Highlights from HIVE Power Hour: Strategic Foresight in Early Careers

Attrition is rising. AI’s impact is accelerating. Budgets are tightening. Skills gaps are widening.

With 2025 in full swing, this is the reality facing Early Careers leaders: The way organisations attract, develop, and retain early talent is changing rapidly, and those who fail to adapt risk falling behind. In an era of uncertainty, strategic foresight is no longer a luxury — it’s a necessity.

To explore how forward-thinking organisations are tackling these challenges head-on, The Smarty Train’s Chief Innovation Officer Dr Khairunnisa Mohamedali was joined by Francesca Jones, US Early Careers Leader of Talent Attraction & Acquisition at EY, Kelly Glynn, Global Head of Early Career Learning at Citi, and Steve Taylor, Group Managing Director of The Smarty Train for HIVE Power Hour: Strategic Foresight in Early Careers.

Bringing together Early Careers leaders from over 40 global organisations, the session offered practical strategies to help organisations anticipate and navigate future disruptors. With topics spanning stakeholder engagement, to Gen Z, to demonstrating Return on Investment (ROI) across the talent lifecycle, our panellists shared invaluable insights and tools to help our HIVE Community ensure their Early Careers strategies remain resilient and ready for the year ahead.

Read on for the key discussion points and actionable takeaways from the HIVE discussion:

Q: Are there any disruptions you’ve experienced in the last few years that have noticeably impacted your Early Careers Functions?

Francesca highlighted the shift in candidate expectations, particularly with the rise Gen Z entering the workforce. “I think one disruption that everyone can relate to is that post-pandemic Gen Z candidate,” she noted, “Navigating their different needs has really made us re-think a lot of our approach.”

Kelly echoed this, reflecting on how the pandemic forced organisations to adapt to new ways of working: “The last five years have been a whirlwind for strategic planning. In 2020 we were navigating the pandemic, and by 2022, we were back to in-person—but it wasn’t the in-person we knew before.” Kelly also echoed Francesca’s statements on the new generation entering the workforce. She noted, “We’re spending a lot of time understanding Gen Z—not just in recruitment, but across the entire talent lifecycle.”

Francesca additionally pointed to the evolution of skills as a key area to watch, particularly ensuring that these remain up to date with shifting technological needs. Steve added by highlighting the growing importance of soft skills: “In our discussions with leaders we’re seeing growth in a need for softer skills like growth mindset, curiosity, communication, and adaptability. These are critical for building resilience in a workforce navigating an increasingly unpredictable working world.”

Q: How are you future-proofing your Early Careers function against future disruption?

Kelly shared how Citi has established an Early Career Forum to foster collaboration and strategic planning. She explained, “The forum includes stakeholders from the various products and functions at Citi as well as our own team. It’s a dedicated space for diverse perspectives, to really help us see those potential disruptors on the horizon.”

One of the outcomes of the forum has been a renewed approach to skills assessment at Citi – particularly rethinking the end-to-end candidate journey from recruitment through to leadership positions years into their career. “We’re looking at the space outside of those core technical skills,” Kelly added, “and looking at other skills that we’re going to need at Citi to create that pipeline for our future leaders.”

In a similar vein, Francesca emphasised the importance of carving out time for strategic thinking: “I’d love disruption to only take up 10% of my time, but I find it can sometimes take up to 30% or 40%. The best way I’ve found to future-proof against this uncertainty is to hold myself and my team accountable—making sure we have allocated time for future-focused conversations, both short-term and long-term, so we can discuss potential disruptors proactively instead of reactively.”

Francesca also highlighted the need adopt an experimental mindset, staying agile and open to new approaches in attracting and hiring talent: “We’ve had a slightly rigid focus in the past, but we’ve made great progress in being more adaptive and experimental in our approach. Remaining agile has been so helpful in allowing us to try new approaches and innovate.”

Q: ROI is increasingly on the radar of Early Careers teams. How can you demonstrate the impact of ROI when it isn’t immediately visible?

Steve stressed the importance of starting with the end goal in mind when defining success metrics: “It’s important to start with the ambition and the goal and work backwards from that. So, ask yourself what success would look like, and then that’ll help steer which data systems you may need to establish to get there.”

He cautioned against expecting perfection, noting that even simple processes like tagging data can take time to refine. “Having a benchmark that you can steer towards and define as a threshold can be incredibly helpful as a starting point, even if that means looking externally so you can know what ‘good’ looks like, albeit in a different context.”

Francesca shared her experience of adapting ROI metrics to better align with stakeholder needs: “When I stepped into this role it took time to work out what our success metrics needed to look like.” She added: “I asked what metrics would be most helpful for us to be able to demonstrate to our stakeholders, and opening the door to that conversation has really helped us with engagement going forward.”

Kelly agreed with Francesca’s emphasis on stakeholder engagement, and added their use of robust processes like focus groups and surveys to measure the effectiveness of programmes like their training initiatives in New York: “We wanted to really measure how effective our initiatives are with the aim of figuring out what’s working (and what isn’t), so we’d have that information ready for when we need to get the conversation going with the stakeholders we’re reporting to.”

Q: Finally, are there any assumptions that we make as Early Careers professionals that we should be careful of? Any words of wisdom to offer with 2025 in full swing?

Kelly: “I would say that the landscape is changing and if we continue to do the same things we used to do, that won’t make us successful in the future.”

Francesca: “I couldn’t have said it better – how we source, or how we engage, or how we provide something like internships for example – just doing it the way we’ve always done it won’t be good enough anymore. I always try to challenge myself on whether we need to be doing things the way we’ve been doing them, or if a new approach might be needed.”

Want to be part of the HIVE conversation?

If you’re navigating the same storm, you don’t have to do it alone. HIVE isn’t just an event, it’s a year-round community of Early Careers thought leaders, disruptors and pioneers.

Apply to join HIVE to take part in our goals of:

• Interrogating trends and information that will help leaders expand their strategic insight
• Fostering a global community of shared learning and connected purpose
• Helping elevate Early Careers on a global scale to address the current challenges that senior leaders are facing

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HIVE content is curated by a Content Advisory Board, ensuring a range of perspectives and diversity of thought. Please get in touch if you would like to take part in a future Content Advisory Board. Our 2024 HIVE Content Advisory Board consisted of:

(UK) Sir David Metcalf CBE, Emeritus Professor of Industrial Relations, LSE

(UK) Saj Jetha, Founder, The Smarty Train

(US) Dan Black, Global Leader, Talent Strategy & Organisational Effectiveness, EY

(UK) Dr Khairunnisa Mohamedali, Chief Innovation Officer, The Smarty Train