Revisiting 2025 Early Talent Program Benchmarks

As 2025 draws to a close, many Heads of University Recruiting (UR) are taking stock of a year shaped by significant change, persistent operational pressure, and continued scrutiny around how Early Career programs deliver value to the broader organization. This moment invites reflection, not only on outcomes, but on the benchmarks that informed decisions throughout the year.

The insights in this analysis draw exclusively from several Veris Insights’ 2025 employer benchmarking research available to our members in the Member Library. Each report is grounded in survey responses from more than 150 large employers across over 20 industries, with data collected directly from University Recruiting leaders and their teams. Together, these sources provide one of the most comprehensive views available of how Early Talent programs operated in 2025 and where priorities shifted under pressure.

1. Strengthening Early Career Talent Pipelines Emerged as a Top Strategic Priority

Across Fortune 1000 employers, strengthening Early Career talent pipelines stood out as one of the most consistently elevated strategic priorities for University Recruiting teams in 2025. 52% of employers rated this focus area as a high priority, placing it among the top strategic concerns overall. 

This prioritization reflects more than long-term aspiration. In a year marked by hiring freezes and economic uncertainty, Early Career teams faced heightened scrutiny, increasing pressure on UR leaders to deliver strong, job-ready talent.  Despite these constraints, internships remain well positioned to deliver cost-effective hiring outcomes while helping teams fill critical skills gaps that are difficult to address through full-time hiring alone. 

For Heads of University Recruiting, this benchmark reinforces a shift in how pipeline health is evaluated. Programs are increasingly assessed on continuity, readiness, and alignment with projected demand. 

2. Intern to Full-Time Conversion Rate is the Metric University Recruiting Teams are Most Focused on Improving

When University Recruiting leaders were asked which metrics they wanted to improve most in 2026, intern to full-time conversion rate emerged at the top. 78% percent of employers selected conversion rate as a priority metric, outpacing offer acceptance, retention, and cost-per-hire measures.

This emphasis reflects the dual roles that internships play: both as an early assessment mechanism and a de-risked hiring channel. In an environment where application volume remains high and screening capacity constrained, improving conversion efficiency has become a lever for reducing downstream hiring pressure.

The signal here is subtle but important. Many teams are moving away from treating intern volume as the headline indicator of success. Instead, leaders are evaluating how effectively internships translate into accepted full-time roles, and how consistently that conversion performs year over year. 

3. University Recruiting Budgets Remain Largely Stable after 2024 Cuts

In 2024, 2 in 3 University Recruiting teams faced budget cuts, forcing leaders to fundamentally shift how they operate and recruit.

Against this backdrop, 2025 budgets appear more stable than many UR leaders expected. The median UR team budget in 2024 stood at $291,500, and early signals for 2025 suggest a steadier baseline: 60% of employers expect their UR budgets to remain unchanged, while 20% anticipate an increase. Together, these indicators suggest sustained, though cautious, confidence in Early Talent investments.

That stability, however, has not erased the efficiency mandate introduced by the cuts of 2024. Heads of University Recruiting are under immense pressure to develop defensible budget narratives. Continued investment now depends on data that clearly demonstrates how Early Talent programs contribute to hiring efficiency, retention, and long-term performance.

4. High Application Volumes Continue to Be a Challenge for Recruiting Teams

High application volume was a persistent operational challenge for UR teams in 2025. 43% of employers described applicant volume as very challenging, with an additional 43% identifying it as somewhat challenging.

However, this pressure was not evenly distributed across the recruiting lifecycle. Bottlenecks most often appeared at the top of the funnel, where screening capacity struggled to keep pace with inbound interest and candidate experience often took a hit. For University Recruiting teams, this daunting influx of applications further burdens the ability to select the highest quality talent.

Veris Insights benchmarking data suggests that many leading teams are responding by refining eligibility criteria, investing in screening tools, and narrowing sourcing channels to core schools and highest-return channels.. Quality and convertibility—not raw volume—are emerging as the defining indicators of funnel health.  

5. Reducing the Number of Schools Targeted Became a Common Cost-Control Measure

When University Recruiting teams made cost adjustments in 2025, reducing the number of schools targeted was the most common move. 53% of employers reported narrowing their school lists as a direct response to budget considerations.

It’s important to note that this trend does not indicate a retreat from campus recruiting, but instead are tightening focus. Data from our School Selection Strategy report show that employers continue to engage with a median of 20 schools, with deeper investment concentrated among a smaller subset of institutions.

