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Susan White (00:02)
Having somebody in HR who’s thinking about the gaps and the needs in the business is really critical to the business ever achieving their goals or their mission, their vision, and their values.

Welcome to The JoyPowered® Workspace Podcast, where we help HR and business leaders embrace joy in the workplace. I’m Susan White, owner of Susan Tinder White Consulting, an HR consulting practice. Joining me is my dear friend JoDee Curtis, owner of Purple Ink, a large-scale HR consulting firm that I’m an executive collaborator with.

Today, we’re unpacking a role that not every organization may have — or may not call it HR business partnering — but we believe can significantly impact organizations, and so we think it’s important to discuss the HR business partner role.

What is an HR business partner, really? It doesn’t necessarily need to be a person who has a title of HR business partner. It can be somebody who is maybe the only person in HR. It could be an HR generalist who really comes at things with a strategic lens. It can be the chief people officer or HR director. What it is when we say HR business partner, it is someone who is in human resources who’s looking at the business that they support, the organization they support, and they try to bring people impact to it. We think of it as a strategic role that connects the business to its people strategy.

In today’s landscape, we think that the HR business partner or someone having that strategic lens is really crucial. Deloitte did a 2025 global human capital trend survey, and in that survey, they said 66% of executives say that recent hires aren’t fully prepared for the demands of work, which really highlights a persistent skills gap that we in HR, those of us with strategic lens, really need to help solve for.

And this really does matter because having somebody in HR who’s thinking about the gaps and the needs in the business, not just through hiring, but by maybe reskilling and aligning the talent the organization has with the needs of the business is really critical to the business ever achieving their goals or their mission, their vision, and their values. What else do you think, JoDee, that an HR business partner really can bring to the game?

JoDee Curtis (02:28)
Yeah, well, we hope that all HR people understand the business needs, but an HR business partner very specifically was designed for someone to understand the business needs and maybe to translate that back to the rest of HR, maybe the recruiting team, the learning and development team, the benefits person. I mean, if you have a larger team, right, that they would be that central focus on the business needs of the organization. So they understand the business and what’s driving the success, the profitability, and in accomplishing goals of the organization. And they also help the business understand the why behind HR’s initiatives and compliance needs.

I know I when I first heard that term, “HR business partner,” I guess it — you say it came out sometime in the 90s, I think, or early 2000s, but I don’t think I was familiar with it till maybe around 2010, because I remember thinking the first time I heard it, boy, I wish that had been my title.

I — it even, you know, I was an HR director then, or I had been an HR director and just, think an HR business partner just so clearly defines that that’s what we’re here for is to partner with business leaders on different topics and goals.

Susan White (04:13)
Yeah, that’s very fair. At the time, it was back in the mid 90s when I worked for Bank One and they introduced the concept of HR business partners. And at the time, I’d been an employment and employee relations manager for a segment of the country, and I got the opportunity or invited to be the HR business partner for the retail portion of the organization for this particular region that I was in, so moving from employment and employee relations, which, you know, serviced all parts of the bank, to just one line of business, retail business.

I thought, gosh, what is… I don’t really know what HR business partner does, but okay, if it’s new, sounds intriguing, I’ll go do it. And what I loved about it at the time is we were kind of, like, figuring it out as we went. I got to be part of a leadership team. I was an HR person at the table with all the other subject matter experts, like from sales and from finance and from marketing.

I brought a level of expertise to a leadership team and we as a group helped drive the direction that the retail organization in that region would take. I just loved, I fell in love with it and I got the opportunity then over time to continue doing that and manage larger portions of the country. I think it really provided me great appreciation for thinking as a businessperson more than just as an HR person.

JoDee Curtis (05:43)
Yeah. And also gave you that opportunity to just kind of zone in on one business unit, right? Where you really could understand all their – You, you weren’t necessarily trying to understand every department, but the business unit you had, you could do that, right? Yeah.

