How do you advance your career without having to change company? Two workers in three think you can't: according to new research from SHL, a company specialising in talent assessment, 66% of employees are convinced they have to leave their employer to grow professionally, even when they would rather stay.
The figure comes from the report “Talent Mobility at Work in 2026: The Hidden Workforce”, released by SHL on 15 October 2026. The research is based on an online survey commissioned from Propeller Insights and carried out in June and July 2026 on a representative sample of 2,036 workers aged from 18 to over 65: 1,029 in the United States and 1,007 in the United Kingdom.
What the SHL research says
The picture that emerges is not one of tired or disengaged people. On the contrary, most respondents say they want to grow and are willing to challenge themselves. Here are the main figures from the survey, all referring to the full sample of 2,036 workers unless stated otherwise:
- 66% think they must leave their current company to move their career forward;
- 83% would reskill to get a more senior role, 82% to move to a different role;
- 89% would accept a formal skills assessment to prove what they can do;
- 84% would like their company to proactively flag internal opportunities that suit their profile;
- 42% believe their manager truly knows their skills beyond their current role.
Another figure concerns the preference for external candidates: 59% of US workers and 49% of UK workers report it. And 31% name managers' reluctance to lose the best people in their team among the main obstacles to internal mobility.
The problem isn't skill, it's visibility
The heart of the report lies in a seemingly small figure. Among those who feel their skills are underused, one in five says their manager doesn't even know those skills exist. SHL calls it a talent visibility problem: the capabilities are there, but they stay hidden inside the organisation.
It's an observation worth considering from the individual professional's side too. The survey measures perceptions, not actual careers: it says what workers think about their managers, not what managers really know. But precisely for that reason it suggests something useful. If fewer than half of people feel fully seen, part of career work consists in making what you can do readable, even before learning something new.
How to advance your career: being seen for what you can do
Technical skills are proven by results. Soft skills, on the other hand, come across mainly through the way we present ourselves and communicate every day: how we speak up in a meeting, how we pitch an idea, how we handle a discussion with our manager. These are signals that build, day after day, the idea others form of us and of the role we could take on.
A few concrete ideas that don't require waiting for a company development plan:
- get clear in your own mind about which skills you want to bring out and which examples to tell them with;
- bring them into regular conversations with your manager, not just the annual review;
- keep what you say about yourself consistent with how you present yourself, in your clothes as in your posture;
- volunteer for cross-functional projects, where you work with people who don't already know your role.
The role of companies
The report is aimed mainly at organisations. Lucy Beaumont, SHL's global vice president for product and design, notes that companies keep looking outside for people with skills and experience they may already have in-house, and urges managers to look beyond qualifications and current job titles. It's worth noting that SHL sells skills assessment tools: its reading is consistent with its business, and the data should be taken as an indication of a trend rather than a definitive measure.
One clear signal remains: according to almost 80% of respondents, the prospect of career progression increases job satisfaction and engagement. Making internal paths visible benefits both sides.
Key takeaways
The survey covers the United States and the United Kingdom, and the Italian context has its own dynamics. But the gap between what a person can do and what their manager sees is an issue in every organisation. Before concluding that leaving is the only way, it's worth asking whether your abilities are truly readable by those who make the decisions.
If you too feel your manager knows only part of what you can do, the work starts with your professional image. With Image-Pro, CG Imagine supports professionals and managers in building a presence consistent with the role they aspire to: how you present yourself, how you communicate your skills, how others perceive you, so that 42% is not a limit but a starting point.
Photo by Hunters Race on Unsplash
