Dive Brief:
- Human resources skills were the third-most sought after job skill set, listed as a requirement in 27.3% of all U.S. job postings at the end of 2025, according to a new report from Indeed Hiring Lab.
- The report said HR skills such as employee engagement and management were valuable far beyond organizational HR departments, calling the HR skill set “necessary across a broad range of occupations.” In addition, most management job postings as well as more than 20% of administrative assistance job postings, called for an HR skill, which the report said reflected the importance companies place on effective people management.
- Business operations skills were the top requirement and were listed in one form or another in more than 70% of all U.S. job postings, per the report. In particular, customer service and administrative skills were the most in-demand business operations subcategories, appearing in 37.1% and 35.8% of all postings, respectively.
Dive Insight:
Hiring Lab’s report analyzed more than 3,000 individual skills taken from millions of U.S. job listings published on Indeed in Q4 2025. According to the findings, being adept at business fundamentals is valuable for nearly every worker.
“Relying on staff who can navigate the functional side of a business is crucial, as reflected in the skills employers are looking for,” per the report, which added that business operations skills including administrative, human resources, business project management and analysis skills were extremely important in today’s job market.
For HR workers, this suggests that their skill sets are in demand, even outside traditional HR roles. The report found that employers expect workers to support the broader business in some way and required at least one business operations skill in nearly all project management roles (97.7%), HR roles (96.3%) and customer service roles (96.1%).
These skills are less in demand in positions that require more hands-on expertise, however. Only 24.1% of job postings for personal care and home health workers and 25.8% of postings for physicians and surgeons required business operations skills.
The demand for business operations skills in the workforce “reflects the enduring necessity for coordination and planning within any organization,” the report said.
This need for workers with strong organizational skills may also be because of a larger leadership crisis in the U.S. workforce. A 2025 report from Express Employment Professionals found that more than half of job seekers who are or were managers said they left their roles, or planned to. In addition, that same report found that Generation Z workers said they wanted to develop their own individual expertise rather than manage fellow workers.