INTERNATIONAL NEWS

SINCE THE MIDDLE OF LAST MONTH, employees in Belgium have been mandated to work from home for four days a week. The move by the government of Prime Minister Alexander De Croo comes as daily COVID-19 cases soared in the country, with Belgium registering one of the highest per-capita case rates in Western Europe. The remote work mandate will run until December 12, when it may be lowered to three days a week, depending on the COVID-19 situation in the country.

GLOBAL BUSINESS TRAVEL SPEND is expected to surge in 2022 and fully recover by the end of 2024, a survey by the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA) has predicted. GBTA’s annual study of business travel spending and growth covering 73 countries and 44 industries, found that after a sharp 53.8% decline in spending to US$661 billion in 2020, global expenditures are expected to rebound by 14% in 2021 to US$754 billion.

PILOT, all Apple employees will need to begin returning to their offices starting February 1, 2022. Initially, employees will be required to work for one or two days in the office, before, beginning in March, employees will have to come to the office on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, while being allowed to work from home on Wednesdays and Fridays. However, employees deem to hold important positions and roles may not be considered for the hybrid work pilot and will be asked to come to the office four or five days a week.

WORKERS in the US quit their jobs voluntarily in September, the highest recorded number in two decades, according to the US Labour Department. Of these, nearly a million workers quit their jobs in the leisure and hospitality sectors, reflecting a steep competition for workers. There were 10.4 million job openings in the United States as the end of September, with roughly 75 unemployed workers for every 100 job openings.

AMAZON HAS REACHED A US$500,000 legal settlement in California, where the tech giant was alleged to have failed to adequately inform warehouse workers about COVID-19 cases in the workplace. This is the first application of California’s “right to know” rules that require employers to keep staff notified of any potential COVID-19 exposures at their work sites, to tell them about pandemic-related protections, benefits, disinfection, and safety plans, and to report cases to local health agencies. Amazon has denied any wrongdoing, saying the law did not require it to share total number of cases with employees, although it has since started to do so.

ASKING JOBSEEKERS about their previous salaries is contributing to the gender pay gap in the UK, says the Fawcett Society, a charity campaigning for gender equality and women’s rights. Jemima Olchawski, the Fawcett Society’s chief executive, told the BBC, “We’re calling on employers to make a simple change and stop asking potential employees about salary history. Evidence shows that this will help stamp out pay inequality, not only for women but for people of colour, and people with disabilities.”

BY SHAWN LIEW

For tech aficionados, Apple’s 1984 MacIntosh commercial remains one of the most iconic ads of all time. It may also turn out to be a key reference point for HR leaders in 2022, suggested Amer Iqbal, APAC Head of Digital Transformation, Facebook.

Speaking with HRM Asia Magazine, he described, “A woman runs into a crowded theatre, the sea of expressionless faces illuminated with the dim flicker of an authoritarian figure filling their minds with propaganda. The woman throws a sledgehammer, shattering the screen and setting the masses free.”

“We’ve always been drawn to tales of individuals taking the power back. While the 80s’ revolution was apparently about selling beige, box-shaped computers, 40 years later we find ourselves fighting for a more noble cause: breaking down the walls between work and life and ushering in a re-emergence of self.”

Describing the last 18 months as providing “false starts and failed reopenings”, Iqbal is optimistic that 2022 will shape up to be a time of rebirth and reinvention for many organisations, although it will not come without challenges.

“The single greatest challenge, and equally the greatest opportunity for organisations, will be the shift of power remote freelance and gig workers.

“Ultimately, those organisations who can successfully serve the needs of their people and unlock the full potential of the individual will sail into 2022 riding high,” Iqbal concluded.

Amid all the change that a world of work constantly in a state of motion has brought, one common thread: People, Power, Performance, has grown stronger, said Don Weinstein, Corporate Vice President of Global Product and Technology, ADP.

