DEI rollbacks could exacerbate tech talent shortages – nearly half of recruitment leaders worry diversity cuts will impact their company’s appeal and employee retention
Recruitment leaders are scrambling to secure AI talent, but cuts to DEI initiatives could harm appeal and staff retention
Finding talent with AI skills has already become a major challenge for enterprises, but with some enterprises shelving DEI hiring practices, research suggests the situation could get worse.
In General Assembly’s State of Tech Talent report, two-thirds of recruitment leaders said hiring candidates with AI skills is more challenging than recruiting for other tech roles.
This means many enterprises have to pay more to secure talent, with 68% saying they usually have to offer higher salaries to candidates with AI skills, up from 64% last year.
Meanwhile, virtually all said that it's harder today than three years ago to find qualified candidates with both the soft and technical skills needed.
The study found three-quarters of tech hiring leaders are also worried they're hiring skilled AI workers too quickly and without taking time to build a sustainable, diverse pipeline of talent.
"To move forward, we need to build an AI economy that uplifts everyone — employees and companies alike," researchers advised.
"That requires upskilling and reskilling employees for an AI-powered future of work and building more sustainable entry-level pathways into technical careers."
DEI in the spotlight in the AI era
Notably, six-in-ten organizations said the increased focus on AI skills has heightened the need for diversity initiatives.
Building teams with a broad array of backgrounds has proven beneficial when it comes to successfully implementing AI strategies. Yet despite this, around 4% of HR professionals surveyed said their company had scaled back or eliminated their focus on DEI in tech hiring over the past year.
Hiring leaders aren't happy about this, however, and are concerned this could lead to greater problems down the line. Around half believe this could raise costs per-hire or lead to higher employee turnover.
These concerns are warranted. Analysis from Deloitte, for example, found a significant portion of Millennial and Gen Z employees are more likely to stay at a firm longer if it boasts a diverse workforce.
Nearly half (45%) of respondents warned candidates will see their company as a less desirable place to work. This aligns with research from Glassdoor, which found prospective employees are more likely to accept a job with employers that align with their values on DEI.
The topic of DEI in tech has come to the fore in recent months, with a host of major tech firms including Google, Meta, and Amazon scaling back or scrapping diversity policies.
Naturally, these moves have sparked intense criticism from industry stakeholders and raised concerns among minority groups across the sector.
Execs aren’t clued up on AI
Elsewhere, the study found there are skills-related issues at the top of many enterprises. Most VPs and directors, for example, said they’d never had any training on the topic of AI.
Only four-in-ten executives said they were very or extremely confident they know how to use AI tools without compromising company data, and more than a quarter said they were not very or not at all confident.
Around two-in-five admitted they lacked the knowledge to make decisions when it comes to hiring vendors that use AI.
Daniele Grassi, CEO of General Assembly, said this underlines the need to upskill executives to prepare for the ‘AI era’.
RELATED WEBINAR
“Technical and non-technical leaders alike must understand the legal, privacy and ethical implications of AI use," Grassi said.
"They need to know how to evaluate AI vendors, how to protect company data, and how to guide their teams on using AI in their work. Companies who don’t establish AI usage policies and upskill executives on AI face consequences ranging from data and privacy breaches to competitive disadvantage."
MORE FROM ITPRO
- What makes an effective diversity strategy?
- Diversity measures no longer “business critical” at Microsoft, internal emails suggest
- How to successfully implement a diversity strategy
-
Why patching velocity matters as Claude Mythos supercharges vulnerability discoveryFrontier AI models such as Claude Mythos and GPT-5.5 make patching more urgent than ever. How can firms increase the velocity at which they apply fixes and mitigations?
-
The UK is running on fumes as data center build-outs can’t keep pace with demandNews The country's vacancy rate has dropped sharply, with much of the pipeline early-stage and uncertain
-
Sluggish AI returns ignored as ‘fear of missing out’ continues driving investmentNews Poor returns on investment aren’t stopping the sharp increase in AI investment
-
Dell raises annual forecasts as AI boom continues to reward hardware vendorsNews Supply chain adjustments and shrewd management of the memory chip shortage help Dell capitalize on increased demand for AI
-
Upskill your staff in AI or expect them to quit, says GartnerNews Organizations need to focus on targeted AI tools and training to make the most of their staff and succeed in transformation
-
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang says these professions will be the big winners of the generative AI boomNews White collar workers might be sweating, but Jensen Huang thinks skilled tradespeople will be in the vanguard of the AI revolution
-
AI adoption projects keep failing, but enterprise ‘FOMO’ means investment is still risingNews More than half of organizations say they're only deploying AI because their competitors do
-
‘Today’s actions are not a cost-cutting exercise’: Cloudflare is cutting 1,100 jobs as internal AI usage surges 600%News The layoffs at Cloudflare come amid a 600% increase in internal AI usage
-
The first hurdle is the hardest in generative AI adoption – and businesses keep fallingAnalysis AWS’ UK chief said AI advances “feel like magic” at its recent London summit, but many firms are facing the reality of sluggish gains
-
UK firms are grappling with mismatched AI productivity gains – employees are more efficient, but business performance is stagnatingNews AI is providing value at an individual level, but “systems and workflows” need to be redesigned for business-wide gains
