Top HR Trends and Priorities for 2023

As companies settle on in the hybrid/remote way of working, it is now obvious that talent has clearly won in the talent war.

To attract and retain the best talent in the fast-changing global business environment, here are the top five trends we believe that HR leaders need to consider while preparing their roadmap for 2023:

1. A Renewed Focus on Employee Experience

   According to a survey by Glassdoor, 90% of employees say that a positive work culture is important when considering a job, and 89% say that they would prefer to work for a company with a positive work culture over one with a higher salary.

   The same survey found that companies with a strong workplace culture are 1.3 times more likely to outperform their peers, and employees at these companies are 1.7 times more likely to say they are satisfied with their jobs. With money no longer the prime motivating factor, organizations are looking to improve the employee experience to create a happily engaged workforce.

   The scope of employee experience extends beyond employee benefits to include employee well-being. Employee well-being in this case refers to supporting employees in all aspects of their lives, including professional and personal.

   Case in point, Hewlett Packard’s HP Spirit Program provides employees with emotional and social support to enable them to address challenges in their personal and social life. It provides health and well-being apps and an employee resource group to help working parents strike the right balance between their personal and professional life.

2. The Rising Importance of Upskilling in a World Transformed by AI and Automation

   As technologies like AI automate manual drudgery work, the impact of automation and digitization on the nature of work cannot be understated. According to McKinsey, a whopping 375 million workers will need to switch occupational categories because of automation.

   While the earlier workforce transformation took place over decades, the speed of change today is potentially faster, and broader, covering a significant percentage of mid-career professionals.

   Over two-thirds of executives surveyed by McKinsey considered addressing potential skill gaps due to technological change among their top ten business priorities and believe that reskilling and upskilling will help to mitigate talent shortage challenges.

   Source

   Thus, the critical challenge for company executives and HR leaders is to figure out how the job roles will change and the kind of talent they will need in the future.

   Companies thus need to create an objective career roadmap for distinct roles to provide employees visibility about their future career paths to enable them to plan skills development for the future.

   PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers), for example, has launched a multi-year digital upskilling program to prepare its workforce for the future, which is being replicated by some of its clients as well. The program leverages employees’ existing capabilities and experience and imparts new digital skills through a tailored program to prepare them to face challenges in an uncertain world.

   Elsewhere, retail giant Amazon also announced a talent development program to upskill a third of its US employee base by 2025 by spending seven hundred million dollars, enabling them to pursue new opportunities within and outside the company.

3. Emphasis on Diversity and Inclusion to Foster Innovation

   Diversity in the workplace refers to a company’s employee base with a good mix of people with distinctive characteristics, such as gender, race, and ethnicity. Inclusion is about acceptance and ensuring that diverse employee contributions are valued, and they get equal opportunities.

   There has been a greater emphasis on diversity and inclusion (DI) initiatives because of the competitive advantage it offers.

   A company with a gender-wise, racially, and ethnically diverse employee base performs 25% better than its competitors who lack diversity. A diverse employee base also brings diverse perspectives, which help improve the quality of decision-making, enhance team problem-solving skills, and empower employees, thus ensuring they are 150% more likely to propose ideas and new ways of doing things.

   When it comes to talent attraction, diverse workforce helps to attract talent, with studies stating more than three-fourths or 75% of active and passive job seekers prioritizing it as a qualification criterion before applying for or accepting a job offer.

   Even as D&I (Diversity and Inclusion) has benefits, the recent pandemic has led many organizations to put their D&I initiatives on hold. However, they risk facing a backlash from talent and customers and HR leaders must work collaboratively with senior management to ensure that organization’s D&I efforts are on track for long-term sustainable advantage.

4. Rising Precedence of Work-Life Balance

   Voluntary employee attrition has increased significantly, with employees quitting for a healthier work-life balance, more professional freedom, and finding a better sense of purpose in their work.

   The hybrid work model has become the norm, with 63% of high-growth companies adopting a flexible workforce model. However, it requires HR to reorient its policies and practices for the success of the hybrid work model. This requires taking into account not just the professional needs of employees, but also their personal, emotional and social needs.

   At its core, the flexible work model requires organizations to define how they will create a fair workplace for all employees regardless of their location. HR thus needs to view talent as a dynamic entity that constantly evolves to keep up with changes in the business environment.

   Organizations that help employees find the alignment of their life’s purpose with the company’s vision will result in more meaningful employee engagement and better retention. This gives them an edge over firms that have a rigid model of work.

5. The Proliferation of Data Analytics to Improve HR Processes

   One of the critical recruitment challenges is getting the right talent. Predictive analytics can help you identify if the candidate will be a good fit for the company by comparing the candidate’s characteristics and attributes with successful candidates. Recruiters can analyze data from previous recruitment drives to derive valuable insights, such as the best sourcing channels for hiring.

   Another significant HR challenge that can be addressed with analytics is employee turnover. Analyzing past data on employee turnover can help to identify the root cause of an employee leaving the organization. Advanced data analytics can analyze unstructured data from career community platforms to identify employee issues and enable HR to take corrective measures.

   As the technology applications in HR processes have increased, the volume of data has increased, and analytics is being leveraged to predict and assess recruitment strategies, employee retention and engagement, and other HR activities. HR analytics enables organizations to take the guesswork out of critical organizational challenges and implement data-driven decisions.

   Case in point, Juniper Network uses big data analytics on LinkedIn data to analyze where the top-performing employees come from and where they go after leaving the company. The company uses insights to fit its recruitment strategy to hire and retain the best candidates.

   In conclusion, if companies need to outperform their peers in today’s world, HR and business leaders need to constantly evaluate their HR policy to adjust to emerging realities and keep employees at the crux of their people decisions.

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