He added, “To support and empower their people, employers are rooting their decision-making in data and leveraging those insights to better their employees’

back to the people,” he predicted.

While reverting to what used to work before the pandemic struck may seem like an appealing and easy option, Iqbal sees going down that route as a missed opportunity for organisations to take what they have learnt from the pandemic to rethink how to improve processes and practices.

“How can we put a positive lens on the doom and gloom we have heard so much about?”, he asked.

With the Great Resignation for instance, people are leaving their jobs to find purpose and autonomy. Organisations need to ask themselves if they are the ones who can offer it. Where mental health is concerned, Iqbal asked, “If managers acted more like mentors, would people still feel the need to check their personality at the door?”

With a significant portion of the workforce likely to work remotely as part of a hybrid setup in 2022, he also believes that more organisations will tap into the advantages of lean, just-in-time skills from

needs and what drives their productivity.”

According to the ADP Research Institute’s new People at Work: A Global Workforce View study, employers are now looking for new opportunities to increase employee visibility and better understand the needs of a dispersed workforce as they explore on-site, fully remote, or hybrid workplace models.

To accelerate performance, ADP recommends that employers focus on their employees’ individual strengths and provide opportunities for employees to develop new skills or embark on a new career trajectory with more opportunities for growth.

The theme of placing people first was also continued by Jason Averbook, CEO and Co-Founder of CEO, who believes that HR leaders have a key mission in 2022 – creating a people-centric workforce experience that reinforces organisational purpose and culture.

“A thriving workforce is a required ingredient of a thriving business,” he emphasised. “Connect your people strategies to organisational purpose. Obsess over their experience, their care and wellbeing, their mental health and ability to thrive. Put their needs first; make them feel safe, cared for, and connected to your mission; help them find joy at work. They can and will rise to the occasion, but only if people leaders set the tone.” (Read more on page 18).

With change set to be a buzzword for the workforce in 2022 as uncertainly continues to linger because of the pandemic (or endemic), HR and people leaders will also need to manage and ensure a productive workforce, no matter where employees may be working from.

While work from home (WFH) was the default for many organisations in 2021, this will gradually transition to a work from anywhere (WFA) model in 2022, suggested Dickson Tang, Keynote Speaker and Author on Creative Human Capital.

“WFA will be at the top of the HR agenda in 2022,” he predicted. “It has been proven that the workforce can still deliver results while working from home during the pandemic. Since WFH is workable, it is natural that employees will be advocating for WFA.”

Tang also recommended HR leaders to consider three factors when preparing for the implementation of WFA, beginning with making WFA a talent management initiative. “The war for talent is global,” he explained. “Highly skilled employees, especially the younger generation, are excited by the concept of traveling around the world, while staying employed full-time. In this case, WFA is a talent management initiative, not just a mode of working arrangement.”

HR leaders then need to discuss with their management on how they may begin to implement their WFA initiatives. “Brainstorm and ask, how might you improve your HR and WFA policies, so that HR can help you unlock your team’s creativity and productivity?”

Once policies for WFA have been shaped, HR leaders can then work with operational and technical teams to address infrastructure issues, Tang continued. “This includes ensuring public Wi-Fi security, setting up asynchronous and synchronous communication channels to let employees get work done easily. Embrace WFA, because that’s the way to go for 2022,” he concluded.

BY SHAWN LIEW

Rob Squires, VP for Sales, Asia Pacific and Japan, Ceridian, told HRM Magazine Asia, “As organisations plan their return to work, they are finding that many of their employees may be tempted to look for new roles, leading to what is now called the Great Resignation.”

In the APAC region, two-thirds (67%) of employees aged 18-34, and more than half (54%) off all workers, are considering or actively looking for new roles, revealed an upcoming Ceridian survey. Driving this development are two groups of employees – those who are suffering digital burnout because of prolonged work-from-home arrangements, and those who want more control of their time instead of spending it on commuting or long hours at the office.

