It’s a troublesome hiring atmosphere nowadays. Many companies have slowed or paused hiring amid financial uncertainty. So, any employer growing its hiring quantity is sort of a magnet for job-seekers.
That’s the case for Progressive. The insurance coverage large just lately introduced plans to rent greater than 12,000 workers for 2025, up from 10,000 new hires final 12 months. Moreover, the corporate’s expertise acquisition workforce expects to obtain lots of of 1000’s of purposes this 12 months, Progressive’s enterprise chief of expertise acquisition, Neil Lenane, tells HR Brew. Lenane shared how the corporate plans to handle that quantity of résumés whereas supporting the enterprise’s progress.
Hiring spree. A lot of Progressive’s progress stems from booming enterprise. Final 12 months, Progressive added greater than 5 million insurance policies whereas internet premiums collected grew by 21% to $74.4 billion. On high of that, the corporate has already added 1.3 million insurance policies within the first quarter of 2025.
The most important bucket of latest hires this 12 months, round 5,000, will account for this progress, Lenane mentioned. The rest might be to fill vacancies created by inner promotions which Progressive should rent externally for, and lastly, to fill attrition.
Many of the roles Progressive will rent for contain claims and get in touch with heart roles—50% of the corporate’s workforce is in claims.
“[We’re] always making sure that we have folks to be able to handle claims and or to replace the folks who have moved into trainers and leadership and all those things,” Lenane mentioned.
They’re bulking up their authorized workforce as nicely. “Lawyers is a big focus this year again as we get more policy holders, more claims, you need more lawyers to be able to represent our insurance when they’re in accidents,” Lenane mentioned.
TA benefit. At a time when many hiring groups are getting flooded with elevated résumé volumes, any employer rising its ranks can anticipate a tsunami. Progressive receives a mean of 800,000 purposes yearly, and Lenane mentioned quantity for roles that sometimes don’t appeal to a lot curiosity has spiked. For instance, a current opening for a digital and communication supervisor position netted 178 purposes when traditionally it might not have acquired greater than 30, in response to Lenane.
“I’m not struggling to find people. Where you’re always challenged is to find the right folks based on the skillset and people who are going to thrive in a very inclusive culture,” he mentioned.
However it’s not simply actively hiring throughout a recruitment slowdown that’s attracting expertise to Progressive. The insurance coverage firm has a bonus over a few of its rivals, because it has established a distant or hybrid-friendly coverage for many roles together with in claims, buyer care, IT, analyst, authorized, and company capabilities, whereas rivals like Geico and Farmers have carried out return-to-office mandates. And, as corporations in different professions that Progressive employs, resembling tech, implement strict RTO mandates, that can drive expertise its means as nicely.
“The more companies that are dialing back remote, hybrid work, the more those people tend to be in my hiring pools,” Lenane mentioned.
Turning to AI. To accommodate the quickly rising variety of job candidates, Lenane’s workforce is leveraging AI.
With recruitment, AI is used to forecast progress expectations and form hiring technique, supply candidates, and lower down recruiters’ workloads.
“I get 800,000 applicants. I can’t talk to every single one of them,” Lenane mentioned. Consequently, Progressive has adopted asynchronous interviews, permitting candidates to reply questions despatched to them over video at their very own comfort. AI is used to assist hiring groups perceive how that particular person would reach that position, although a recruiter finally makes the choice on who to maneuver ahead with.
“AI is enhancing our ability to make decisions and solve problems,” Lenane mentioned. “But at the end of the day, the humans are driving the bus.”
Eye on candidate expertise. As AI hastens the hiring course of, Lenane’s workforce have to be aware about candidate expertise. Round one in each 4 candidates are present or potential Progressive prospects, he notes, and poor experiences can flip away future enterprise—particularly if folks air out their frustrations on-line.
“We’re moving a lot faster through the process because we’re leveraging technology. So that changes people’s expectations,” Lenane mentioned.
Lenane’s workforce has elevated give attention to offering candidates with suggestions, resembling suggesting how they’ll enhance their interview conduct, or recommending different roles they’re higher fitted to.
“We’re able to have a little bit more of those types of interactions…because some of the systems are helping them do some of the back end admin work,” Lenane mentioned.
This report was initially printed by HR Brew.
This story was initially featured on Fortune.com
