Hack your way to better HR with our complete guide to innovative HR software tools and useful HR technology tips.
Recruit faster, save HR budget and swerve hiring bias with these ultimate HR tech hacks. Consider this guide to be your HR equivalent to the handy IKEA hacks trend. We can all do with a little helping hand here and there, to make the most of limited HR resources or save money. HR technology has improved by leaps and bounds in recent years, and in 2025 we are anticipating the launch of a number of new HR tech tools, free and paid-for, to help streamline your workflow.
Our top 5 tech ‘hacks’ for 2025 include:
Read on to delve into each HR tech hack in more detail, along with a useful HR tech tools list to help you evaluate the best investments for your business in 2025.
How Can You Swerve Bias by Using HR Tech?
With more legalities and recommendations surrounding hiring bias being introduced in the UK on an ongoing basis, it can be difficult for HR teams to navigate the complexities of bias during the hiring process.
We often bring multiple layers of bias into the assessment of a candidate, whether we want to or not. This can be as seemingly harmless as opting to hire someone we feel we get on with better or shares a similar background to our own, or it can extend to more serious discrimination, such as assessing someone on the basis of gender, race, age or other factors, rather than on their qualifications or ability to perform in the role.
Some of the best HR software in 2025 sets out to tackle the issue of hiring bias head-on. Both unconscious bias and conscious bias can be swerved with the help of AI-powered recruitment tools and insightful analytics that help HR teams to identify existing bias in the workplace. Some of the best HR software innovations for 2025 include YOONO’s smart background searches that help to eradicate bias at the earliest stage of the recruitment process, and Tableau, which offers infographic data visualisations that expose how diversity stacks up within your business, helping you to make informed decisions going forward.
Top 5 HR Tech Hacks: Where to Invest Your 2025 Budget
In 2025 HR teams can expect to demand more—much more—from their HR technology. Even free HR tools are now extremely high-performing, giving your team more control over how they hire and how they manage the employee experience.
Below, you’ll find our edit of the very best HR tech tools 2025 and general HR tech trends, including online HR tools for ease-of-use, free HR tools for budget-friendly upgrading, and AI tech for HR that makes every step of the HR process smoother and smarter.
01 - AI-Powered Background Reports at Early Stage
Smart HR tech is the biggest seismic shift that has happened within the industry for decades, but the fancy novelty of AI tech tools is quickly evolving into something far more comprehensive and genuinely useful for HR teams and recruitment agencies.
One of the biggest innovations in HR tech is the introduction of smart background searching that can be conducted at a much earlier stage of the hiring process. YOONO is the new kid on the block of HR smart tech that offers users the ability to reveal information about a candidate’s online presence, including social media, press coverage, qualifications and employment background, simply by searching for a name. It’s background screening…but not as YOONO it.
Advantages of early-stage background searches include:
Saving time, in the ability to screen a high volume of candidates pre-interview and skip lengthy research with instant reports.
Saving resource, with low-cost report generation, free report credits, and allowing HR departments to operate with fewer staff and avoid external research resourcing.
Avoiding reputation damage down the line, by identifying any issues of concern at a very early stage.
Allowing for pre-consent background checking, as all information is sourced from publicly available information online.
Why not try YOONO at no initial cost? You might find that AI searching can disrupt your hiring process positively, helping you to know exactly who you’re hiring even before interview stage. Sign up for an account and you’ll get 5 free reports to start searching right away.
02 - Predictive Analytics
What if all the data about employees and candidates in your business could be assimilated into actionable intelligence? Sounds like a big tech mouthful…but analytics is actually one of the most useful yet oft neglected HR tech hacks. No more speculation about employee wellbeing or demographics—many of the best HR software apps of 2025 are designed to give you the hard facts, before you make key decisions.
HR analytics platforms like Tableau, IntelliHR and Qualtrics XM bring more insights to the meeting table than Google Analytics, with tailored data designed to highlight the most relevant HR information, such as data about hiring trends, employee demographics, diversity and pay gap stats, location movement tracking and much more.
In short, these futuristic predictive analytics, often underpinned by AI modelling software, are designed to help HR professionals see exactly where things are going well…and where there’s room for improvement, minus any guesswork. Take it to your next meeting to seriously impress your director.
03 - Smart Employee Experience
Industry analyst Josh Bersin spoke about employee experience being a ‘significant, major, major problem’ at the 2025 HR Technology Conference held in Las Vegas in September, with many of the best HR tech tools of 2025 focussing almost solely on this ‘hot space’. Employees today have more job-hopping options at their fingertips than ever before, and talk about their working experiences—good and bad—openly with others online. Businesses who neglect the employee experience will see candidates and existing hires running for the door faster than you can whisper ‘toxic work culture’.
Luckily, the third HR tech hack on our list is HR tech tools for employees—software designed specifically to improve employee wellbeing, boost morale and engagement, and generally make working for a business altogether more fulfilling and inspiring.
Think AI therapy apps for employee mental health, portals for improving skills and in-role learning, and wellness tools that build in helpful data for HR to keep track of how changes are impacting on employee experience. Try mobile app Blink, which aims to improve intracompany communication with an intuitive and engaging ‘super-app’ that blends social features with essentials like onboarding, security and team resources. Or take Mo for a spin, a recognition platform that aims to boost employee performance and motivation.
04 - Enhanced Compliance Tools for AI Usage
HR compliance is extremely important, ensuring that all candidates and employees are treated fairly and within legal parameters. However, new technology like AI software and controversial ‘bossware’—employee ‘spying’ apps that monitor data like time, clicks and site usage—are making the process of meeting HR compliancy more complex than ever before.
Although tech seems to be the root cause of some non-compliancy within the HR industry, it’s also reassuring to know that other HR tech tools exist to help you keep everything in check. It may sound like a contradiction but these enhanced compliance tools often include AI features that help HR companies to implement AI effectively and ethically. That’s right—’good’ AI that helps you keep ‘bad’ AI in check.
With UK legislation surrounding AI still running to catch up with the pace of the tech itself, it’s important that businesses, HR departments and recruitment agencies keep up to speed.
Trust management platform Vanta automates compliancy, testing the software that your team uses on an hourly basis and collecting audit evidence, to make sure everything you’re using and doing is fully compliant. If you’re hiring internationally, compliance software Deel offers extensive global coverage.
05 - Hyperautomation and Do-It-All Platforms
Tech hack your way to more time, less expense and way less hassle with 2025’s influx of hyperautomation HR software. These nifty do-it-all HR platforms bring together all of your most-used apps with a whole host of extras, such as analytics dashboards, onboarding features, workflows and payroll integration. Why have ten windows open when you can have just one?
The best 2025 HR software trends really lean into the idea of simplifying an overcrowded HR tech market, understanding that people want to be able to work and collaborate with greater ease and efficiency. An all-in-one HR platform like Hi Bob caters for both employers and employees equally, bringing together essential HR processes with clever features that focus on boosting employee experience and team togetherness.
In 2025, Explore Hard-Working HR Hacks…
2025’s best HR software tools are designed to lighten your workload (and your desktop) with all-in-one tech solutions that combine everything you already use with some seriously impressive HR tech wizardry.
We’ll also see more software dedicated to enhancing the ‘human’ element of HR, by ironically using Artificial Intelligence to make people feel more connected in the workplace, and improve their overall wellbeing and employee experience.
Wherever you choose to invest your HR budget in 2025, consider these HR tech hacks your shortcut to a quicker, better and overall smarter workflow. You won’t regret the investment, however small, in these clever HR technology options.