Clearly, the power dynamic has shifted towards employees, as Squires explained, “They know what they want, and they are willing to move on if these needs are not met. Organisations need to be focused on employee value to retain their top staff and attract candidates from companies who are not engaging their employees.”

Where once it may have been just a workplace perk, employee experience (EX) is now tied to the resilience and growth of business and is critical to the attraction and retention strategy of organisations. “Organisations need to invest time, energy, and budget in creating experiences that employees across roles, work modes, locations, or tenure, can engage with,” said Squires.

To manage a hybrid workforce, he recommended that organisations leverage technology to create a work environment that meets people where they are, driving greater harmonisation between work and life.

For instance, companies with a global presence need to stay on top of regional compliance issues that apply to employees working out of different locations. This will help mitigate risk, especially in payroll, said Squires. “Adapting a global payroll strategy and using a single solution can minimise risk, streamline operations, manage costs, and achieve greater global visibility, while ensuring employees are paid correctly and on time.”

Employees also expect pay, labour scheduling, hiring, job searching, learning, and onboarding to be available on-demand, while business leaders continue to seek ways to communicate and connect transparently with an increasingly diverse workforce.

To help improve workplace communication, Ceridian recently launched Dayforce Hub, which offers a personalised interface that gives employees access to tools and resources to help them manage their work lives better and gives leaders an opportunity to communicate updates through one centralised location. Together, this delivers an experience that drives engagement and alignment with organisation culture.

According to the Ceridian survey, 27% of organisations in APAC are currently working in a hybrid model, while 34% are working remotely. Over the long-term, however, a more permanent move to hybrid work is expected, with 71% of organisations planning to hire remote employees.

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, working arrangements have drastically changed, and will likely continue to do so. With this lingering uncertainty in place, 38% of employees ranked flexible work policies as their most valued employee perk and non-cash benefit.

“Flexible work policies afford more freedom to employees, such as reduced commute times, personal times for themselves, and more options for where they can live,” Squires explained. “These things contribute to the overall satisfaction of the employee with work/life balance.”

He was also quick to highlight the change in employee expectations that comes with a hybrid workforce. “Employees expect betterdesigned experiences and how these are delivered. Leaders will need to adjust their style and put a renewed focus on inclusivity, and make sure that employees who continue to work remotely stay informed and included.”

As hybrid work continues to change the way people work, Ceridian’s survey has also revealed an under-the-radar development that may soon be thrust firmly into the spotlight.

While 13% of employees in APAC currently have access to their earned wages on an on-demand basis – rather than having to wait for the traditional payday - over half of workers (53%) have indicated a preference to have this option made available to them. “On-demand pay is identified as bring highly valued by employees, although few employers are currently making this available,” said Squires.

In the current state, pay cycles do not always line up with expenses. This means that employees faced with a financial emergency or unexpected between pay periods experience a cash flow crunch.

“The increasing preference for ondemand pay demonstrates an appetite for greater flexibility over one’s personal finances, providing an alternative to highinterest credit cards and payday lending,” Squires concluded.

At the heart of every business organisation today are its people and talents. With remote and hybrid work arrangements now the new norm, the push to convert data analytics to people analytics is escalating. Data analytics is used not only by large enterprises and MNCs in predicting global trends and consumer preferences but also by SMEs and HR teams in compensation and benefits, managing attrition and retention, pulse surveys, and employee engagement.

As a global HR and payroll service provider, BIPO continues to innovate in areas like business intelligence (BI), data, and people analytics as part of its awardwinning cloud-based HR Management System (HRMS). Henry Liew, BIPO’s Principal Data Scientist, who spearheads the company’s Global Innovation Hub in Singapore, indicated that businesses today need to combine the art of HR with the science of data analytics to deliver results aligned with business operations and goals.

