] Original
For talent acquisition leaders, it sometimes feels as if there is a set of opposing forces fighting for control over hiring processes: We need a strong, supportive candidate experience We need to provide fair consideration and minimize bias We need to pick the candidate who can best perform the job… All that seems like a tough mission, frankly! But when you realize that there’s a single practice that actually taps into all three of those items, the whole thing suddenly becomes dramatically...
What's in Store for Talent Acquisition in 2024? Join Our Livestream to Find Out Original
The period of time over the last year or two has led to some of the most interesting (and challenging) talent acquisition swings in the market in my entire working lifetime. Recruiting teams have been cut sharply by reductions in hiring as companies prepared for tough economic times, and we’re seeing employers use more automation than ever before to take over pieces of the recruiting workload. But more than just looking at what is behind us, most of us want to know what is ahead.
What's New in Employee Retention, Performance, and Culture? [Livestream]
On Thursday, August 10th, our team will be hosting a special livestream to look at our brand new data on Performance, Engagement, and Culture Enablement (PEACE). Based on 1,000 global workers, this study has some incredible insights on how employees feel about their experiences at work today, what employers need to do to support them, and more.
HR Tech Awards 2023: Winners Announced
This isn't just about recruiting tools or just about learning systems. It cuts across the entire journey of an employee today.
Critical Success Factors For Attracting and Hiring in the Modern Environment [New Report]
Hiring moves quickly. That’s true in a practical/process sense, but it’s also true from a broader trends perspective. What works today is different in some ways from what worked two or five years ago. As we’ve been drawing insights from our new talent acquisition research (our first infographic on Pay Transparency, Ghosting, and Other TA Priorities, for example), we have run into some key trends and threads that every talent and HR leader needs to know.
First Look at 2023 Talent Acquisition Research: Pay Transparency, Ghosting, and More Original
Of all the aspects of human capital management, talent acquisition has seen a tremendous upheaval in the last three years. From a full stop in 2020 to full speed in 2021 and 2022, we’re now seeing some mixed signals about what the future holds. The essential piece is that small and midsize employers are hiring more than very large ones, and we’re seeing a strong appetite for hiring in most industries other than the obvious software/technology space that’s taken some layoff hits in recent months.
It's HERE! My New Talent Scarcity Book is ***Free*** For a Limited Time Original
Over the last year as companies struggled to find good people to hire and fought at the same time to keep their best staff, I knew there had to be a story there. I began digging into the data and found some surprising and potentially alarming details: there is a real talent shortage globally, and in many cases it’s getting worse.
2022 Was Another Record Year for HR Tech: See 20+ M&A Activities that Shaped the Market
Last year one of our most popular posts on the blog was a recap of some of the 2021 M&A activities across the HR Tech landscape. When you juxtapose that with the fact that 2021 was the biggest year ever for the HR technology market in terms of investment, we just couldn’t go without sharing the biggest pieces of the last 12 months and highlighting a few of the notable 2022 transactions for their specific value.
Employee Burnout and Belonging: Top Learning Trends for 2023
Employee belonging, burnout/stress, and DEI are all tied together, and they all intersect learning as well. In our brand new research on learning and talent development, we looked at some of the key areas where employee demand is shifting and evolving. In many cases, workers aren’t just asking to be trained to upskill in their jobs anymore.
The State of Voice of the Employee and Enterprise Employee Feedback Survey Platforms
In the last few years, the workplace has transitioned from a focus just on employee surveys to a more continuous listening approach. This transition has also been branded in some cases as “voice of the employee,” since it opens a direct channel from the workforce to company leadership, giving workers a voice like never before. This isn’t just a shiny object.
HR Tech Connect Summit 2022: A few tickets left
Over the last few years, one of my favorite events has been the HR Tech Connect Summit. This year it happens on November 16-18 in Tampa, FL. This is a smaller, more intimate event than many in the industry. The best part? It allows talent and HR leaders to build deeper connections, see some of the world’s leading workplace technologies, and learn about the latest trends in the space.
Can You Really Save 200,000 Minutes of Onboarding Time? [Webinar]
What’s your take on onboarding? Back in the day, I really enjoyed the opportunity to help new hires set up benefits, meet our team, and get their gear. This really paved the way for a successful employment experience. At the same time, I was always limited in the “fun” parts by the constant checklists, forms, and other requirements.
Employers Turning to Technology to Solve Hiring Woes [New Report]
In the last 24 months, hiring has gone from a “let’s wait and see” to a highly competitive experience that is leaving employers scratching their heads at what to do next. Today, we’re releasing a new research report based on how more than 1,000 employers are facing these challenges.
The Remote Work Gap: How to Add Flexibility in a Non-Flexible Industry or Job
This is one of the hottest conversations in the workplace, today, and no, I’m not talking about the most challenging hiring environment we’ve ever seen before. I’m talking about remote work. If you work for a software company, chances are you’re one of many people who is working a remote or hybrid schedule these days. But if you’re in some other industries, you’re likely feeling some different emotions because you may not have the option of working virtually.
Tech Brief: Gloat
Gloat is an Internal Talent Marketplace used by the world’s leading enterprises. The platform helps enterprises democratize career development, unlock skills, and future-proof their workforces, by utilizing a powerful AI engine and relying on years of experience and implementation.
2021 Was the Biggest Year Yet for HR Tech: See 30+ of the Top M&A Activities
Last year one of our most popular posts on the blog was a recap of some of the 2020 M&A activities across the HR Tech landscape. When you juxtapose that with the fact that 2021 was the biggest year ever for the HR technology market in terms of investment, we just couldn’t go without sharing the biggest pieces of the last 12 months and highlighting a few for their specific value.
Skills Provide an Objective Data Foundation and a Common Business Language
When it comes to discussions about skills in the workplace, it can feel very much like an all-or-nothing proposition. You either get it right and reap the rewards or you get it wrong and never have another opportunity to solve the skills puzzle. I’m hoping the following parable helps illustrate how that’s simply not true. A ceramics teacher stood up in front of her classroom and told the students they would be competing on a pot they would make.
7 HCM Trends for 2021: Prioritizing People-Centric HR
2020 is going to be the year that the world never forgets, but in a swirling pool of chaos there are some important components that we can’t miss. There are silver linings to every cloud, no matter how dark, and those present opportunities for employers to create better workplaces as time progresses. Below are some key trends that every employer should consider, including looks at everything from talent to experience to equity and more.
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