In assessing school selection strategy, historical hiring outcomes, conversion performance, and retention data can be used to justify where teams should focus their time and travel, ensuring that reduced reach does not come at the expense of pipeline quality.

To help make more data-driven school selection decisions, Veris Insights’ SchoolScope platform includes filters for school type and name, along with student degree, major, race, gender, and more. This allows the team to assess schools through the lens of their specific goals and priorities.

6. Anticipated Business Growth Drove Intern and Entry-Level Headcount Forecasting

Veris Insights’ workforce planning data show a clear through-line between business outlook and Early Talent hiring decisions. Anticipated business growth was the most commonly used metric for forecasting both intern and entry-level full-time headcount, cited by 66% of employers for intern planning and 69% for entry-level full-time planning.

This is a meaningful signal for how University Recruiting leaders can position Early Talent programs within an organization during 2026 planning. Early Talent teams no longer anchor to a fixed number of requisitions each year. Instead, it is increasingly modeled as a forward-looking investment that scales in alignment with business confidence. For many teams, this has meant closer collaboration with finance and HR business partners earlier in the calendar year.

As internal workforce metrics and labor market data become a necessity to build scalable, sustainable, and dynamic headcount planning models, teams that can translate program performance into forecastable outcomes are better positioned to influence headcount decisions rather than react to them. In practice, this means that intern conversion rates, retention outcomes, and historical yield data increasingly serve as planning assets, not just retrospective metrics.

7. Over Half of Employers Do Not Require Interns to Interview for a Full-Time Role After Graduation

A significant procedural shift emerged in 2025 around intern conversion practices. 54% of employers reported that interns were not required to complete a formal interview process before receiving a full-time offer, representing a substantial increase from the prior year (43%).

This change reflects growing confidence in internship evaluation frameworks. Employers appear more willing to treat internships as extended assessments, reducing redundant steps that add friction for high-performing interns. It also suggests that teams are prioritizing speed, candidate experience, and retention certainty.

8. Early Career Talent Still Represents Only a Sliver of Headcount

Even with strategic attention on Early Talent pipelines, Early Career employees remain a relatively small portion of total workforce headcount. The median proportion of Early Career employees within the full-time workforce stood at 9%, with a median of 14% of new full-time hires classified as Early Career talent.

​​This context is useful because it reframes how Early Talent programs are evaluated. Early Career hiring is, by definition, timebound, which naturally limits its share of overall workforce headcount compared to experienced hiring. In 2025, Early Career employees continued to represent a relatively small portion of total full-time headcount, while still accounting for a meaningful share of new hires.

What changed in 2025 is how much precision mattered. As organizations faced tighter planning cycles and greater scrutiny around workforce decisions, small shifts in Early Career outcomes carried clearer downstream impact.

9. The Vast Majority of Entry-Level Offers Convert to Accepted Hires

Offer acceptance rates remained strong in 2025 for entry-level full-time hires. The median acceptance rate for new full-time Early Career offers reached 80%, a 3% increase from 2024.

These results suggest that, once offers are extended, organizations are generally competitive in the Early Career market. Strong acceptance performance also reflects the effectiveness of internships and early engagement in shaping candidate expectations well before the offer stage.

This could be strengthened with some context on reneges. Ex. Although offer acceptance remains stable, reneges still exist…… could also mention tech as a callout since they had the highest renege rates view.

The stability that this provides shifts attention earlier in the funnel. With acceptance largely secured, the differentiators for program success increasingly lie in sourcing efficiency, assessment accuracy, and conversion strategy.

10. Intern-to-Full-Time Converts Prove to be the Most Loyal Cohort

Retention is where many Early Talent investments truly pay out. Data from our 2025 Employer Annual Timelines and Hiring Metrics Report shows that interns who converted to full-time roles consistently showed stronger retention outcomes than new graduate hires across cohorts.

This matters because it connects the internship program to outcomes that the broader business values. Intern conversion is a retention strategy that can reduce early attrition risk and accelerate organizational integration.

As University Recruiting leaders reflect on 2025, this data provides strong empirical support for sustained investment in conversion-focused programs. Early career talent data continues to show that interns who become full-time employees deliver measurable value well beyond their initial hiring cycle.

Taken together, these ten Early Talent program metrics point to a 2025 defined by focus. This is a time to take stock of your own metrics and compare them with industry benchmarks, helping identify where performance is strong and where targeted improvement could shape 2026 planning. This comparison supports more grounded decisions and clearer conversations, anchored in how peer programs are operating today.