The results are in! PI Worldwide surveyed hundreds of HR professionals for the Recruitment and Retention Trends report and learned that employers are struggling to find talent for open positions, with more than half of the respondents saying that it is their biggest problem.

Interestingly, the survey also uncovered a likely reason why they perceive the talent pool as shallow. According to the data, when evaluating potential hires, most organizations are only focusing on candidates’ skills, experience, and education – or hard criteria – and are not including “soft” criteria, such as personalities and behaviors, as part of the job requirements. By emphasizing “hard” skills only, they’re inadvertently narrowing their own candidate pool.

• 65% of small, 45% of medium and 40% of large companies say that finding talent is their biggest problem.
• Small businesses report a greater percentage of successful hires than medium and large companies, but more than half of the respondents consider only 40–79% of their hires to be successful.
• Almost 50% of unsuccessful hires are due to behavioral discrepancies or inadequate skills.

To get a detailed picture of how your peers are doing with their recruitment and retention efforts, download the full report.