Indeed says AI skills shortage is outpacing employer demand
Indeed found nearly 6 in 10 employers want AI-capable workers, while only 14% of employees call themselves AI natives.
By Colin Brandt · Enterprise Reporter
· 3 min read
Indeed AI skills shortage data points to a widening labor problem for companies trying to turn AI spending into operating gains: nearly 6 in 10 employers are looking for workers who can use AI to produce work, while only 14% of employees describe themselves as AI natives. The job site based the finding on a study of 1,001 job seekers and 300 employers, published Tuesday.
Indeed defines the scarce group as workers with enough AI ability to use the technology across tasks and workflows. The report does not say how many of those workers are in technical roles, how the sample breaks down by industry, or how employers distinguish basic tool use from production-grade AI competency.
The hiring signal is still clear. Employers want AI-fluent staff faster than the labor market appears able to supply them, according to Indeed. That puts more pressure on internal training programs, especially for companies already buying AI software, cloud services and compute capacity.
Why is there an AI skills shortage?
The shortage stems from a mismatch between corporate demand and worker readiness. Indeed said fewer than half of workers overall report receiving the AI training they need, while more than three-quarters of workers who identify as AI natives said they are getting that training.
Kyle M.K., senior talent strategy adviser at Indeed, said companies are unlikely to solve the problem by recruiting alone because the external market does not have enough AI-skilled candidates to satisfy demand. He said technology leaders would get more leverage from developing the employees they already have rather than treating the issue as only a hiring challenge.
Formal training remains uneven. M.K. said only 32% of workers surveyed reported receiving proper training for the job they are doing now, leaving much of the current AI learning to employee initiative rather than company-led programs.
AI investment is ahead of AI adoption
The skills gap is arriving while infrastructure spending keeps climbing. Gartner expects worldwide IT spending to reach $6.37 trillion this year, with data center systems and infrastructure among the areas pushing totals higher. Hyperscalers have put billions of dollars into data centers and compute capacity to support AI demand, but enterprise adoption depends on whether employees can use the tools inside real workflows.
That gap matters for operators and vendors because AI budgets can grow without producing broad usage. CompTIA data cited by CIO Dive found that business tasks account for only one-quarter of professionals’ total AI use, with the remainder tied to personal tasks as tools such as ChatGPT spread among consumers and workers.
Trust is another brake. One-quarter of workers in Indeed’s survey named accuracy, ethics and privacy concerns as the leading obstacles stopping them from becoming more familiar with AI.
M.K. said workers are not rejecting AI because they are unwilling to change. He said the issue is that many do not know how the tools are being applied or what happens to their outputs.
For companies selling AI into enterprises, the findings point to a practical constraint: customer readiness is not only a CIO budget issue. Adoption depends on training, governance and employee trust, none of which can be solved by adding another model, dashboard or vendor contract.
This story draws on original reporting from CIO Dive.
