THE PERSONIO INDEX
Real workforce signals from European organisations
Every quarter, we publish anonymised, aggregated data from Personio's European customer base — 16,000+ organisations across multiple markets and sectors. This is the first edition. The numbers you see here are the baseline. Come back in Q3 to see what moved.
WANT THE FULL BREAKDOWN?
The Personio
Index report
This page shows the headline readings. The report goes deeper. See how signals vary by market and sector, with full methodology and a format built for sharing with your leadership team.
TRENDING
The trends in numbers
The Personio Index tracks headcount growth, salary budgets, recruiting activity, and AI-driven workforce changes.
8.7%
Headcount
growth
Average across Personio customers in 2025 — down from a high of 26.1% in 2022.
5.9%
75th percentile
salary budget
Down from around 10% in 2022–23. Median budgets remain relatively stable.
6%
Small business
recruiting intensity
As of January 2026. Medium and large organisations are at 1.6%.
4.9×
AI-related job
title changes
Increase since Q2 2024. April 2026 alone surpassed all of Q1 2026.
AT A GLANCE
Headline readings
Headcount growth
After peaking at 26.1% in 2022, headcount growth has cooled to 8.7% in 2025 — and organisations are becoming more selective about which roles they open.
Salary increase budgets
Until 2025, cooling was concentrated at the top quartile — but Q1 2026 shows a broader downward shift across all distributions.
Recruiting activity by company size
Recruiting fell sharply from 2022 and recovery is cautious and uneven — small businesses are rebounding fastest, with medium and large organisations only beginning to move again in early 2026.
FEATURED TOPIC
AI workforce signals
Hiring trends
As organisations start ramping hiring to increase AI capability, one big question is how they’re hiring to build that muscle. Our data suggests that senior hires are high on the priority list.
AI-related title changes
AI is reshaping existing roles as well as creating new ones — the rapid rise in AI-related title changes suggests organisations are beginning to formalise what AI-ready roles look like.
What we're watching next
The Q2 data raises these questions.
In Q3, we'll answer them with new data.
Does the recent uptick in medium and large company recruiting intensity hold beyond March?
Do salary budgets show further compression or begin to re-accelerate?
Is hiring growth broadening beyond tech and professional services?
Does the pace of AI-related job title changes continue to accelerate?
About our data
The Personio Index draws on aggregated, anonymised data from Personio's European customer base of 16,000+ organisations.
No customer- or employee-identifiable information is published. Findings reflect directional signals within our dataset — not representative commentary on the European workforce as a whole.
Download the Q2 report