Employers responding 'pragmatically' to secure AI expertise
Most employers recruiting AI-equipped talent in Australia are facing challenges as demand for these candidates surges, according to a new report from Robert Half.
Its poll of 500 hiring managers revealed that 99% of employers who are hiring AI talent are running into hurdles with high salary expectations emerging as the biggest issue employers hiring AI talent, with 41% of respondents citing it as a challenge.
It comes as wage premiums reached an average of six per cent for job vacancies in Australia that required AI skills, according to a PwC report last year. The average goes up to 25% for vacancies in the United States.
These wage premiums stem from the surge of talent demand and the lack of clear salary benchmarks, according to experts at Korn Ferry.
In Australia, 36% of employers hiring AI talent said there is a scarcity of qualified candidates. Another 32% said there is strong competition among organisations.
AI talent's skills and experience are also put into question, as 30% of employers said they find it difficult to assess true AI capabilities during interviews. Others said candidates lack:
- The right mix of technical and soft skills (32%)
- Relevant industry experience (28%)
Demand for AI talent
The findings come as 92% of Robert Half's respondents said they have a need for AI-related roles in their organisations. The most in-demand positions are:
- AI Product Manager (35%)
- AI Governance Specialist (29%)
- Data Scientist with a machine learning focus (28%)
- AI Engineer (28%)
- AI Architect (28%)
- LLM/NLP Engineer (22%)
- Robotics Engineer (AI-driven) (19%)
Demand is also anticipated to increase, as 91% of tech leaders in the report said they expect demand for AI/ML talent to go up in the next 12 months.
"The breadth of in-demand roles shows that companies are embedding AI into strategy, governance, and operations rather than limiting it to technical development," said Soni Huzefa, Senior Practice Director at Robert Half, in a statement.
"We are approaching a tipping point where AI skills shift from optional to essential across organisations of all sizes."
Finding AI talent
To improve hiring, 97% of employers said they are turning to alternative strategies to secure AI talent, according to the report.
Half of the respondents said they use AI-powered tools to accelerate candidate matching. Others said:
- Hiring career changers or self-taught engineers with non-traditional backgrounds (49%)
- Promoting continuous business process evaluation (42%)
- Hiring remotely to tap into broader or global tech talent pools (37%)
"Employers are responding pragmatically by broadening their candidate search sources, moving beyond traditional candidate pipelines," Huzefa said.
"As demand increases in the world of AI, transferable skills and adaptability are commanding a premium, giving employers that prioritise potential over credentials a distinct advantage in navigating this new landscape."
