Five trends that will shape future work decisions

Businesses around the globe have spent the better part of this year adjusting to the new reality of remote working.

While some companies have reopened and allowed employees to office full-time, many others have either gone fully remote or adopted a hybrid model that incorporates a 'two to three-days in office' requirement for staff.

With workplace regulations also becoming stricter, buzzy office spaces might soon become part of a pre-Covid era.

Here are a few ways that remote work will shake up individual lifestyles, business operations, and functional areas like human resources: 

One, a hybrid work model that supports work from 'anywhere+office'. The adoption of the hybrid model of work, which is a combination of remote work and onsite work, will continue to increase in the post-Covid world.

While some employees will prefer work-from-home as it allows them to be more productive, provides flexibility, prevents the office commute and supports location independence, others will opt for office, as they feel face-to-face interactions with peers are necessary to be productive. Organisations may also adopt a model where employees are required to come into the office only a few days a week.

Two, hub-and-spoke offices. An office style that might gain further traction is the hub-and-spoke workspace. Organisations may have their central headquarters (hub) for periodic team gatherings and strategy discussions, and a network of small satellite offices spread across various small towns or rural villages in a country.

The model promises dual benefits. Small offices substantially reduce operational costs for organisations, while also allowing employees to work in an office that is closer to their hometowns. This will subsequently bring forth a true revitalisation of smaller towns and cities, as businesses slowly realise that they do not need to be based in a metro in order to achieve success.

Three, adoption of HR tech. As remote work continues to take off, the adoption of cloud-based HR technologies will increase to provide seamless employee experience while working remotely.

Virtual hiring

These technologies also help keep employees engaged and productive. Many organisations will turn to HR tech for functions like virtual hiring, onboarding, learning and development, performance management and smart decision-making.

Four, remote hiring. The way organisations hire employees changed drastically in 2020. In-person interviews were quickly replaced by video interviews. This trend will continue well into 2021.

Five, changing performance assessment trends. One of the key business aspects that has changed considerably by remote working is performance management. Organisations will start measuring what matters: Work done instead of hours worked, and visions accomplished versus tasks completed. Some companies are making performance reviews an ongoing process, giving up annual routines.

Continuous feedback will become an essential aspect of employee management, which will help the workers clearly navigate their job responsibilities and expectations when they work remotely. Rethinking the goal-setting approach and identifying core measurement functions is the first step towards sanity in this new normal.

Ultimately, the events of 2020 accelerated existing trends by forcing businesses to embrace the paradigm shift in workforce management and employee experience. While there will always be resistance at different levels, it is clear that there is no going back to the pre-pandemic normal.

These trends will continue to shape the world of work in 2021. If anything, change is not such a bad thing if we are now working smarter as opposed to harder.

 

Mr Bourne, Region Manager, Africa, Zoho Corporation