If there’s one word to describe the labor market right now, it’s “uncertainty.”

Businesses appear to be hunkering down on talent acquisition as they face a number of challenges in early 2025, including potential tariffs and renewed concerns over a recession. As such, labor turnover remained largely unchanged in February, according to the latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Total hires and quits changed little or even decreased month over month (MoM), while job postings declined slightly.

“During high uncertainty times, it’s not surprising that companies scale back,” Sevin Yeltekin, a macroeconomist and dean of the Simon Business School at the University of Rochester, told HR Brew. “They’re going to take a little bit more of a conservative view in any kind of expansion, and in hiring as well.”

For more on what HR needs to know about the latest JOLTS data, keep reading here.—PM

It’s so satisfying when we meet someone who gives off good vibes. It’s a phenomenon the Beach Boys felt so strongly about, that they could only describe the feelings as “excitation,” and honestly, it’s a little tough to know what exactly the vibes even were. (Lyrically, there’s room for that song to grow, IMO.)

But vibes—even the good ones—don’t belong in the interview process. They can even make it hard for interviewers to offer up candidate feedback that's useful, skills- and experience-based that won't come back to haunt them as legal landmines down the road.

Recruiting and feedback HR tech company Textio this week at Transform in Las Vegas introduced a new AI-powered module to make the hiring process more objective and skills-focused, and take that vibe-check out of the interview process.

For more on how Textio is bringing a skills-based structure to the interview process, keep reading here.—AD

Want to attract candidates to your company? Set up your HQ in a TV-famous office, like iCIMS. The HR software company is based at Bell Works in Holmdel, NJ—aka, Lumon Industries, the mysterious biotech company at the center of sci-fi thriller Severance. Its second season sparked a spike in visits, and interest, in the complex and its businesses.

“It’s been interesting to see sort of the uptick in interest in Bell Works, knowing now that this is a hot spot due to the tie back to the show,” Stephanie Sansone, director of talent acquisition at iCIMS, tells HR Brew. (No, iCIMS’ employees aren’t severed. Yes, Sansone is asked that often.)

The exposure has helped attract NYC-area talent to iCIMS, which, prepandemic, touted itself as a tech employer for workers looking to ditch the commute into the Big Apple. But that’s shifted as iCIMS has expanded globally.

For more on how Sansone leads talent acquisition at iCIMS, keep reading here.—PM