A report by the Chartered Institute of Personnel management (CIPM) has revealed that human resource (HR) professionals in Nigeria have to adopt more agile and proactive approaches across five crucial functions due to the increase in talent migration also called the ‘Japa syndrome’.
The 2025 CIPM report titled ‘Navigating the effect of JAPA on Nigeria’s Human Resource Environment’ conducted by the institutes research and publications committee, acknowledges the ripple effects of talent migration has left HR teams scrambling, from recruitment challenges to workforce planning headaches.
The most pressing challenges are in the area of recruitment where recruiters experience difficulty in attracting candidates.
Others are in succession planning which has disrupted leadership development. Retention of employees has led to revising compensation structures. Training budgets have also led to a dwindled return on investment. Workforce planning is also challenged due to unpredictable resignation trends.
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New approaches to adopt across 5 HR functions
Based on the report, here are the approaches in which HR teams need to adopt across its five crucial functions due to the increase in talent migration:
Recruitment: Human resource professionals are facing mounting challenges in attracting qualified candidates, with vacancies remaining unfilled for extended periods and recruitment costs spiralling.
A survey conducted by Jobberman in 2023 indicates that 63 per cent of employers acknowledged having difficulty recruiting for mid- to senior-level positions, attributing the shortfall largely to the migration of skilled workers abroad.
This growing trend has forced HR departments to rethink traditional hiring strategies, while adopting modern hiring strategies.
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Succession planning: The on-going departure of talented individuals, particularly within mid-level and senior professional roles, has significantly impacted succession planning efforts.
This trend has created notable gaps in leadership development and resulted in the loss of key institutional knowledge. As a consequence, the continuity of strategic initiatives and the preservation of established best practices have been undermined.
As a result HR requires a more adaptable and flexible approach to succession planning bearing in mind potential employee attrition.
Retention: One of the rising strategic imperatives today is talent retention. The CIPM HR Practice Needs Report for 2025 identified this as a top business issue for the year.
Many organisations are revising compensation structures and improving working conditions to manage attrition. Some companies have launched internal mobility and career development frameworks to boost employee engagement and loyalty.
Training budgets: Investments in employee development have suffered significantly with increased emigration. The anticipated return on investment (ROI) in learning and development initiatives has dwindled.
Organisations have become more creative in their offerings often embracing on-demand learning platforms and tightening eligibility for long-term training sponsorships. Some companies are starting to implement mandatory post-training service bonds to mitigate losses.
Workforce planning: It’s getting more difficult for HR professionals to predict how many workers are needed because people are quitting their jobs in unexpected ways.
This has changed how companies plan for their workforce. Many are now using different methods like looking at possible future scenarios to determine which employees might leave.
To keep things running smoothly, more businesses are also choosing to outsource tasks that are not part of their main work.
