The energy industry is going through a transformation unlike anything we have seen in decades.

There is a massive energy crunch happening right now and everyone from oil and gas companies to nuclear startups to battery storage firms is fighting for the same experienced professionals.

If you are trying to hire in this space you already know how competitive it is.

According to the IRENA 2024 Jobs Report the renewable energy sector now employs over 16 million people globally and demand keeps climbing. The talent pool is not shallow but the best people have options.

Lots of them.

I have spent years recruiting in this sector and I want to share what actually works when you are trying to pull experienced talent into renewable energy roles.

High Level Takeaways

• Talent is actively moving away from traditional oil and gas toward companies that represent the new wave of energy technology
• How you signal long-term health matters more than your job description because candidates are evaluating your partnerships and pipeline
• The recruitment playbook is shifting toward more technology-centric and entrepreneurial approaches
• Small modular reactors and hydrogen energy are creating entirely new talent demands that will explode over the next five years

Why Energy Talent is Moving Away From Traditional Oil and Gas

There is a variety of different energies in this space right now. You have traditional oil and gas. You have natural gas which is starting to really grow. And then you have the emerging sectors like solar and wind and nuclear and storage.

Most companies are trying to shift away from oil and gas. But the reality is the energy demand has kind of forced us to realize that we are probably a couple decades away from that being realistic. So there is maybe a little less concern with the oil and gas industry than there was a few years ago.

But here is the thing. People tend to prefer the more progressive and cleaner energies because they see them as more of the long term solution. The latest hiring recruiting trends confirm that mission-driven companies are winning the talent war.

When it comes to the energy space you are seeing a bit of a pull from the old traditional oil and gas into more of the emerging market. It is not just renewable but natural gas. You have fusion. You have nuclear. You have these on-site reactors and really cool companies where they build stuff.

Beyond just the energy generation there is also a storage and battery industry that has been built out. These companies will come and build on-site storage. They do these massive batteries that are like backup generators that can power entire buildings. Those are seriously progressive and attractive to candidates.

The New Signals That Tell Talent Your Company Has a Future

If you have a company that shows a good sign of health because they have extra energy credits that they can sell and can operate in a secondary market that is something that appeals to candidates. This is something that is aligned to the long term vision of energy as opposed to some of the traditional products and services.

Energy historically is grid. You have a plant. You have a grid. Energy goes across the grid. Those companies have owned the boat for a long time.

Now there is a whole new world where you are building energy specific for a specific location. It can be run by natural gas. It can be run by reactors. It can be run by stored energy. The grid charges the batteries and the energy storage.

Those are all very progressive and very high in demand. Those are the ones that are really going to see the highest level of growth because the market was small before and that market is just starting to grow and expand.

You are not fighting over market share. You are creating a market.

People look into that now more than just asking is it clean or original energy. They want to know if you are part of that new wave of energy in the new world we are living in. I think that is the most appealing thing to candidates.

How Companies Signal Health to Top Candidates

Number one is the easiest way. Make a deal with major partners. You are all over the news and those companies publicize who is doing deals with them.

You are seeing a lot of these companies that were not even historical energy companies. They were mining companies or crypto companies that started selling their energy and they get all this publicity. Think of Core. Think of Iris Energy. Think of Nimbus. These companies were struggling and now their stock is up two thousand percent.

Part of it is the customers you are working with. If you have the right customers there is a good chance that they are going to get publicity and people are going to know who you are. This is why candidate experience matters so much in this sector. Word travels fast.

But you have what is a new market now. And I think part of it is telling people that there is an old way of doing things and there is a new way of doing things. We are part of the new trend. It is a cleaner world. A safer world. A more customizable world. We are transforming the energy industry.

If you are talking to people about being part of a transformation in what is a multi trillion dollar industry that will never go away it gets people excited. It is kind of reinventing the wheel in a sense. Something that will always be needed and always be used but now it is getting a whole new makeup and a whole new start.

Why Your Recruitment Approach Needs to Change

On the recruitment company side I do not really see a huge fundamental difference in methodology. But I do think companies are thinking a little bit more technology-centric. And then innovative and entrepreneurial.

Because again there are just all these new ideas and concepts. Rather than just plugging a hole I think they are probably thinking of people a little bit differently. What they could provide longer term. How the evolution of the business goes and how they can take them there. Understanding AI in recruitment has become essential for companies trying to move quickly in this space.

At the end of the day though people do not have experience in an industry that does not exist. So it is like these companies have maybe been around for ten years but ninety percent of their growth has happened in the last year. It has been a small market. And now it is a really big market and it has happened really fast.

