The hiring landscape continues to evolve, presenting a focus on flexibility for businesses across various sectors.
Evolving trade policies, ongoing inflation, a skilled talent shortage, and the rise of artificial intelligence are reshaping the economy in Canada. As a result, companies are adjusting their workforce strategies and focusing on flexibility to remain competitive in a changing market. With hiring continuing to shift, both employers and workers will need to adapt to new challenges and opportunities.
Average hourly wages among employees are up 3.6% year-over-year as of March 2025, following growth of 3.8% in February45.
Employers Budgeting 3.4% for Salary Increases in 202539
Challenges Are Opportunities to Outperform Your Competitors
We are in a challenging time to hire and retain staff. However, this can be good news for companies that can rise to the challenge. When most companies are struggling, opportunities arise for the organizations that can be flexible and creative in their efforts to attract talent.
What Is Your Top Priority?
Since 1964 we have helped thousands of employers achieve their workforce productivity goals. Please use our Leadership Priority Finder to create a personilzed Leadership Priority Kit with custom productivity solutions assembled specifically for you.
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Or, explore how we can help employers solve for some of the most common priorities we encounter below.
Attracting Quality Candidates
48% of employers say that failure to find the right workers is the biggest risk to hitting their growth targets7, and 52% of employed workers are NOT actively seeking new opportunities.1
Minimizing Time-to-Hire
Job seekers say that a slow hiring process is the top reason they lose interest in a potential employer leading to increased ghosting and the loss of an employer’s preferred candidate.2
Improving Engagement/Retention
Four in five Canadian employers are worried about their ability to replace employees who leave in the current competitive labour market.18
Optimizing Costs
Labour is often one of the biggest costs of doing business and labour expense is up 4.5% year over year.3
Better Agency Partnerships and Customer Service
Customers report 3 times faster hiring and better results when working with AppleOne.8