Workers are not simply waiting for the economy to improve. Many are also placing confidence in the value of their own skills.

Even with a stagnant job market, concerns that AI could replace some roles, and continued anxiety about potential layoffs, roughly 7 in 10 workers said they were highly confident their skills would be valuable in roles at other organizations and would make them competitive in the job market, according to the Global Employee Monitor, a report published Wednesday by SHRM.

The survey also found that more than 8 in 10 US workers said they “adapt effectively to changes in priorities, processes, or work environments,” and that the quality of their work exceeds expectations.

“Workers are quite confident in their capabilities despite technological changes and the economic uncertainty that's been permeating,” James Atkinson, vice president of thought leadership at SHRM, told Yahoo Finance.

“They are focused on the things that they can control,” he said. “They can't control how the overall economy is shifting, the uncertainty, the ups and downs of that, but they're optimistic about their own abilities.”

SHRM surveyed 10,789 workers across 26 countries from January to June. Respondents were at least 18 years old and were employed either full-time or part-time at organizations across a range of industries.

Workers put more trust in their own skills

Job-hugging remains a feature of the labor market, but workers appear to be relying less on employers alone to provide job security and more on their own abilities to create it.

Nearly 7 in 10 US workers said they were more inclined to stay in their current jobs than leave. That has not stopped many from exploring alternatives: 4 in 10 said they had actively searched for a new job in the past 12 months, while 30% said they had seriously considered quitting their jobs.

That combination matters for employers because staying put does not necessarily mean workers are disengaged from the broader labor market. The findings point to a workforce that may remain cautious about moving while still testing options and building leverage through skills.

At the same time, workers are focusing on strengthening what they can offer. Atkinson said employees are actively investing in new skills and adapting to change.

“They're seeing the changes that are coming, and they're working to figure out how to prepare themselves for that,” he said.

AI concerns and portable skills

“Workers seem to be making a distinction about AI coming for jobs that most headlines miss,” Dan Schawbel, a workplace trends expert and managing partner of Workplace Intelligence, told Yahoo Finance.

“They're not confident their current job is safe; they're confident their skills are portable,” he said. “That's a much smarter read on the labor market than blind optimism, because it means people are hedging against employer risk rather than ignoring it.”

“That shift toward skills as the asset rather than the job is exactly the mindset that holds up best in downturns,” Schawbel added.

Atkinson said fear of technological transformation remains present. “I don't want to minimize that, but it's moving toward 'let me figure it out and move forward with it.'”

As a result, he said, workers are adding credentials and certifications tied to targeted skills that they can highlight and use as they seek advancement within their current organizations or pursue other jobs.

“Workers trust themselves now more than they trust the world around them — I find it heartening that even as the economy wobbles, their confidence in what they bring stays steady,” Nancy Ancowitz, a career strategist, told Yahoo Finance.

“My clients tell me the pressure to get and stay employed can be relentless,” she said. “Yet they keep adapting and delivering. We've become a workforce of chameleons.”

Nearly 9 in 10 workers agreed that they had effectively adjusted to changes in their work and had worked to build or improve the skills needed to navigate future shifts, according to the report.

“We've spent years treating adaptability as some rare, prized trait, and now it looks like most of the workforce has just absorbed it as table stakes,” Schawbel said.

“People have been through enough disruption that navigating a new tool or a reorg doesn't rattle them the way it used to,” he said. “That's a quiet but real shift in how workers see themselves, and I think it's the strongest counter to the narrative that workers are overwhelmed right now.”

Optimism remains widespread

More than 8 in 10 workers said they felt at least somewhat optimistic. That included nearly 6 in 10 who described themselves as optimistic or very optimistic, compared with 17% who expressed some level of pessimism.

“Something sturdier is going on underneath,” Schawbel said. “My take is that workers have started pricing in uncertainty as the norm rather than treating it as a crisis every time a new headline hits. That kind of steadiness is genuinely harder to manufacture than a temporary mood spike.”

Pay remains the strongest workplace factor

In the first half of the year, pay remained the most powerful factor in the workforce, according to SHRM’s findings. Nearly half of surveyed workers said pay was the top reason they were attracted to a job, stayed in a job, or left one.

Other factors, ranked as less important, included benefits, job security, career advancement opportunities, and work/life balance, according to the research.

“People are still transactional about where they work and why,” Schawbel said. “Pay isn't competing with purpose or culture anymore. It has become the baseline that has to be satisfied before any of that other stuff even registers.”

The report leaves employers with two signals to watch together: whether workers’ confidence in their own adaptability continues to hold, and whether compensation remains strong enough to keep employees from turning job searches into departures.