The workforce has come third in the race for the top priority among CEOs for 2025, according to new research from Gartner.

Research among 416 CEOs and other senior business leaders saw growth and technology take the gold and silver respectively, with the workforce left to take bronze.

While more than half (57%) of CEOs plan to increase investment in people and culture next year, that is down from 69% from the year prior.

Additionally, less than half of CEOs (46%) plan to increase investments in hiring versus 54% in 2022, Gartner found.

Speaking exclusively to UNLEASH about the research, Alexander Kirss, Senior Principal in the Gartner HR practice, says increased interest in leveraging new technologies – particularly AI – to facilitate growth is impacting prioritization of the workforce.

“For CEOs and senior business leaders, understanding, addressing and communicating growth strategies is a regular activity, yet many CEOs struggle to translate their opinions on talent and the workplace into a precise, actionable set of priorities,” Kirss tells UNLEASH.

He details that 86% of CEOs surveyed reported they plan to use AI to “maintain or grow company revenue” and just over half (56%) estimate that company productivity will “increase by at least 11% from using GenAI over the next two years”.

“The AI hype boom has led many leaders to rush towards exploring and implementing technologies before they feel left behind,” Kirss adds.

The risk is that CEOs deprioritize their current workforce in the rush to embrace AI.”

Refine, reinforce and monitor

In response to this trend and to ensure the workforce remains a strong priority, Gartner has identified three key talent areas that CHROs and HR leaders should be partnering with CEOs in the coming year.

The first is to refine the CEO’s point of view on current talent priorities. Kirss explains that while CEOs may have “sweeping views” on talent they may struggle to translate this into actionable priorities.

This is where CHROs become “indispensable”, he says.

“CHROs who excel at turning these visions into operational realities cement their role as key architects of the company’s strategic talent blueprint, solidifying their role as trusted partners to the CEO”.

The second recommendation is to prompt the CEO to reinforce talent priorities. When CHROs take on responsibility for executing talent prioritization, CEOs can become “disengaged” from the process.

In response, Gartner states CHROs should promote cross-organization communication through the C-Suite by “embedding opportunities to discuss talent priorities” and “discussing talent priorities in regular organizational and operational updates.”

“Doing this will not just keep the CEO engaged on these priorities but also ensure that all stakeholders clearly understand what the talent strategy is and why it’s important,” Kirss says.

The third and final area for CHROs to work on is to monitor emerging talent trends to help priorities evolve.

CHROs should schedule dedicated time to review emerging talent trends and determine the specific impact they are likely to have on the organization’s talent priorities, Gartner recommends.

They must also assess their organization’s readiness to adapt to future talent priorities while “proactively identifying and addressing potential barriers that could hinder them”.

“CEOs must trust in their CHROs, who can add immense value by helping to examine how they think about talent and implicit assumptions that are driving their point of view,” Kirss adds.

By sharing the challenges, costs, timeframes and impact that CEOs’ beliefs could have on employees and the organization, CHROs can uncover areas of misalignment and help the CEO understand how and why they have come to their specific goals.”