The Future of Work Requires You To Do Some Work - Now! (Part 1)
A recent report from PWC entitled “The Future of Work. The Board’s Role in Rewiring Work” has some interesting insights.
Whilst addressing questions and considerations for Non-Executive Directors (NEDs), I believe that the report should be read by every leader tasked with leading their teams and organisation into the post-pandemic future.
The Now Of Work
The time is now
The loudest and overriding message from the report was that there is no time to wait.
“While there may be hesitance among leaders to take bold steps, as they ‘wait for the dust to settle’ on our post-pandemic ‘normal’, NEDs must start pushing organisations forward and leaders must start to experiment and trial new approaches – to leadership.”
Yes – you read that right. Leaders must find new ways to lead.
The report was compiled following four virtual sessions with leading thinkers and NEDs exploring how to create a new reality in the most effective way.
I want to explore my takeaways from each of the sessions. This week i am exploring the first three sessions and next week I will look at session 4 because for me that is all about leadership and change.
Session 1- Work type: How we make it work
The key takeaway for me was the challenge of performance management in a hybrid environment.
This is something I have been writing and speaking about for some time, and this report validating my thinking.
The antiquated yet prevalent style of leadership involves attaching value to an employee’s contribution, when they can be seen working at their desks.
This approach requires a fundamental adjustment to effectively manage performance regardless of where employees are located.
There are two critical aspects to this adjustment.
Firstly, leaders need to be able to measure performance based on outcomes and not hours spent at a desk.
Measuring knowledge worker performance
Most of our employees are knowledge workers. They are not making widgets allowing performance to be measured by how many widgets are produced in an hour. Productivity cannot be measure by the increase in widgets produced each hour overt a given period of time.
Knowledge workers think for a living. Their outputs are often intangible and difficult to define.
Leaders have to measure performance based on outcomes not hours.
Proximity bias
The second factor is the removal of proximity bias.
Leaders with proximity bias unconsciously favour the workers with whom they have the most direct contact. Leaders have to overcome this.
They should ensure that employee who attend the office are not favoured over those that do not. Leaders need to lead considering inclusivity and equity at all times.
Session 2 – Workforce: The effect on our workforce
Despite it being called the “future of work” – it is not something that can be put off.
The use of the term “future of work” may be a contributor to organisational complacency as it infers that action can be deferred, when it cannot.
Workplace planning is an immediate imperative unless you want to become a “small dot in the rear-view mirror” of your competitors.
Whilst many workers still fear automation will replace their jobs the truth is that it will augment jobs, or in some cases create new jobs which will require employee reskilling and upskilling.
Leaders have to take a deliberate and systematic approach to workforce planning in the face of automation, AI and big data.
This is not a time to wait and see what other organisation are doing. You need to get on this change curve now.
You have to prepare your workforce for what is coming in three, five-, or ten-years’ time and enable the required skills transition.
Session 3 – Workplaces and spaces: Where we work
The office is not dead. It will be different.
Employees want flexibility and choice between working in the office and working remotely.
In Australia, 76% of survey respondents said they would like either wholly virtual work (16%), mostly virtual work (25%), or a mix of face-to-face and virtual work (35%).
With that in mind, leaders should engage with employees, determine their preferences, and the role of the office in the future.
There is no one-size-fits-all solution to the future of the workplace.
As the report stated:
“As you look ahead, it’s critical that any discussion about workspaces includes a focus on the role of culture, the nature of work, digitisation and the workforce of the future. The longer you can give yourself to engage with your workforce and understand their preferences and work patterns, the better you can build a real alignment between corporate objectives and people’s preferences and create a place (or places) that facilitates both.”
We have already witnessed organisation such as Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase decreeing that there will be a return to the office for the entire workforce.
Whilst this is an option, I firmly believe it will result in a loss of competitive advantage and impact the organisations employee value proposition. Organisations offering hybrid working arrangements can attract employees from many locations also meaning that employees have more choice of whom they can work for. The power is in the hands of the employee.
The one question you should NOT be asking at this time is “how much space will we need.”
This is putting the cart in front of the horse.
This question will need to be addressed once you have explored the relationship of the organisation to its purpose, culture and the type of work people are doing.
A true statement in the report – “Prioritise the need to make the office worth the cost of the commute and make the question ‘How much space do we need?’ the last question asked, not the first.
Part 2
Next week I will be exploring the fourth session called “Our experience of work.”
Our experience at work is make of a medley of intangible but critical components. Think culture, ways of working, leadership, the space we work in and the people we work with.