On the recruiting side you are selling as much as you are recruiting. Which I know most people do not realize. It is kind of hand in hand. I was always good at sales so I ended up being a good recruiter and made that natural progression over.

But you have to know and be knowledgeable about what is out there because these people are being approached by a lot of different people and organizations. There is a gold rush of talent just like there was in AI. We are seeing it in energy. So I think you do need to be a little bit more savvy on how you sell and get people excited.

The Sectors Creating Entirely New Talent Demands

It is more technology driven because when you customize stuff you do not really have a huge ecosystem of stuff that is monitoring it. So you have to build these standalone technology stations that monitor these systems. They are very technology driven. Not this old cables and wires and sending energy.

You need to be able to log into a network and check the system real time. You are starting to see a lot more in the smart factory and smart energy space as well where these systems are integrated into the technology.

I would say more of what we see is IT OT. You know information technology and operational technology. A lot of that exists in manufacturing and places with facilities that have a lot of machinery. Those require you to constantly be monitoring them. It is not like monitoring the network connectivity. It is like hey this thing is providing tons of output and people could die if this machine breaks. This is where AI staff augmentation can help you find specialized talent from adjacent industries.

So highly critical technology that is constantly monitored is something that there is a lot of conversion. In fact I just got off a call asking if I cannot find this exact guy in energy could we find someone from manufacturing because the technology still operates in a similar way.

Small modular reactors are one of the highest in demand things right now. Rather than having to build massive dangerous nuclear plants I can literally say hey you have a fifty story building and I am going to build a nuclear reactor on site to power your entire building.

They are already kind of big in China and overseas. We are starting to get to it here but we have had a lot of red tape. That is where you see companies generate zero revenue but have commitments three to seven years out. And they are trading at like a hundred times multiples. Crazy demand because the power efficiency is just insane.

My Dark Horse for the Future

I am going to go out on a limb here because it is not a big market yet. But I did go to environmental engineering school and I am starting to see that five to ten years from now my bet is on hydrogen energy.

It is the most abundant element. The only byproduct of hydrogen energy is water vapor. There are zero emissions. In fact it makes a stronger ozone and ecosystem. It actually builds and helps make it better.

It is not the most difficult to build. The problem is it is just so expensive to extract the hydrogen and put it into a fuel form. There is a lot of research that has to be done on finding ways to isolate and get your clean hydrogen.

Hydrogen is more powerful. It is more abundant. It is zero emissions. It has got way more upside than anything else and you are just starting to see credits go out from the government. They are approving it. You are starting to see some adoption and it is getting rolled out. It is just still more expensive. And people are all kind of like well we will let them try it first. The whole chicken and egg dilemma.

How to Structure Compensation in a New Industry

It just depends on the role. If you are on the creative side of the business or if you are joining a startup it would be the same stuff that most people would want. Equity. Commission if I make new products or if I go to market with stuff I would get equity split of it. Having the ability to kind of eat what you kill.

The truth is now these companies get big and you have ten percent of the company that is creative and ninety percent that is just the operations and HR and payroll and your network engineer. That is not unique to the industry. That is going to be the same old same old. It is a corporate job.

But if you are someone that is providing a creative mentality then you are going to want to have an ability to get some skin in the game. Which is either really high commissions or equity or recognition. Getting credit for what you do I think is another thing that people really care about now. The hard facts about soft skills show that recognition and growth opportunities matter as much as base salary for top performers.

If they are early like pre revenue companies then yeah they are going to want equity. If it is a giant established company you are not going to get equity right now. But if you go build really cool new stuff and make the company worth billions of dollars then if not equity it is just going to be huge commission.

Getting Your Pitch Right Because Talent Has Options

They have to know the why. Why what are we doing. What is our mission. What is our purpose.

Because I think people now that you can go remote and you can do a lot of these other jobs it is much easier to find work. You really have to be able to explain the why to people and put on your sales hat because for good talent it is very competitive.

Being able to sell what you are doing and articulate in a clear way. This is why this is a problem we are solving. Almost like a pitch deck. You almost have to have your pitch down and lock these people in because there is that competitive situation with all these different companies that are all emerging and shooting up really fast.

There has got to be a very clear upside. People want to know that if I am gonna take a risk it has to be very clear what my opportunities are.

If you want to win top talent in renewable energy you need to treat recruitment like a sales process. Know your why. Signal your long-term health through your partnerships and pipeline. And make sure candidates understand exactly what their opportunity looks like.

The companies that figure this out will build the teams that power the next generation of energy. The ones that do not will keep losing their best candidates to the competition. If you need help building a sustainable team of vetted professionals who fit your culture schedule a consultation with MSH.