Susan White (05:48)
Right. Yes, it was. It was a great opportunity.

JoDee Curtis (06:09)
Now in 2026, the business context is shifting very quickly with automation, AI, strategic workforce planning disrupting traditional models. There’s so much more to that role. And SHRM’s 2025 CHRO benchmarking report found that organizations are expanding HR teams to an average of nearly two HR professionals for every 100 employees, which just a year ago was at 1.1.

I am just thrilled to see that number go up. And I think it’s an indication of the business understanding what an impact HR can have, right? And that there are so many more needs that people have in all the areas, right? As every area gets more complicated, recruiting and benefits and employee relations, and there’s just so much more to it now than there ever was.

Susan White (07:20)
I echo that so much. I can remember for decades, they always said one HR person per 100 people. And honestly, with compliance needs, with all of the demands, that’s why I believe HR people got so stuck in being transaction doers, you know, just to keep the lights on and keep the organization running and responding to charges and to trying to mediate problems and figure out what benefits. No wonder they couldn’t be that HR business partner, that strategic partner. Their hands were so full of all the stuff that had to get done, not the stuff that could get done. Yeah.

JoDee Curtis (07:59)
Right, right. I think that’s a real indicator that organizations are investing in HR strategically because they know that people aren’t just a cost center and they’re core to the competitive advantage of the business. HR business partners who use their business acumen and their people decision making are really aligning their firm’s people direction with the organization’s strategic direction, right? That’s the ultimate goal, that both of those are both aligned. And HRBPs, like most roles in HR, need to be able to influence without direct authority to make anyone do anything. And that can be tricky, right?

Susan White (08:55)
It’s kind of like when you hear a kid say, “you’re not the boss of me.” Well, you know what? In companies, employees hear HR saying, you know, this is what direction we should go, they’re like, well, you’re not the boss of me. So it can be hard.

JoDee Curtis (09:08)
Yeah. Yeah. And consequently, HRBPs who serve as the face of HR to the business unit really need to build that trust and confidence in them so that their internal customers want to work with them and not just have to work with them or need to work with them, but they seek them out or want to include them in meetings and want their opinion on the issue.

Susan White (09:40)
I really do think that’s one of the reasons I loved the HR business partner role so much is that I love building relationships. You know, my strength is Woo: winning others over. I love doing that. And I think that when you are that strategic partner, when you’re actually at the leadership table with a line of business or part of your organization or the whole organization, you have to recognize that you’ve got to be credible. You gotta bring confidence. You gotta bring competence. You have to get people who really do invite you in and want to work with you. So I’m so glad that you raised that point.

Well, the final area that we think is just fundamental as part of the foundations of HR business partnering is being able to be that competent HR advisor, consigliere, whatever you want to call it, a partner who brings data to the table. Metrics and data analytics have never been more important, I believe, in the world of HR.

And the HR business partner who is doing all that translating and understanding business needs, helping the rest of HR kind of align what resources and tools we have to equip our leaders and our staff to achieve their goals, we’ve got to be able to unlock the confidential people data appropriately to bring back measurements and bring back the understanding of why different trends are emerging.

What are we seeing as maybe the core reason that we’ve got different outcomes happening? We’ve got to be able to dig in and figure out what should we be measuring based on the information vault of people data we have? What should we be measuring? How do we communicate that? Where do we kind of set up or, you know, flares or alarms when we see that some of the data is going in direction that’s not in alignment with where it needs to be?

We’ve got — I think it’s going to help us by using data. Going to help us convey our competence and confidence, but it’s going to help our leaders make better informed decisions on people-related issues and matters. I think that the HR business partner today is recognizing that, that our believing something’s the right thing to do is important, but our being able to support that with the why, with the data, either internally or benchmarking against external data, or bringing in data about changing trends and surveys and reports and studies that are out there that will help us make better decisions in the workplace and help our leaders make better decisions.

