Hybrid Work Wars
The US Chamber of Commerce reports, “Remote work, hybrid work, and returning to the office: Businesses have taken a scattered —and at times inconsistent — approach to allowing employees to work from home. Many business owners are realizing that the decision whether or not to allow remote work actually focuses on the wrong thing.”
“It’s about accessibility, not presence,” wrote Wired.”There is plenty of technology to support remote work, but sometimes you just need to get people face-to-face to unlock the creativity and innovation needed to solve tough problems.”
The UK Recruiter claims, “We’ve also seen that some companies, most notably those in the financial services sector, are moving full speed ahead with their return-to-office plans, citing their in-person culture and the need for young workers to interact with their colleagues. However, a recent survey found that two-thirds of workers said they would resign if required to return to the office full time. A remarkable 40% said they’d consider quitting even if they were asked to come into the office only one day per week.”
During the pandemic, we’ve grown separate, focused inward, and gone tribal. Existential despair about society, politics, and climate change are at an all-time high. We may be woefully unaware of the human need for social connection. We may save time by commuting via zoom, but we lose big in our deep need for community and camaraderie.
Stability Hunting
“The last few years have been tough on the labor force. A recent Gallup survey reflects the fatigue many employees are feeling. “In the Gallup poll, a little over half (53%) of the workers said they were looking for jobs that have a greater degree of security than they currently have,” reported Nasdaq,” reports the US Chamber of Commerce.
“While there are still plenty of talented workers in the job market seeking employment, many of them are choosy about where they land next. These employees want stability and peace of mind about their future with a company. Business owners can tap into this desire in their employer marketing materials and recruitment outreach.”
Strengthening employee experience in 2023 is critical, writes Forbes. “The Future of Work team fielded hundreds of inquiries about talent attraction and retention, anywhere-work strategies, burnout, culture, and employee experience. The pace of inquiry has only become more urgent as the expansive rhetoric around employee experience confronts the belt-tightening mindset of economic uncertainty.”
Both employees and employers are seeking stability and may need help finding it in 2023.
Upskilling
Career mobility and upskilling will be top priorities for employees. Amazon is even paying college tuition for its front-line employees, stating, “we’re committing more than $1.2 billion to provide free education and skills training opportunities to more than 300,000 of our own employees in the U.S. to help them secure new, high-growth jobs. We are also investing hundreds of millions of dollars to provide free cloud computing skills training to 29 million people around the world with programs for the public.”
LinkedIn’s 2022 Global Trends Report reveals that “upskilling and opportunities to grow at their current company are two of the top priorities for today’s workers, coming in only behind compensation, work-life balance, and flexibility. This is partly due to the pandemic and also the result of shifting job requirements and an uncertain job market, all of which have left people feeling unprepared for their next career move and desperately in need of more support.”
Workplace Intelligence reports, “For employees, developing their skills and climbing the career ladder is about much more than getting a salary boost or enjoying greater status and recognition. In addition to higher pay (cited by 59% of employees), people hope that advancing their career will lead to better work-life balance (48%) and a sense of purpose (41%). Among employees with leadership ambitions, 47% are drawn to the idea that they could create a better work experience for the next generation and inspire others to follow their dreams.
LinkedIn claims, “A study performed over 100 years ago by Harvard University, the Carnegie Foundation, and Stanford University is still relevant today. The study concluded that 85% of job success comes from having well-developed soft skills. A more recent study from 3 years ago, now indicates 93% of employers want you to have the soft skills necessary to thrive.”
The list of the top 10 soft skills includes:
- Communication
- Organization
- Teamwork
- Critical Thinking
- Emotional Intelligence
- Creativity
- Collaboration
- Flexibility/Adaptability
- Time Management
- Curiosity/Continual Learning
The Great Rebalance
Forbes reports, “The post-pandemic frenzy, when people quit on a whim and there were two job openings for every person unemployed, is no more. That was a one-off. In 2023, less job hopping and fewer counteroffers are likely as the demand for talent and the supply of candidates evens out. Salary rises will be less common, too. Many employers have already increased wages over the past 12 months – a shortfall of talent left them with little choice. So, any pay raises they can afford to award in the future will be marginal.”
“The highs of 2022 may be behind us, but the lows won’t be as low as in previous times of economic crisis. The jobs market is more likely to regain its balance – no more unsustainable levels of vacancies or talent shortages – with the correct number of jobs vacant for the candidates available, or certainly closer than it has been in the past year.”
CNBC reports, “After the Great Resignation and quiet quitting, the era of ‘loud layoffs’ is here. Shocking layoff news is overshadowing a bright job market. Within weeks, mass layoffs have flooded headlines. More than 50,000 workers in tech lost their jobs in November, up from 12,600 in October.” These have mostly been in the tech sector primarily, including Twitter, Meta, Amazon, Salesforce, HP, Lyft, Doordash, and more,
Technology’s Income Possibilities
The dawn of industrial automation had brought mostly negative impressions from workers. This is because they view automation as a powerful excuse to replace people with robots. That’s just but a normal reaction to this so-called impending “rise of the robots.”
While not replacing several positions, technology is creating new ways to earn money. Over the past 25 years, 30% of the new jobs created in the US were non-existent or didn’t exist. These new jobs include IT systems management, app creation, hardware manufacturing, and IT development.
How does technology create new jobs? New jobs will emerge because dynamic entrepreneurs continue finding ways to optimize the power of technology. The net effect of new technologies on jobs can be substantially positive.
When technology deletes some jobs, it will also create new ones elsewhere.
For instance, for the past 15 years, the Internet has erased around 500,000 jobs in France. But in the same period, the Internet generated 1.2 million new jobs! That’s a net creation of 2.4 new jobs for each wiped out.
AUTHOR
John Patterson
Co-founder and CEO
INFLUENTIAL U
John Patterson co-founded and manages the faculty and consultants of Influential U global. Since 1987, he has led workshops, programs, and conferences for over 100k people in diverse professions, industries, and cultures. His history includes corporate curriculum design focusing on business ecosystems, influence, leadership, and high-performance training and development.
