UL Careers Early Careers Employer Survey 2026

Graduate Hiring Confidence and Sentiment

Early Careers Recruitment Outlook Employer confidence in early career hiring remains relatively high across all time horizons, but with a more measured and cautious tone than in recent years. In the short term, 76% of employers report feeling confident about early career hiring. This increases slightly to 82% over the 6–12 month period, before softening marginally over the longer-term horizon. Only a small proportion of employers report low confidence at any stage. This consistency across timelines suggests that graduate recruitment remains an established and necessary part of organisational workforce planning. However, the shift from strong confidence to more moderate confidence indicates that employers are increasingly balancing growth ambitions with cost control, operational constraints, and external

uncertainty. Overall, rather than pulling back from early career hiring, many organisations appear to be proceeding with greater caution, flexibility, and closer monitoring of workforce needs. Entry-Level Roles Are Evolving Alongside steady confidence levels, employers report noticeable changes in how entry-level roles are being structured and delivered. While the majority of organisations (62%) indicate that roles have remained broadly unchanged, a significant proportion report adaptations. These include roles being redesigned to incorporate broader responsibilities, the introduction of automation or AI supported tasks, and, in some cases, a shift towards more flexible or fixed-term hiring models.

66%

Which best describes your organisation’s current early careers hiring approach?

24%

4%

2%

2%

2%

0%

Delaying graduate start dates

Pausing placement hiring but maintaining graduate

Pausing all early careers hiring

Pausing graduate hiring but maintaining placements

Reducing graduate cohort size

Hiring but more cautiously

Hiring as planned

16