The short answer: A boomerang employee is someone who leaves a company and is later rehired by it. Employers rehire them because they onboard faster, carry less hiring risk, and are easier to find than strangers when skilled talent is scarce. The evidence on long-term performance and retention is more mixed than most HR content admits.
What is a boomerang employee?
A boomerang employee worked for your organization, left, and later came back. The gap can be a few months or many years. ADP defines them through payroll records: people who were once active on an employer’s payroll, went inactive, then returned.
How common is boomerang hiring?
More common than many HR teams assume. Boomerangs make up only about 2 percent of active employees but account for 31 percent of new hires on average since 2018, and hit 35 percent in March 2025, up from 31 percent a year earlier. That was the highest rate since ADP began tracking in 2018, and 68% of new hires in the IT sector were returning employees.
Two caveats. The data is US payroll data, not global, and it is a single-month snapshot. ADP’s own chief economist tied it to a stable labour market with very cautious hiring, by both employers and workers. Part of the surge is a slow market, not a sudden love of alumni.
Why companies rehire former employees
Less guesswork
A hire who has already done the job at your company is a known quantity. Korn Ferry’s reading of the ADP data is that employers want people who have done the role before successfully, which means less guesswork about whether a candidate can thrive.
Faster ramp-up
Returners already know the systems, the stakeholders, and the unwritten rules. They can be easier to onboard and more prepared to hit the ground running.
Scarce skills
The sectors with the highest boomerang shares, such as information, education, and finance and insurance, rely on highly skilled workers who can be difficult to recruit.
The grass wasn’t greener
Workers lured away during and after the pandemic may have learned the new job wasn’t better. Employers benefit from that second thought.
The numbers at a glance
| Metric | Figure |
|---|---|
| Boomerangs as a share of new hires, March 2025 | 35% (up from 31% in March 2024) |
| Boomerangs as a share of all active employees | about 2% |
| Boomerang share of new hires, information sector, March 2025 | nearly two-thirds |
| Pay increase on return vs. for those who stayed | 5% vs. 2% |
| Boomerang managers vs. other hires: first-year performance | similar |
| Boomerang managers vs. other hires: turnover | higher |
Boomerang Managers vs External Hires
The most rigorous peer-reviewed study tracked 1,318 boomerang managers against 20,850 external hires and 8,546 internal promotions at a large retailer. The findings:
Boomerang managers’ performance stayed flat after rehire, and in year one they performed similarly to other hires.
Internal and external hires improved more over time, and were less likely to leave than rehires.
Boomerangs who left a second time tended to cite reasons similar to the first exit.
Despite this, boomerangs were more likely to be promoted than internal hires and as likely as external hires.
One of the study’s authors summarized it this way: someone who was an average employee before leaving will probably be an average employee again.
This undercuts a claim you will see repeated online, that boomerangs have far higher retention than new hires. The retention evidence is contested, and rehiring only people who were strong performers is a selection effect, not a boomerang effect. The study is also a single retail employer from 2000 to 2010, so treat it as a caution, not a verdict.
The hardest part of boomerang hiring is not finding people but what happens to the colleagues who never left.
Visier’s analysis of 2.4 million employees across 142 organizations, as reported by KORE1, found returning employees received a 5% pay increase vs. 2% for those who stayed. Employees can read that gap as a penalty for loyalty.
When not to rehire
Ask these questions before sending an offer:
Has the reason they left changed?
Were they a strong performer?
Is the role still the right fit?
Can you pay fairly without breaking internal equity?
A previous exit may also have been shaped by practical issues such as the notice period, especially when the employee had limited flexibility to make a move. When reviewing the returner’s previous compensation, a salary slip can help HR separate the employee’s actual earnings from assumptions about their old package.
Before you make an offer
The terms of the return should also be documented clearly in the appointment letter, particularly if the role, reporting structure or compensation has changed since the first employment.
Compare the offer with what your loyal peers in the same role earn, and fix gaps first. A returner’s skills are likely worth more now, so pay for what the role is worth today, not what they earned before. A short internal note on why this person is returning, and what has changed, prevents rumour from filling the gap. A review of the company’s payroll structure can help HR check whether the proposed package fits the current role and its place within the wider pay hierarchy.
Any outstanding salary arrears from the employee’s earlier employment should be settled separately rather than quietly rolled into the terms of the new offer. It is also worth checking whether the employee’s expectations around benefits, holidays and leave laws in India still match the company’s current policies.
Frequently Asked Questions
A worker who leaves an organization and later returns to work for the same employer, whether after a few months or many years.
Rehires tend to ramp up faster, carry less hiring uncertainty, and are available when specialized talent is scarce. A cautious labor market has also made known quantities more attractive.
Not necessarily. One large peer-reviewed study of retail managers found rehires performed similarly in year one and improved less over time than other hires.
It can make sense if the reason you left has been fixed. Negotiate as a new hire, since your skills and market value have likely changed.
A company-managed community of former employees, used to share news, build relationships, generate referrals, and recruit returners.
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