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As 2025 gets into gear, it’s worth pausing to reflect on an intriguing hiring trend we saw in 2024: a modest increase in InMails sent by recruiters. Between October 2023 and September 2024, InMail outreach (that is, InMails sent by recruiters to passive candidates) grew by 5%. 

It’s one of a few signals that may hint at increasing hiring activity — almost 80% of executives say they plan to hire in 2025 and, as we recently revealed, recruiter demand rose significantly over the past year. 

However, when we zoom in on which candidates recruiters have been messaging, a much sharper picture comes into focus, with one job function seeing a 44% increase in InMails received. 

Rather than an across-the-board hiring increase, this suggests that employers may still be struggling with stubborn skills gaps, as companies increase efforts to find qualified candidates within certain job functions. In fact, as we’ll see later in this story, companies that increased their InMail messages over the past year also tend to focus more on upskilling. In other words, it’s not an either/or situation: Talent professionals are looking both internally and externally to bridge their skills gaps. 

Read on to see which types of candidates saw the greatest growth in recruiter outreach — and discover the surprising traits that companies who increased their InMail outreach share in common. 

Here’s who recruiters InMailed at higher rates in 2024

Job functions roughly map to the departments — like engineering, sales, marketing, or HR — you might find in a large organization. Virtually every function saw an increase in the total number of InMails received, but a few saw dramatic spikes.

Notably, the top two functions seeing sharp increases are both revenue-generating roles reliant on strong soft skills: business development and sales. Healthcare professionals also saw a lot more outreach from recruiters in 2024, as the talent shortages plaguing that industry continue. 

Companies that increased their InMail outreach share a couple of things in common

When we isolated the companies that upped their InMail sends in 2024, we noticed a fascinating correlation. 

Employers who sent more InMails were far more likely to say they had specific plans for 2025 — namely, investing in upskilling employees and evolving the company’s approach to hybrid work, according to LinkedIn’s Executive Confidence Index survey.

This is a bit of a chicken-or-the-egg quandary: Are these companies sending more InMails because they’re struggling to hire qualified talent? That could also be the underlying impetus to invest in upskilling or evolve your hybrid policies — they’re all bids to gain and retain skilled workers. Conversely, they may be fast-growing businesses because they champion values like upskilling and work flexibility, both of which are consistently top priorities for candidates. 

At the end of the day, the takeaway for recruiting pros is this: The companies increasingly reaching out to candidates are also the companies with strong plans around talent development and hybrid work. These policies may offer a competitive advantage that recruiters shouldn’t overlook. 

Final thoughts

The data underscores a valuable insight for recruiters: Outreach alone is rarely enough. Companies that prioritize both candidate engagement and internal workforce development tend to emerge as leaders in a competitive hiring landscape. 

As 2025 unfolds, recruiting strategies that balance proactive outreach with investments in upskilling and flexible work environments will likely define the next wave of talent acquisition success.

Methodology

“Recruiter demand” is defined as the change in job posts over time on LinkedIn for talent acquisition roles. To calculate year-over-year change in recruiter outreach and demand, we compared the total InMails sent in October 2024 against October 2023 and the volume of paid job posts for recruiters on LinkedIn in September 2024 against September 2023. Job functions are determined by the role the member held at the time of receiving the recruiter-sent InMail. 

LinkedIn’s Executive Confidence Index (ECI) is an online survey taken every quarter by approximately 5,000 LinkedIn members (at the VP-level or above in 10+ countries). ECI U.S. data included in this report is from September 2024. Members were randomly sampled and must be opted into research to participate. 

We analyze data in aggregate and will always respect member privacy. Data is weighted by seniority and industry to ensure fair representation of executives on the platform. The results represent the world as seen through the lens of LinkedIn’s membership; variances between LinkedIn’s membership and the overall market population are not accounted for. We analyzed survey results for U.S. respondents at companies that increased their InMail activity as compared with a year ago to better understand what companies that are recruiting are focused on for the coming year.

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