Recruitment plans for 2026 are declared by 84% of employers, which is only 2 percentage points lower than a year ago. Companies will focus primarily on acquiring experienced and efficient operational employees, as well as sales and IT specialists who will help organizations navigate the transformation phase.

Attracting candidates who meet companies’ precise expectations will not be easy at all. Despite reports coming from the labor market, 47% of employers still expect recruitment difficulties.

74% of companies have planned pay raises for 2026, while only 5% of them assume they will exceed 10%. The decreasing scale of raises over the years may negatively affect companies’ attractiveness and employee satisfaction. Currently, only 39% of professionals declare satisfaction with the compensation they receive.

The labor market is in a stabilization phase, and at the beginning of 2026 there are no signs of either an incoming crisis or dynamic growth. At the same time, many companies are at a point of transformation—organizational, structural, and digital—driven, among other things, by business uncertainty and the development of artificial intelligence. In connection with these changes, they show high demand for efficient operational employees with a strong competency background.

– The dynamic digital transformation of business, which is already changing competency demand in the labor market today, is both an opportunity and a challenge for employers and specialists. The year 2026 will be a good time to create competency maps in organizations, identify critical shortages, and plan a strategy to solve this problem. For professionals, this means the need to take actions aimed at acquiring new qualifications. Investments made today will pay off in the near future—for employers in the form of a competitive advantage, and for employees as attractive career paths – says Alex Shteingardt, Managing Director of Hays Poland.

Organizations are not putting recruitment on hold

According to the study described in the 2026 Salary Report, 84% of companies plan to recruit this year, which is only 2 percentage points lower than last year. At the same time, as many as 47% of all companies expect that the number of permanent-role recruitment processes they run in 2026 will be higher than in the previous year. This is a very positive indicator for the coming months.

As the key reason for recruitment plans, surveyed companies indicated business growth (45%) and the need to find replacements for employees who decide to leave the company (32%). However, analysis of results obtained over the last five years shows that these arguments are gradually losing ground to structural changes, which this year achieved a record result of 20% of indications.

Competencies above all

This year, companies will be most interested in operational roles and those related to business support, which play an important role in every transformation process. It will also be crucial to acquire employees in sales and customer service—responsible for delivering satisfactory financial results—as well as in IT and engineering, without which it is impossible to bring business to the next level of digitization.

The evolution of desired competency profiles is also visible in responses to the question of which competencies companies will focus on in their recruitment processes. At the top of the list were business and analytical skills, such as project management, business analysis, and strategic planning. Technical and industry-specific competencies ranked second, followed closely by soft and leadership competencies, indicated by as many as 42% of surveyed organizations. It should be expected that the importance of skills such as communication, interpersonal abilities, or team management will grow along with the progressing digitization of the world of work.

– Demand is growing for experienced experts who combine extensive experience and knowledge with advanced digital, leadership, and soft skills. Employers are aware, however, that acquiring such people from the market may create challenges and require aligning the financial offer with their precise expectations – emphasizes Agnieszka Pietrasik, CEE Executive Director at Hays. – This does not mean, however, that they will abandon budget discipline in 2026. Companies will still remain very cautious in shaping salary grids – she adds.

Raises included in plans, but their amount may not satisfy professionals

These words are confirmed by this year’s Salary Report survey results. Although last year raises were granted by 80% of surveyed companies, and 74% included further increases in their plans for 2026, their scale will be decidedly smaller. A comparison of employers’ responses from recent years reveals a downward trend, and planned raises less and less often exceed 10%. Only 5% of companies plan to increase salaries by 10%. This is 6 percentage points less than a year ago.

The slowdown in wage growth results from declining inflation, but also from budget discipline still in force in many organizations. Moreover, more and more companies are preparing for upcoming regulations increasing employers’ obligations regarding pay transparency. Therefore, pay policy and salary grids are being subjected to thorough analysis, which goes hand in hand with greater caution in changes to offered rates.

Will wage pressure verify companies’ pay policies?

However, the low scope of planned raises may negatively affect not only success in attracting new talent essential for companies, but above all the satisfaction and engagement of current employees. The share of specialists feeling satisfied with the compensation they receive has fallen over the year to 39%, and 42% of respondents in the Hays Poland survey feel that their pay is inadequate to their scope of duties. This may be related to an increased scope of responsibility or an excessively high workload.

In this context, it is not surprising that 66% of employees also expect raises in 2026—more than in the previous edition of the survey. Some of them certainly hope for an improvement in their company and the granting of raises not implemented last year. Others will probably closely watch the labor market and seek attractive offers from other employers.

About the Report

The Hays Salary Report contains summaries of compensation levels offered to specialists and managers in more than 500 positions. We supplemented these with expert commentary and the results of a labor market survey conducted at the turn of November and December 2025. The report includes the perspective of nearly 1,100 companies operating in Poland and more than 1,800 employees and candidates.