By Aditya Kohli
The year 2020 has been something but forgettable. I think it was a year that has shown some thing that is remarkably human—our potential to evolve, the agility to respond, and the resolve to overcome against all odds. I am reminded of a quote by Viktor Frankl: “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”
As an HR leader, I have been fortunate to be a portion of a wonderful group of pros who have been tasked with the duty to manage the crisis, respond to the requires of our personnel, and concentrate on restarting the company. As I reflect on the year, I saw 3 major HR priorities that superseded almost everything we have been focused on. Employee overall health and wellbeing emerged as the quantity 1 priority. Second, as company continuity and emotional resilience have been tested, there was a substantial concentrate on communication, proactive connects, and engaging not only personnel but their households also. Finally, the HR function invested in constructing abilities and capabilities to help new methods of working.
In 2021, as organizations begins to totter back to pre-Covid-19 levels, we will continue to see traction on the great work carried out by the HR function. The 3 trends that will be a priority for CEOs and Boards are:
—Employee wellbeing (EW): The pandemic has shown us that though digital company models have been game-changers, the excellent pivots to productivity in the pandemic have been delighted, engaged, driven and most of all wholesome personnel. It also showed us that most organisations are not performing adequate to produce an atmosphere exactly where personnel can be at their very best and thrive. As we start out the year, I anticipate corporations to adopt a more holistic method towards EW that goes beyond overall health covers, and focuses on physical, emotional, mental and economic health—an integrated method towards wellbeing that connects to all other HR systems like men and women improvement and efficiency management. Technology will have a considerable function to nudge, help and track every single individual’s journey towards wellness.
—Workforce flexibility (WF): We ought to appear at WF across 3 dimensions. Workplace (exactly where does the work get carried out), Work (what requires to be achieved to produce worth) and Workforce (who will do the activity). Workplace: The pandemic has shown that work can be effectively carried out from virtually anyplace and the function of the workplace and that of residence is radically becoming redefined. For lots of, workplace spaces will turn out to be hubs for collaboration and knowledge, and residence a location for work. Work: How we structure it, measure it and provide it evolved at a phenomenally speedy pace, largely due to enhanced digitisation and adoption of technologies. There will be a lot of stress for organisations to redefine jobs, abilities and organisational architecture. While I do not consider there is 1 very best model, the mix of the workforce will modify a lot. There will be a considerable improve in hybrid workforce, which incorporates gig workers, portion time, outsourced, contract, seasoned shared talent and perhaps a significant quantity of virtual personnel (bots) also.
—Digital HR: In 2021, we will witness more investment in HR digitisation. Technology will enable augment HR capability and make the function a lot more ‘human’ by driving employee knowledge at a scale that wasn’t doable prior to. Much of the transactional HR work requiring repetitive activity, queries and talent engagement will be carried out by bots. People analytics will turn out to be more mature, supplying actionable intelligence and deeper company insights.
Going by the existing markers, it appears 2021 will be a year to appear forward to at several levels.
The author is CHRO, Clix Capital