In 2025, demand for HR professionals remained close to the level recorded in 2024. Recruitment decisions continued to be made cautiously, with the demand index for HR specialists standing at 0.63—below the average for all positions, which was 1.01. Companies were less inclined to expand HR teams, focusing instead on strengthening competencies and improving operational efficiency, according to the Salary and Trends Report in Enterprises by Grafton Recruitment. At the same time, the scope of responsibilities handled by HR departments expanded, including tasks related to employee wellbeing and support for management teams.
Demand for HR Roles
After several years of expanding HR teams, companies slowed recruitment and adopted a more cautious approach to hiring new employees. According to data from Grafton Recruitment’s Salary and Trends Report in Enterprises, demand for HR staff in 2025 remained below the benchmark level (1.01). The demand index for HR roles stood at 0.63, close to the 2024 level of 0.71. Last year, organizations focused on developing key competencies and making better use of resources within HR, payroll, and personnel administration.
“Over the past two years, companies in the corporate sector have been recruiting more cautiously. While the overall number of job postings has remained relatively stable, there have been noticeably fewer offers in departments such as audit, IT, tax, HR, and finance. In HR, finance, and marketing, the declines may be linked to automation, as more tasks are being taken over by systems. Companies are approaching hiring decisions more carefully and concentrating on retaining key competencies,”
says Magdalena Głuchowska, Lead Recruitment Expert at Grafton Recruitment.
The range of competencies expected from HR teams has been evolving for several years, and this process has clearly accelerated recently. Requirements for operational roles have increased, and despite slower recruitment, these positions have remained crucial for the efficient functioning of organizations. As simple tasks are increasingly automated and AI-based tools are implemented, the development of new skills has become more important. These include proficiency in modern technologies, data interpretation, and work requiring analytical thinking and independent decision-making. Communication skills—essential for cooperation with managers and teams—have also gained importance, along with competencies related to wellbeing and social responsibility.
“HR departments are responsible for payroll and personnel processes, administration, and—on an increasingly large scale—tasks related to supporting managers, employee development, and having a real impact on shaping an organizational culture based on trust and accountability. This trend is expected to strengthen further this year. HR will not only be a business partner but also an initiator and catalyst for change,”
emphasizes Iga Jasińska, Senior Recruitment Consultant at Grafton Recruitment.
Salaries in HR Departments
According to the Salary and Trends Report in Enterprises, in 2025 the remuneration of HR directors in Warsaw remained unchanged compared with 2024, ranging from PLN 25,000 to PLN 40,000 gross per month. Slightly lower rates were recorded in Wrocław and Kraków, where salaries ranged from PLN 20,000 to PLN 37,000. HR Managers earned noticeably less, although their pay levels remained high. In Warsaw, monthly salaries for this role ranged from PLN 18,000 to PLN 26,000, while in Wrocław and the Tricity they ranged from PLN 16,000 to PLN 24,000.
For operational roles such as recruiters, salaries in Katowice and Łódź ranged from PLN 6,500 to PLN 12,000. Slightly higher rates were observed in Poznań, the Tricity, and Wrocław, where pay started at PLN 7,000 and reached PLN 13,000. In this case, differences between cities were relatively small. The situation was different for payroll and HR administration specialists, where regional disparities were more pronounced. For example, in Łódź salaries ranged from PLN 6,800 to PLN 11,000, while in Poznań the lower threshold was PLN 10,000 and the upper limit reached PLN 14,000.
How Did Salaries Increase in 2025?
In 2025, the pace of salary growth in HR departments varied, with the strongest increases seen in operational roles. The highest pay rises were recorded among talent sourcers (11.6%), while salaries of recruitment and training specialists increased by 11.0%. Pay for payroll and HR administration specialists rose by 10.4%.
Significant changes were also observed in specialist positions. Recruitment and employer branding specialists saw the largest increase at 9.4%. Average salary growth for HR specialists was 9.2%, while HR analysts received increases of around 7.4%. Salaries of HR coordinators rose by 7.0%, and CSR specialists by 6.5%.
At the managerial level, salary growth was more moderate. Pay for payroll and HR administration managers increased by 6.5%, compensation and benefits managers by 6.2%, and HR managers by 6.3%. HR Business Partners recorded growth of 5.0%, while HR directors saw an increase of 3.7%.
“In 2025, companies clearly differentiated their approach to pay rises in HR departments. The highest dynamics concerned selected operational roles, particularly those related to recruitment and talent acquisition, while at the managerial level and in some expert roles, growth was more moderate. This shows that salary decisions were based on clearly defined priorities and directed to areas where market pressure and operational needs were strongest,”
comments Iga Jasińska, Senior Recruitment Consultant at Grafton Recruitment.
Wellbeing as a Real Area of HR Responsibility
In 2025, increasing emphasis was placed on solutions that help companies maintain long-term team effectiveness. In this context, wellbeing gained importance—not as a benefit, but as an element of work organization.
“Wellbeing is increasingly seen as a response to the growing burden on employees resulting from prolonged stress, time pressure, high work intensity, and difficulties in maintaining a work–life balance. Available analyses show that needs in this area are clearly increasing,”
adds Ewa Michalska, Operations Director at Grafton Recruitment.
According to the Social Insurance Institution (ZUS) report Sickness Absence in 2024, Poland recorded 27.4 million certificates of temporary incapacity for work in 2024, translating into 290 million days of sickness absence. Of these, 1.6 million sick leaves and 30.3 million absence days—12.6% of the total—were related to mental health issues, including severe stress reactions, adjustment disorders, anxiety, and depression. Compared with 2023, this represented an increase of nearly 14%. The scale of these figures shows that wellbeing is no longer a marginal issue but has become one of the key challenges facing modern organizations.
In this context, the recommendations of the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (OSHA) are gaining importance. They point to the need for a systemic approach to mental health in the workplace. For employers, this means implementing solutions that not only allow for responding to crisis situations but, where possible, prevent them through work organization, management culture, communication, and genuine support for employees during periods of overload.
Report link:
https://pl.grafton.com/pl/raport-wynagrodzen-i-trendow-w-przedsiebiorstwach-2025-0
About the Report
The Grafton Recruitment report was prepared based on job advertisement data and a quantitative survey conducted among employees. The analysis covered 4,975,256 job postings sourced from a popular recruitment portal in Poland. From this pool, 1,414,836 offers related to the private sector were identified. After a deduplication process to remove duplicate records, the final number of unique job advertisements amounted to 637,793. The study included positions covered by Grafton Recruitment’s salary grids.
