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RECRUITMENT & RETENTION

Job of a lifetime

Frederic J. Brown/Getty Images

As the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan wraps up, efforts to recruit employees for the next Olympic Games are already well underway.

Consulting firm Korn Ferry announced in January it is working on this with the organizing committee for the 2028 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games, which will take place in Los Angeles. In addition to helping the LA28 organizing committee hire thousands of employees to bring the Games to life, the firm is advising on other HR-related matters, like developing an employee value proposition and advising on post-career transition strategies, a leader with the firm told HR Brew.

LA28 plans to hire about 5,000 employees over the course of four years to work for the Games, said Jeanne MacDonald, CEO of Korn Ferry’s recruitment process outsourcing practice. The firm has been advising the organizing committee on these efforts since 2024, working closely with LA28 Chief People Officer Tami Majer, she said.

For more on the recruitment strategy for the LA 2028 Olympic Games, keep reading here.—CV

Presented By Paradox, a Workday Company

On the frontline of hiring

When a frontline candidate applies to your job, they’re probably applying to at least 10 others at the same time. Hey, you gotta cast a wide net.

If you’re not first to respond, you’ll likely lose that candidate. In their conversation, Joshua Secrest, head of frontline marketing at Paradox, a Workday Company, explains to leading HR tech analyst Josh Bersin that AI automation can be key to winning frontline talent and helping businesses reduce their time-to-hire to just three days.

They also discuss the development path of frontline managers and how retail organizations create strong leadership. According to Paradox, the frontline workforce accounts for over 70% of US jobs.

Josh and Joshua chat about the impact AI is having on these roles (and filling them), how to think about speed and quality of hire, and what Workday’s recent acquisition of Paradox means for the future of frontline hiring (a lot).

Read on.

DEI

Confusing work guidance

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Morning Brew

On Feb. 13, the UK Supreme Court ruled that trans people can use bathrooms associated with their gender identity at establishments and public spaces like pubs, but not at work.

The ruling came after the nonprofit Good Law Project disputed 2025 guidance from the high court that a person’s legal gender was based on their biological sex at birth, according to the news outlet, Them. The guidance on gender definition under the 2010 Equality Act failed to stipulate how daily life would change for trans individuals, but determined, under the guise of protecting “biological women,” that only those assigned as female at birth could be considered women, according to the BBC.

Legal experts warned last year that the court’s definition of gender would influence how organizations interpret the UK’s equality laws moving forward, the Guardian reported.

The court’s Feb.13 finding also dictated that employers must provide trans people with mixed-sex bathrooms, as trans people are still a protected characteristic via the gender reassignment designation under the Equality Act.

For more on what HR should know about the ruling, keep reading here.—KP

RECRUITMENT & RETENTION

The essential economy

Ford

Two companies, similar stories: Carhartt was founded in Detroit in 1889. Fourteen years later, so was Ford. Carhartt has made apparel for Ford factory workers for over a century.

Today, the two companies both call Dearborn, Michigan, home. They cater to similar segments of the workforce: Skilled trades workers make up the core customer base for Carhartt’s workwear, and Ford’s commercial business is the quiet profit engine of the company, booking $2 billion in earnings in Q3 2025.

Beyond these affinities, what drew the two together for a recently unveiled multiyear brand partnership was a mutual focus on workforce development. The collaboration “explores the intersection of heritage workwear and automotive craftsmanship, uncovering shared values of durability, innovation, and local pride,” according to a news release.

Both Ford and Carhartt have a vested interest in solving a nagging problem: the fact that the US could have as many as 1.4 million unfilled trades jobs by the end of the decade.

For more on how Ford and Carhartt are supporting skilled trades, keep reading on Marketing Brew.—JG

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WORK PERKS

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Francis Scialabba

Today’s top HR reads.

Stat: The number of US workers who went on strike last year reached 306,800, a 13% YoY increase. (Economic Policy Institute)

Quote: “The fact that it is low-hire, low-fire is actually not a great state to be in. The churn is important to the productivity growth. You want to see the most talented go to the places where that talent is the most rewarded. And if we are in this really stable period, that means that talent is not being repositioned to its best use.”—Nela Richardson, chief economist at ADP, on the adverse impacts of a flat labor market (CNBC)

Read: Meta has reportedly reduced its employee stock distribution by 5%, marking the second reduction in a row. (Reuters)

Front line, bottom line: In their conversation, Paradox’s Joshua Secrest explains to HR tech analyst Josh Bersin that AI automation can be the key to winning frontline talent, helping businesses reduce their time-to-hire to just three days.*

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Written by Courtney Vinopal, Kristen Parisi, and Jordyn Grzelewski

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