Job hugging is the practice of staying in a job out of necessity rather than engagement. The term describes employees who want to change roles but hold on to their current one because the external market feels too risky to enter.
The Randstad Employer Brand Research 2026, conducted by Kantar with 2,500 respondents in Hong Kong in January 2026, found that 30 per cent of employees plan to change jobs within the first six months of 2026, while only 21 per cent actually changed employers in the last six months of 2025. Actual movement has declined for two consecutive years, from a peak of 24 per cent in 2024.
The report attributes the gap to a challenging macroeconomic environment and organisational change, with talent choosing security over mobility. When employees do finally leave, the two leading triggers are the wish to improve work-life balance and compensation that fails to match rising workloads, each cited by 38 per cent.
India sat inside the same global study, which covered 34 markets and more than 166,000 respondents. The Indian country report has not yet been released.
