A new report finds employers not embracing remote work miss out on talent
Job candidates across the world are dropping out of recruitment processes once they find out that an organisation isn't offering remote work, according to employers in a new report.
HireRight's 2025 Global Benchmarking Report surveyed 1,114 employers, including HR professionals, to find lack of flexibility is becoming a barrier to recruitment for many organisations.
In North America, 30% of the respondents said candidates are dropping out if remote working wasn't offered. This is also the case in the Asia-Pacific region and Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).
In EMEA, 47% of employers said candidates drop out if remote working wasn't on the table, up from 23% in 2024. In APAC, 26% of employers shared similar sentiments, higher than the previous 17% last year.
The report comes in the wake of growing office-return policies from organisations this year. Companies, such as Amazon and Starbucks, have ordered their employees to come onsite more often.
"This suggests that companies that are not (or are no longer) embracing remote working may be missing out on some of the best available talent—and could be contributing to other challenges," the report read.
According to the report, finding candidates who are within a commutable distance from the office is an emerging challenge for employers in North America (27%) and EMEA (32%).
Office-based employees still a priority
Despite these challenges, the report found that more than half of employers across the world are still focusing on finding office-based staff.
More than seven in 10 respondents in North America (73%) and APAC (71%) said they expect to hire office-based employees in 2025.
Hybrid employees only come in second for North American (51%) and APAC firms (64%), according to the report.
In EMEA, the trend is reversed, with employers expecting to hire more hybrid workers (84%) than office-based staff (64%) this year.
"As more companies are rolling out return-to-office programmes, it's unsurprising that so many businesses are expecting to hire more office-based workers in 2025," the report read.
But the report noted that there is still quite a demand for hybrid and remote employees.
"[This] suggests that most businesses are still utilising hybrid working in some capacity and are not requiring all new hires to be full-time office-based (or on-site) workers," it said.
"This data shows that, despite the common media narrative of big corporations ordering all their workforce back to their offices, in reality, in many instances it is a lot more nuanced than that."
