Future of Work

Cyber attacks have been on the rise as more people work from home. A worrying trend, as organizations have previously cited security’s role in digital transformation as a potential risk. Cybersecurity is as much an IT issue as it is an HR issue. As more people work from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations need to make sure that they are training employees on digital security and providing them with access to the right tools and resources to protect their devices and data.

Is working from home the future of work? Some forward-thinking employers have taken extra steps to help their employees work remotely during the pandemic. Some people who are now working remotely aren’t doing so because their employer likes it, but because it’s become a necessity to get jobs done. Some were dubious about whether jobs would get done if employees weren’t in sight, onsite. That’s a concern many still apparently have. Rather than having either an everybody works in the office policy or an everybody works from home one, look for a hybrid of the two.

As the threat and reality of COVID-19 simultaneously sweep the earth, the only certainty is the uncertainty, which is the least favourable place for businesses and individuals. Like all terrible situations there are winners and losers. Many of us can work remotely and still be just as effective, certainly in the short term. Finding innovative ways to mentor, maintain cultures and boost team spirit is very much a challenge of this time.

COVID-19 has undoubtedly taken many companies on a speedy roller-coaster since the global outbreak. The most critical step for human resource leaders in companies both big and small is to show empathy to employees and focus on developing and implementing a streamlined business continuity plan. This article discusses what business continuity planning should look like for human resources leaders and offer a checklist to ensure everyone is safe and your business runs as well as it can during this time.

Businesses have no choice but to adapt to this new environment if they want to retain any semblance of relevance for the times to come. So how fast are things evolving? How different is the new size and growth of IT and business services, and how will these take shape across technology, business process management, analytics, automation and AI?  New research from HFS examines how enterprises and service providers are coping with the immediate and future challenges brought by Covid-19. Enterprises and service providers need to focus on farming existing business verses hunting for new business.

If there’s truth behind the common call to “grow your people, grow your business” shouldn’t HR be the most important department in a company? It’s time to stop viewing HR reps as purely administrative and give them a seat at the board by adopting the principle of “people enablement.” At its essence, people enablement is a more holistic approach towards individual development. Together, HR and the C-Suite can shape the future of their companies, better preparing themselves for this new reality, all while supporting employees readying to be confronted by the changes. 

Over the past two weeks, many employers have been forced to reconsider the global mobility of their workforce and to facilitate the large-scale adoption of home working. Prior to this, despite common rhetoric around the decline of the physical office, evidence suggests relatively low levels of home working (less than 5%) with little signs of this growing considerably in the near future. Will COVID-19 represent a shock to the system that changes our ways of working moving forward, so that higher numbers of individuals work at home?

“I think if we focus on what humans do best, connecting to humans, and lighting the fire in a human by connecting to their motivational purpose…we’re going to see a huge boom in the future of work.” Heather McGowan, Future of work strategist The Fourth Industrial Revolution is fundamentally changing the Australian economy, driven by

The information circulating about the coronavirus and its effects seems to be balanced equally between what we know and what we don’t. This provides conditions rife for speculation without fear of embarrassment. That said, how are business and management going to be reshaped in the future in a post-coronavirus world?

Remote working is nothing new. Plenty of us have been doing it for years – for at least one or two days a week, if not the entire time. Nevertheless, although many companies have long had the available technology to switch their entire workforces over to remote working, they have often been reluctant to do so in practice. 

Welcome to the freelance revolution in the era of COVID-19. This is the third report, and invites freelance business and thought leaders to comment on topics of importance as the global economy works through the pandemic.