I think it’s critical. It’s fundamental to being strong HR business partners. And JoDee, I know you’ve done some work in this area. I don’t know if you’ve gotten some certification or some training on data analytics within the last year or so that I think is smart.

JoDee Curtis (12:35)
Yeah, and I think it’s important, as you mentioned, data is just so critical now that we understand the data and we know what to look for, but that we also then can translate it into stories, right? What are the important factors and what’s the story behind it so that we can communicate that and communicate really what does that data represent?

Susan White (13:05)
No, I think that’s very smart to get their leadership’s attention. They’ve got to get engaged and without telling the story, they may just — the data may not resonate. So I love that. So JoDee, let’s spend just a couple of minutes talking about what an HR business partner is not. And this is our vantage point, our viewpoint on where things could start to go awry.

So HR’s strategic role, I think, continues to evolve. There was a January 2025 PR Newswire report that said that HR strategic partnership has actually stagnated for the first time in years, showing that organizations still have work to do in integrating HR into core strategic decisions. I talk to HR people all the time. Some are… struggle to get to that table.

You know, they might hold the title of HR business partner, but they’re not used as an HR business partner. They might be the chief people officer, but they’re ending up reporting to a director of administration or they’re layered in the organization. Let’s just talk about maybe how we as HR business partners need to think about ourselves, right? First of all, so that we don’t fall into the trap of maybe having a title that doesn’t fit or people thinking that we aren’t capable of more.

So the first thing I would mention is that as HR business partners, we coach leaders. We are internal consultants, truly. But we’re not there to fix all the people problems for them. If you’re an HR person and your leadership team says, well, there’s a people issue, a disciplinary issue, or something needs to be fixed about a person, give it to HR. You’re not helping the leaders in that organization get better equipped to be leaders and managers and developers of people.

You could, you know, that, the expression you can feed the person the fish or teach them how to fish. We want to teach the leaders. Every time there’s a people issue that arises it’s a teachable moment for us to coach, consult, and partner with a leader and help them solve their problems.

JoDee Curtis (15:13)
I think also that they’re not seen as the HR police, right? They’re not just relying solely on policies or rules, or I even think telling people what they can’t do, right? We want to guide their advice or connect people decisions directly to business outcomes without — Yes, throughout that, we may need to follow the policies of the rules and the regulations, but not starting with that, right? I hear so many people say, like, I went to HR and they said no, they said, right? Well, what can you do? What can you do to make this work or to solve the issue or to meet the goal?

Susan White (16:04)
Yes. I love that. There are times where you do have to say no. I mean, you absolutely do, because maybe the person wants to commit a crime. They don’t realize it’s illegal what they want to do, or that it’s going to cause you some regulatory issue.

What I have learned to do internally when I was an HR business partner, but certainly now as an HR consultant, when someone shares with me what they want to do, and I know that it is not the right course, I will say, well, let me share with you why I think that would invite risk into the organization or why I think that would be move that would be risky for you. I try to let them know it’s risk mitigation. And I’m giving advice here because they’re generally the leader, the manager, the supervisor who’s going to ultimately make the call. But I want them to see why, the why behind it.

And if it’s a policy they’ll be violating, I want to just share with you about if we choose to not honor that policy in this case, here’s the potential ramifications. You know, I think it’s about the approach of it. At the end of the day, they still could do the wrong thing, but they’re going to at least hear from me the why behind it. I think that helps.

JoDee Curtis (17:03)
Right, right. I love that about saying the why as opposed to saying no, no, no, no, no.

Susan White (17:09)
Yeah. Or it’s a policy. Can’t do that. And sometimes it’s why that policy exists.

And the third area that I would just mention, business partners, you know, HR business partners don’t report data for the sake of just reporting data. They aren’t just putting together a dashboard every month and keeping it updated. That’s just one of their functions that they do.

