Randstad “HR Trends 2023”: the corporate sector’s expectations for this year are mixed

Only 41% of the nearly 250 companies participating in the research, mostly medium and large, expect an increase in their company’s net sales – compared to 61% last year. The majority of the research participants believe that the biggest problems of the year will be increased wage costs due to inflation and higher operating costs, which they plan to respond to through different strategies.

The experts interviewed are not optimistic about HR issues either. It is telling that while last year 89% planned to increase the number of employees, this year only 34% said so. Wages are a key issue in the labor market this year as well: employee expectations still do not meet the level of wage increases planned by companies, this gap has continued to grow since last year. The good news is that, while last year only 83 percent of companies wanted to increase, this year practically everyone (97%) did.