Energy’s talent crisis continues: The sector must change, starting with transparency

The energy industry has faced a decade-long talent problem. The sector is not seen as either high-tech or sustainable. Energy needs new, ambitious, and diverse talent to find its best self—that includes addressing the climate and broader sustainability emergency and adapting to developing technology such as artificial intelligence. The industry’s challenge to attract early and mid-career professionals is particularly daunting. Naturally, they are considering the decades ahead of them—and what future there is in oil and gas, given the increasingly obvious lack of a transition plan from fossil to clean energy.

Energy firms across the value chain need a new approach and story. The sector’s only hope is transparency about the past and present, alongside radical ambition for the future, bringing in talent capable of addressing the sector’s—and the world’s—challenges.

The roadmap between the current state of the energy transition and something resembling sustainability is horrifying

There is a massive gap between the energy sector’s current and future state. Our separate outline examines oil and gas firms’ minimal investment in clean energy (approximately $30 billion vs. $560 billion in fossil fuels in 2024).

Energy needs the best people to tackle the major battles of the present and next half-century. The energy sector—well, all sectors, but let’s focus for a moment—has not figured out how to transition toward the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), especially decarbonization, or fully realize the potential of emerging technology such as AI, generative or otherwise.

The energy sector is trapped

A recent energy industry roundtable started with talent, which consumed more than half the conversation. Our report on that event covers the roundtable and the potential of AI to drive efficiency and decarbonization. I also spent a week in Houston, where talent discussions kept coming up in different ways.

Multiple oil and gas executives outlined how the people of the energy industry ‘feel trapped’ between a market that doesn’t let them push the boundaries of AI or sustainability (citing finance, stock prices, regulations, and short-term shareholder returns) and a sustainability movement that resents and distrusts the whole industry. That movement includes activists, policymakers, academia, and an increasing number of financing sources. Two years ago, we published a call-to-action lamenting how the lack of transparency from the oil and gas sector about what hasn’t been solved—regarding the energy transition trajectory sustainability needs—hampers the systemic collaboration the energy transition needs. Nothing has changed.

Reorganizations, silos between teams, market volatility, and lack of security limit how little collaboration exists throughout energy organizations and between ecosystem partners

Our separate research framework and innovation assessment (see Exhibit 1) examine the need for aligned goals and a clear connection between business and technology teams in energy companies. We also wrote about the alignment between innovation teams’ technology applications across time horizons, from the day-to-day to five years or more. That disconnect is improving, as the energy sector’s drive for hyper-efficiency helps align technology use toward clear goals. But it is not improving quickly enough.

For an example of cross-organizational need, look to ESG reporting. The time, resources, and energy required to find, collate, and report sustainability data cannot be wasted by reporting alone. That effort should deliver baselining, road mapping, and action. Enterprises that got ahead of regulation, such as the EU’s CSRD—activating in 2025—are already moving from aligning their organizational focus on sustainability to focusing on specific initiatives that deliver impact and business value. Focus on material spheres of influence that work on environmental, social, and economic metrics. See our report on making 2025 ‘the year of CSRD… and much more.’

Exhibit 1: Energy innovation and business teams must break out of their silos, align, and collaborate with a strong focus on efficiency

Source: HFS Research, 2025

The energy sector must find a new level of transparency to enable collaboration across all industries, policies, and civil society needed for the systems change sustainability requires

Two years ago, less than half of senior energy transition enterprise leaders collaborated internally toward their transition goals, and collaboration dropped significantly throughout the ecosystem. Exhibit 2 shows little has changed when considering their plans to work across ecosystems over the next two years.

An example of the energy talent challenge and collaboration is AI helping energy professionals ‘find their life’s work.’ Parallel, which attended our roundtable, is an ‘AI-first hiring marketplace.’ In partnership with ALLY Energy, another delegate, Parallel, is helping the energy sector build a future-proofed workforce. Peak Intelligence, a third partner used by MIT, Harvard, and the US Olympic team as the global gold standard measure of ‘adversity and grit,’ brings a new dimension to a sector that needs it.

Exhibit 2: Ecosystem collaboration is set to decline in the coming years—that cannot be allowed to happen

Source: HFS Research; 56 energy, resources, and utilities executives from the wider HFS Pulse study of 605 Global 2000 enterprise executives, 2024

Energy must embrace diverse perspectives and talent

The ALLY-Parallel-Peak partnership focuses on resilience and purpose in work. The energy industry needs plenty of that. It also requires the broadest possible range of insight, ideas, and backgrounds to meet its challenges. The industry also needs to change its brand. All levels of the sector must address this, from the boardroom to, for example, ensuring in the earliest stages of education that a career in engineering and other STEM subjects is open to all.

The [energy] sector isn’t seen as hot, high tech, or sustainable. The industry faces perception challenges in attracting younger generations—as well as bringing in and retaining individuals from historically under-represented backgrounds.

— Leader in corporate culture, people strategy, and inclusive best practices within the energy industry

The Bottom Line: The energy sector, perceived as neither high-tech nor sustainable, must improve its adoption of emerging technologies and address all sustainability goals, from environmental to social and economic.

The gap between sustainable goals and the current energy system is vast. However, clear examples of success and solutions exist. Those solutions must scale fast. We need to leverage the current system while fundamentally changing it simultaneously.

Leading on AI or the energy transition is still an option. Despite everything, there’s still time for individuals, teams, and organizations across the energy spectrum to become leaders.