Instead, they’re getting in front of leaders and they’re using the relationships that they’re building to talk to the leaders about what’s on your worry list. What are the things that you’re concerned with being able to achieve in the next 12 months? When you wake up in the middle of the night thinking about work, what are you worried about? My guess is you’re going to hear something that involves people. It’s going to be, do we have the right staff? Do I have the right people? Do I have some kind of a performance issue going on?

And you can help them by understanding their needs and providing data that helps them control, manage, understand, interpret trends like skills gaps or productivity data in a way that you can be proactive and help them be proactive about getting to solutions. So thinking about how you use data and be really laser focused that you’re producing information and monitoring things and helping them see bigger picture in a very strategic way.

JoDee Curtis (18:34)
Right.

Susan White (18:35)
So what are some of the specific HRBP challenges that we hear from our listeners about? I’m gonna say the first one. People that are in HRBP roles or want to be in HRBP roles or just want to be viewed as a true partner in HR. They get pulled into tactical work so much. They’re drinking from a fire hose. They don’t feel like they can stop, take a breath, be strategic, figure out how to understand the business better because they’re so busy doing. How often do you hear that, JoDee?

JoDee Curtis (19:04)
Yeah, so often. And honestly, I just had a conversation with someone a couple weeks ago who had been promoted to very, very high level in the organization that they told me no HR person had ever held this title before. And I knew she had kind of been struggling in her role, and I said, wow, like, that’s fantastic that you were promoted to that title. I said, do you feel better about your role? And she said, no, it’s so much administration. They’re still, even though they rewarded her with this recognition, they still view that role as being so administratively oriented because before her, that’s really all they had had. And she has so many skills that they just don’t know what to do with, I don’t think.

Susan White (20:09)
So still tactical when they could be really using her strategic brain. They could be using her in very different way. Wow, that’s rough.

You know, when I hear this and people say, Susan, I can’t get out of the weeds, I can’t get up into the clouds to be, you know, ideating and thinking and offering value, I’m so busy, some of the things that I throw out brainstorm with them and things that I’ve seen work is first of all, really doing a self-assessment about what are all the things that are on our plates? What are all the things on my plate? What needs to come off? What can be delegated? What should we stop doing?

So often in organizations, you do things because it’s always been done. What can we get rid of? Introducing automation. Never in our history has there been more automation tools at our disposal. I do believe that it’s really important that every HR person spends some time every year going to a conference, going to an expo, seeing what the new technology is, going to webinars. — there’s a lot of free ones out there because everybody’s selling. Talking to your peers at HR local workshops to talk about what are you using for your employee relations tracking system? What are you using… What new software have you started using this year? Because I do believe automation continues to get better and better and less and less expensive.

JoDee Curtis (21:32)
Right.

Susan White (21:34)
There’s certainly AI, which we’ve talked about on prior episodes, that’s certainly figuring out what the systems are, making sure in the organization that it’s approved, what policies you have around it. Outsourcing, there’s so many firms out there happy to take pieces and parts of your HR work and oftentimes they can do it cheaper than you can do it. You think about the man hours it takes you to do and they maybe do it better with less errors and more because they have more rigor and more tools than you’ve got to do that.

So thinking about what can we outsource? Just what can we lift off of your plate that maybe we might — it be a business proposal to help your organization get comfortable with it coming off your plate, but it could be well worth your time to spend the time getting people socializing that idea and then executing on it. Any other advice you have trying to get out of tactical work, JoDee?

JoDee Curtis (22:31)
I just think thinking about all those things. You know, the next topic is about setting unclear expectations, and I think that can connect with being tactical or being pulled into tactical work that unclear expectations maybe of the leader, the CEO, whoever is, you know, working with the HR business partner, but also from the HR business partner themselves.

Like this example I just told you, I feel like this person is super frustrated because she’s getting pulled into tactical stuff. But I’m not sure she’s making it clear of the expectations of what she can be providing or where she can be more valuable to them at a higher level. And/or on the other side, if she’s setting the expectation that I am going to delegate this… I mean, she does have a team. So I think that’s a combination of both sides understanding what the role is, right? And setting boundaries really, really, and clarifying where you can add that strategic value. And again, not being the policy police but being a bridge builder to bridge HR and the needs of the business at the same time.

