Leadership Briefing: 14 September 2026
What this week's policy thinking means for leaders
This week’s briefing brings together a set of signals about work, growth and trust. Permanent hiring is beginning to recover, but employers remain cautious; government policy continues to put investment, AI and skills at the centre of economic growth; and new evidence points to the importance of stable conditions, inclusive employment support and sustained workforce development.
Across the stories, the leadership challenge is less about responding to one policy announcement or data point and more about building organisations that can adapt with confidence. Leaders will need to balance immediate pressures with longer-term capability: making careful hiring decisions, investing in skills, introducing AI responsibly and creating the trust needed for people to engage with change.
Reports and publications worth exploring
1. Permanent hiring shows first signs of recovery
The latest bulletin from KPMG and the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) indicates that the UK jobs market has shown its first increase in permanent placements for almost four years, suggesting some improvement in employer confidence. However, overall demand for staff has continued to fall, although at the weakest rate for almost two years, while candidate availability is rising as redundancies and concerns about job security persist.
The picture is therefore one of cautious recovery rather than a return to strong hiring conditions. Employers are beginning to recruit more permanently while still relying on flexibility to manage uncertainty, and competition for people with particular skills remains strong. For organisations planning their workforce, this makes it important to distinguish between areas where talent is becoming more available and those where specialist skills remain difficult to secure.
Read more: Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC)
2. Growth speech puts investment, AI and skills at the centre
In his latest growth speech, Chancellor John Healey set out the Government’s ambition to increase investment, improve productivity, make greater use of AI and create more opportunities across the country. He also highlighted the importance of skills and workforce participation, including addressing the number of young people not in education, employment or training, while giving regions greater powers to shape their own economic futures.
The speech brings together several issues that will have a direct impact on organisations, from AI and productivity to skills and devolution. The Institute of Leadership has looked at what sits behind these ambitions and the leadership capability needed to turn them into reality, including the role of managers in leading technological change, developing people and making better use of greater responsibility.
Read more: Analysis of the Chancellors Growth Speech, The Institute of Leadership
3. Connect to work programme expansion
The Government’s latest figures show that 25,000 people have now started on Connect to Work, a locally delivered programme providing personalised employment support for disabled people, people with health conditions and others facing complex barriers to work. Since the programme began, 4,100 people receiving out-of-work support have moved into employment, while 26% of participants are aged 16–24. The Government plans for the programme to support around 300,000 people by the end of the decade.
The programme is designed around intensive, individual support, including helping people who are already in work to remain there. For employers, this is relevant to the wider challenge of economic inactivity and skills shortages: creating routes into work is only part of the solution; helping people with health conditions and disabilities to enter, remain and progress in employment can also help organisations retain valuable skills and experience.
Read more: Connect to Work delivers for thousands more as programme expands, GOV.UK
4. Businesses say stability matters more than Westminster thinks
New research from the Chartered Institute for Management Accountants CIMA highlights a significant gap between what MPs believe is holding businesses back and what SME leaders are actually experiencing. While MPs put energy and operational costs, regulation, trade and skills high on the list of barriers to growth, SMEs are more concerned about weak consumer demand, taxation and policy uncertainty. Seven in ten SMEs also say the Government’s growth plan is unclear, while 84% believe government growth announcements rarely translate into tangible support.
The findings suggest that businesses need greater certainty before they feel able to invest and grow. More than six in ten SMEs identify a stable tax and fiscal environment as a priority, while 71% cite frequent changes in government policy as a challenge. For leaders, the research is a useful reminder that the conditions for growth are not just about access to skills, finance or technology: confidence, stability and a clear sense of direction matter too.
5. Employer investment in skills continues to fall
New research from the Learning and Work Institute finds that UK employers invested 29% less in training per employee in 2024 than in 2011, while the average amount of training has also fallen from 7.8 days per trainee to 5.7 days. The UK has the highest proportion of training episodes lasting less than a day among comparator countries. The research argues that longer, more developmental training is being squeezed in favour of shorter, compliance-focused activity and, increasingly, recruiting people with the skills employers need.
This is becoming more significant as AI, net zero and other changes reshape the skills businesses need, with an estimated 2.5 million additional jobs requiring higher-level skills by 2035. The research suggests that employers need to make training a more natural response to skills gaps rather than relying primarily on recruitment or workarounds. For organisations, the question is increasingly whether their approach to learning is keeping pace with the changes they expect their workforce to navigate.
Read more: Understanding employer investment in skills, Learning and Work Institute
6. Public trust will be critical to successful AI adoption
New research from The Health Foundation finds that the public is broadly open to the use of AI in healthcare, but that support is conditional on strong safeguards. Accuracy is the public’s top priority, with meaningful human oversight, proportionate regulation and a clear expectation that AI should not result in worse care for any group. The research also found that people tend to prioritise safety, evidence and accountability over faster deployment or the economic benefits of AI.
Although the research focuses on healthcare, the underlying insight is relevant to organisations introducing AI in any sector. People are more likely to accept and trust AI when they understand how it is being used, where accountability sits and how human judgement remains part of the process. For leaders, this reinforces the importance of treating trust, transparency and oversight as part of successful AI adoption, rather than as issues to address after the technology has been introduced.
Read more: The public views on the regulation of AI in health care, The Health Foundation
Leadership takeaway
The common thread this week is confidence. Employers, workers and the public all need clearer reasons to trust the decisions being made around growth, work and technology. For leaders, that means making choices that are transparent, evidence-based and connected to people’s lived experience. Recruitment, skills investment, AI adoption and workplace inclusion will all depend on whether organisations can create the conditions for people to participate, contribute and develop.
