Released yesterday [5 May 2025], the research also shows that 81% of HR chiefs plan to reskill their employees for better job opportunities in the digital labour era.

Conducted in partnership with NewtonX, the online, double-blind study involved 200 chief HR officers, chief people officers and other global leads of HR. It also found that once agentic AI is fully implemented, CHROs expect an average productivity gain of 30% and a 19% reduction in labour costs.

The move toward reskilling employees was one of the key messages of the study, with 89% of CHROs believing that AI agents or digital labour will empower them to reassign employees to new, more relevant roles. Other highlights include:

• CHROs believe that 61% of their workforce will remain in their current roles as they work alongside digital labour.
• 88% of CHROs believe redeployment is the more cost-effective approach compared to hiring outside the business for new roles
• 81% of CHROs are either already reskilling (20%) or plan to reskill (61%) for roles with better future opportunities.
• CHROs believe AI literacy is the number one skill workers need as business move into the agentic economy.
• 75% of CHROs say AI agents/digital labour will increase the need for soft skills at their organisation.
• CHROs plan to reassign employees to relationship-building roles like partnerships and account management and say collaboration and adaptability skills will be valuable in the agentic economy.
• In the near term, CHROs plan to reassign employees to technical roles like data scientists or technical architects. They also anticipate IT, research & development and sales teams will grow as their business begins to adopt AI agents.

Reflecting further on the organisational changes that agentic AI adoption will have, 80% of CHROs believe that within five years, most workforces will have humans and AI agents/digital labour working together. Further, 86% of CHROs say that integrating digital labour alongside their existing workforce will be a critical part of their job.

• Discover more about agentic AI in our feature in the May/June 2025 issue of Recruiter, out now.

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