Susan White (24:08)
Yeah, I really appreciate that. I know for myself, when I went into HR business partnering, it was really hard for me to say no when there was a client need. And I think that I had to learn, and it probably took me longer than I should have, to know when it was time, when requests came in, that if you’re in a larger organization, getting it to the right area, the right person, and that you don’t own it.

You might own the fact that it needs — that the client’s looking to HR to get something done, so you want to be working both sides, make sure that if it’s recruiting or comp or whatever issue it is, that it gets the attention that it deserves. So you kind of have to stay kind of present on it, but you need to let the experts do it. You can’t take everything on your back. You’re not going to be successful.

And the other point is, let’s say you do take everything on your back and you do really well, people are not going to be comfortable giving it to somebody else. They’re going to always come to you. So it’s really important that you be clear expectations and set those boundaries. So I think that’s a great add.

The final challenge that I see a lot and hear a lot is HR business partners who are in this role to be that face of HR really getting traction with the individual leaders that they are aligned to. And sometimes you’re going to have a client, internal client, who welcomes you and invites you to the table and includes you. But often you have to earn it. And just because you’re their assigned HR business partner doesn’t mean that they’re going to, you know, open up their hearts and their minds and their belief in you.

So it’s taking time to really understand that I gotta build a relationship here. As the HR business partner, I need to show my value. I need to come — I need to be paying attention. I need to be in every meeting that I possibly can with the business. So showing up, being present, I think first of all is there.

Forming relationships with all the individuals that are on the team that you can. Usually that’s certainly the senior leader, but all his or her direct reports, their direct reports. Start understanding the talent on the team. You’re going to bring HR expertise or else you wouldn’t be in this role. So knowing when to add value, contribute, comment is important, but soaking it in, asking questions and understanding the business, you’ve got to really demonstrate interest in the business, I think, to get that traction.

Any other things that you’ve seen, JoDee, where people that are in this role are able to get that traction? Any other things you’ve witnessed?

JoDee Curtis (26:42)
Well, sort of taking a different perspective, I was going to share, you know, I just did some meetings with a group of a fairly large organization and they had, I think, 25 HR business partners in the team that I was working with. And they had told me before I met with them that there were very broad levels of relationships between the business partner and their business unit.

So essentially, these 25 people all had the same job title, but some of the people I think were really able to advocate for themselves and gain traction with the leaders, and on the flip side, the business leaders were very supportive of their role and they had a strong working relationship and all was well. But others were saying, well, you know, my business leaders haven’t accepted this role or aren’t coming to me for advice. And I just was interesting as I kept thinking, what is happening there? Is it the HR business partner? Is it the leader? Is it that they didn’t set expectations or they haven’t earned that trust yet?

I wasn’t sure. I mean, as I was working with them over a couple of days, I began to sense it in some people that they didn’t have the confidence maybe to go to that business leader and earn their trust. On the other hand, some of them seemed to have some really tough business leaders.

Susan White (28:35)
That’s real. That is truth, right? It could be any number of those things. And you know what? Sometimes you’re going to meet your match and maybe that person had a really bad experience early in their career with an HR person and they can’t get over it, and there’s nothing you’re going to be able to do or prove to them that you’re a trustworthy internal coach/consultant for them. So I don’t rule that out, but I wouldn’t give up trying. Yeah.

Well, that’s great. Well, let’s — you know what, let’s close out the segment just talking about a few things. Maybe if you are an HR business partner or want to be an HR business partner and you are listening to this episode, what are some things that you can do to just strengthen your capabilities to make sure that your foundations are strong?

