The new hiring reality: Skills, integrity, AI, and early talent

The year is winding down, and after traveling across the world meeting with customers, partners, and thought leaders, there are a few themes that keep rising to the top for me:

1. Validating skills is the best way to screen candidates, now more than ever before 
2. Cheating and integrity concerns feel urgent 
3. AI use cases in recruiting are becoming mainstream
4. Campus hiring programs are still a vital pipeline for future talent

Each of these topics represents both a challenge and an opportunity for talent leaders. Here’s what we’re hearing and how I’m thinking about the big picture for Hirevue and our industry as a whole. 

Skill validation or bust

Candidates are using AI to write resumes. 

The resumes are based on AI-generated job descriptions. 

Resumes are filtered by AI to determine “fit scores.” 

And on, and on, and on.

Rather than inferring skills from a resume or relying on self-reported skills from LinkedIn, companies have to embrace skill assessments. We’re hearing this from customers, and we’re seeing it in our data. 

Whether it’s built atop generative AI – or doesn’t include AI at all – the right assessment can validate a candidate’s skills at the entry to your organization (and again throughout the candidate lifecycle). 

Resumes have always had lower predictive power, but they continue to rapidly degrade in value with the proliferation of AI.

Integrity concerns: the financial services frontier

AI isn’t just reshaping the resume. Companies are nervous about the prospect of cheating and fraud – especially in financial services. What once felt like a hypothetical risk is now a more plausible reality. In an industry built on trust, compliance, and precision, every employee touching internal systems must operate in good faith.

At the same time, 73% of financial services employers report difficulty finding skilled talent, and nearly a quarter of talent acquisition leaders cite identifying the right skills as a top challenge for 2025. 

The result: missed revenue opportunities, overburdened teams, and risk exposure that technology alone can’t solve.

Forward-thinking financial institutions are turning to science-backed assessments to close that gap. These tools help them validate the traits that drive real-world performance (like cognitive agility, customer empathy, and ethical judgment) and connect the right people to the right roles faster. And today, many of these tools have cheating resistance built in or on the way. 

For instance, at Great Southern Bank, skills-based hiring transformed both efficiency and quality. Using Hirevue’s video interviewing and assessments, the bank cut time-to-hire by 43%, saved 12 hours per recruiter per week, and improved candidate satisfaction scores to 87%. Faster hiring, better retention, and measurable ROI—all made possible by looking beyond the resume.

AI Isn’t a Nice-to-Have

What we’re hearing consistently is that AI isn’t a shiny add-on. It’s the infrastructure that enables modern hiring, helping provide information that can help make decisions more evidence-based, reducing manual workload, and giving every candidate a fairer shot. The question has shifted from “Should we use AI?” to “Whose AI do we trust to carry this critical work?” And that’s where the industry is maturing fast.

In all of this, trust matters more than ever. Leaders aren’t just looking for AI. They’re looking for AI from companies that can prove they’re doing it right: transparent systems, validated science, privacy and compliance safeguards, and evolving explainability. In a world where anyone can bolt an algorithm onto a workflow, responsible execution is the real differentiator.

Campus hiring remains a stable pipeline

Lastly, we need to talk about the changing landscape of entry-level jobs. I’m seeing countless articles about the wholesale disappearance of these roles, but what actually seems more likely (and many researchers agree) is that we are at the beginning of an accelerated polarization. This means middle-tier jobs hollow out and both lower- and higher-skill roles proliferate. 

So I want to challenge the idea that “entry-level” roles are going away. The definition is certainly in transition, but there will always be an entrance to the job market, even if it looks a little different. 

Which brings me to early-career talent, a specific kind of entry-level role for white collar workers. 

Today’s college students are immersed in AI. They’re adapting in real-time to new policies about artificial intelligence on campus, debating its merits in classrooms, and competing to win AI pitches and challenges. 

What does this mean for organizations? It means that colleges and universities remain some of the best places to find employees with AI skills. Looking ahead

As we wrap up 2025, it’s clear that the organizations that will thrive aren’t just the ones adopting new technologies but the ones redefining how they measure potential, assess integrity, and create pathways for early talent to succeed. The old playbook of resumes and gut feelings can’t keep up with a workforce shaped by AI.

Leaders who invest now in fairer, skill-based hiring practices will not only fill today’s open roles but build the kind of resilient, future-ready teams that can navigate what’s next.