First thing we’d say, you know, strengthen your business understanding for whatever your organization, whether you’re a not for profit, a government agency or in corporate America, or small business, whatever it is, understand that business, understand that industry, where you can read their financial briefs, where you can read trade journals, where you can go to workshops, conferences, seminars, whatever you can to learn about it. The more you know about the organization’s work, the better you’re gonna be at consulting about the people side of it.

Learn about your competitors. We have the vantage point generally in HR to know where we hire talent from. Get to know the new hires. Find out how they did things in their old companies. Certainly when people leave you and you find out where they’re going, set a focus on those competitors. You want to understand who’s out there, who you’re competing for talent, the retention of talent, and the attraction of talent. What else, JoDee?

JoDee Curtis (30:20)
I think honing — we mentioned this earlier about the importance of understanding the data, so honing your data interpretation skills. I really think sometimes in HR, we might get kind of set on thinking, like, okay, these are the three metrics that are important for us. You know, maybe it’s time to fill or turnover, but those aren’t issues or concerns of your business partner, right? Maybe there’s other things that are happening, a lack of engagement maybe.

So understanding what’s important and ensuring that you are looking at the right metrics or asking the business leader what metrics are important to them, what would they like to see, and figuring out what you can do to provide that information and as I mentioned early in telling the story around it.

Susan White (31:22)
I think that implicit in everything we’ve talked about today is that you’re bringing good HR skills to this role. What I would say is the longer you’re in the HR business partner role, the more onus there is on you to make sure you’re staying current in all the various areas of HR. You can’t — even though you may not be doing talent acquisition every day or learning and development every day or compensation every day, you really need challenge yourself to stay current in what the practices are in those functional areas, what’s on the horizon so when you’re in those strategic planning meetings with the client, when you’re around the business reviews, you can talk about, when it’s appropriate, something that’s coming up in one of the functional areas that could be a real catalyst in the business. So it’s really important that you stay fresh across the spectrum of HR. And that’s not done without intentional effort.

And then I guess finally, I would just say, you gotta stay curious. You gotta stay curious. You gotta ask lots of questions. Yes, we look at the HR business partner function as being an internal coach, internal consultant, consigliere, but it’s not what you’re telling people that makes you valuable. It’s what you’re learning all the time, what you’re learning, and that enables you to then add value by giving recommendations of what you’re seeing, what you’re hearing, what you’re learning. So, stay curious.

JoDee Curtis (32:47)
Yeah, I love it. Best advice of all.

Where do you or did you — I mean, now you’re not technically in an HRBP role, but with many of your clients, I know you function in some capacities of that at times. So where do you or where did you find joy in being an HR business partner?

Susan White (33:11)
You know, I mentioned earlier that I just love the relationship building part of it. And I have to say that I really got — when I was inside a company and now as an HR consultant, sometimes acting as an HR business partner, I find real joy in having impact. And I can’t think of any other job in HR where you feel more integrated into the organization that you support, into the business. You learn to think as a businessperson and an HR person kind of melded together.

I just find that very joyful. And you see that your input, your advice, your consulting transforms into increased profitability, increased revenue, increased employee satisfaction. I mean, go on and on and on. It’s just fun to be able to see tangible results and be a part of it.

JoDee Curtis (34:00)
And we have a listener question from one of our listeners back in July of 2025, and they said, “How do you diplomatically inform an employee when they are taking up too much space in a room when there is a recurring problem?”

Susan White (34:20)
When they just keep doing it, taking up too much space. I have to say, I thought about this question quite a bit because I wasn’t sure if the listener meant, like, too much physical space in the room or is it too much emotional space? Like, are they coming in and their presence is just overwhelming? Are they kind of insisting that they’re the one on stage, that they’re the ones that people are listening to?

You know, as I thought about it, I thought, you know what, I think the answer’s the same, whether it’s physical or if it’s, you know, more emotional space. I think that it’s an opportunity, if you’ve got somebody that just comes into the meeting and they’re taking too much of the time or the energy of that room, I think it’s an opportunity to help that person have more self-awareness and really understand the impact of their doing it, whether it’s physical or emotional space.

It’s causing it — letting them know it’s maybe causing you to not speak up because you don’t want to interrupt them or it’s causing you not to be able to spread out your spreadsheets or your computer because they’re consuming too much. Could be a quick and easy fix because the person just might not realize that they’re doing it or the impact that it has. If you have trust and confidence in that person and that they have trust and confidence in you, then that conversation could be just a direct one-on-one, I care about you, I wanna share with you how I’m feeling about something, and then lay it out there.

Now, my guess is the fact that you’ve written in the question to us that you may not feel like you’ve got that entree to have that one-on-one with them. I think that if they’re impeding your ability to have a good meeting, to have a productive session, I do think you need to take it to your manager. If you share the same manager, it’s a little easier, because you can go to your manager and just say, in the meeting, Tom, Mary, whoever, here’s what they’re doing that is impacting my ability to focus or to spread out or to feel comfortable. And then you leave it in your manager’s hands, hopefully, to have a direct conversation that’s a supportive conversation to that individual to make them aware of the impact.

IF it’s a different manager, maybe whatever this meeting or that you’re together with the individual, you report to someone different than they report to, I’d still start, go to my manager and share what’s going on and how it’s impacting you and ask for their help. My guess is that manager will go to that person’s manager who will then have the opportunity to have that direct conversation. So I’m hopeful. If you can do a one-on-one with them individually, it certainly would be a beautiful thing to do. But I understand if you don’t feel like you can, I think you gotta take it to your manager.

JoDee Curtis (37:11)
Good advice.

Susan White (37:12)
It’s time for in the news. We found a December 12th, 2025 HRdive.com article by Catherine Moody entitled, “More Workers Say They Will Job Hunt in Early 2026, but Competition is Tight.” I found that really interesting.

Moody cited a Robert Half survey of 2000 employed workers, and of them, 38% said they planned to hunt for a new job in the first six months of 2026. And they had a variety of reasons for why the increase in number of people wanting to look for work. The first one is a desire for better benefits.

JoDee Curtis (37:52)
Second one is limited advancement opportunities where they were. That’s very common.

Susan White (37:58)
Desire for better pay, which probably doesn’t surprise anybody.

JoDee Curtis (38:02)
Yeah, or burnout in their role.

Susan White (38:06)
And the most likely to be on the hunt for a new job, according to the survey, were healthcare professionals, which I totally get how stressful those jobs must be. Gen Z workers, which I find interesting because that’s obviously the latest generation that’s in the workplace, and certainly they’re feeling mobile than probably other generations. Working parents… and so I think working parents have so many strains that they’re under that they are thinking about how do I find a better balance in life.

So Robert Half also surveyed 450 job seekers, so people are actively looking for a job; 68% of them expected to take longer to land a job than it had in the past because I think there’s real recognition that company hiring feels more sluggish to them.

JoDee Curtis (38:40)
Yeah.

Susan White (38:59)
And certainly what we’re reading, companies are only considering downsizing, but they’re certainly holding firm on headcount overall. So it tracks with what I’m seeing. How about you, JoDee?

JoDee Curtis (39:12)
Yeah, totally agree. And I think that’s important for people looking for a job to step into it with that mindset, right? That it might take some time and not to be disappointed if something doesn’t happen in the first few weeks, right?

Susan White (39:23)
What I’m certainly seeing is from last May and the December grads, many had used to have job offers long before graduation and that more and more are out looking for work and it’s, it’s taking longer, so.

And people I talk to are open to moving jobs to get more flexibility, more rewards, more challenges, but employers are being cautious and more reluctant to add to staff, or they’re not racing to replace departing employees. So at least at the time of this recording, more sluggish.

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JoDee Curtis (40:40)
Please tune in next time and make it a JoyPowered® day!

Susan White (40:45)
Thank you.