Liew shared, “The common misconception surrounding data, analytics, and BI tools generally stem from a lack of understanding, giving users the impression that with limited features and functions, results are generally complicated and difficult to interpret. These may be true with legacy BI tools. However, a lot has since evolved. In addition to providing real-time data that enable businesses to analyse longterm trends, BI tools now offer customised reports, and are highly sought after as a business enabler to solve short-term problems.”

While the concept of big data and the use of analytics is not new, there is an impetus for businesses to convert data analytics to people analytics – a trend brought about by the current pandemic. Real-time information is needed to respond to the volatile business environment and implement better workforce planning and manpower strategies.

Drawing on his experience working with enterprises and SMEs, Liew shared that today’s business leaders are more inclined to use people analytics to support the decision-making process, with judgment based on actionable insights to deliver results aligned with business objectives.

Liew has noticed growing interest from businesses keen to analyse data such as cost of living, comparing increasingly attractive locations to place high-potential employees as part of succession planning and the anticipated uptick in the global business economy.

People analytics and BI, when integrated with HRMS and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) platforms can have a significantly positive impact on compensation and benefits, performance evaluation, attrition, retention, and employee engagement.

As an example, where attrition is constantly high, data should be analysed over 12 months to determine key motivators (push/pull factors, for example) and identify other possible underlying issues such as leadership change or disengaged employees. Supporting data could indicate that a pay rise and promotions may not adequately address the problem. Instead, a mid to longer-term strategy could include coaching, mentoring, and succession planning to ensure sustainable teams.

Liew concluded, “With remote and hybrid work arrangements here to stay, people analytics combined with technology ensure that data-infused insights is used to implement strategies that support and empower teams. Performance appraisal, salary increase, benefits tagged to SMART goals that are analysed collectively as part of the current business situation will support informed decision making and better overall management.”

Established in 2004 and headquartered in Singapore for Asia-Pacific, BIPO is a leading one-stop, global HR service provider offering payroll and HR management solutions. They are a specialised hybrid HR solutions provider, bringing the best of both worlds – a cloud-based HR technology platform and a comprehensive suite of outsourced HR, payroll, and Professional Employer Organisation (PEO) services to manage global workforces.

Trusted by over 2,800 clients, their global infrastructure in more than 100 countries and regions helps businesses expand compliantly across the globe. BIPO believes in empowering businesses through technology and innovation, to revolutionise the Future of Work.

A survey by the world’s leading Employer of Record (EOR) Globalization Partners revealed that 63% of companies will make remote work a permanent fixture following the pandemic, while some 12% said that remote work was already a permanent fixture and will stay that way. Conducted in June 2021, the survey spoke to 1,250 employees from 15 countries worldwide, who were employed in companies with over 250 people employed globally.

Charles Ferguson, General Manager, Asia Pacific, Globalization Partners, told HRM Magazine Asia, “When the pandemic really gripped, I think all of the companies out there did a remarkable job of pivoting on a dime, really quickly, to enable at least a loose framework for some type of remote access for their workers.”

Working remotely however, has heralded some need changes for many companies with Culture frequently falling victim. In the same Globalization Partners survey, more employees (32%) reported feeling less connected to their colleagues than before, while only 28% felt more connected due to remote working.

“With the remote work environment, it’s not really about natural culture per se, it’s more about engagement culture,” said Ferguson. “An engagement culture is directly tied to your ability as a company to clearly communicate and articulate your values, your vision, and your mission to your employees.”

Simply put, overcommunication is crucial in a virtual work environment to foster a desirable culture. “You have to continually find ways and means by which to engage and communicate with employees’’, Ferguson explained. “Management, however, will have to tread carefully between engaging and making sure people have what they need, versus overstepping the line and becoming a micromanager”.

“An important outcome of adhering to such practices will be the nurturing of trust between employers and employees. When that happens, culture can be built upon the foundation of trust,” said Ferguson.

“To that end, the need for strong communication between both companies and their workers has made the relationship between employer and employee more like a partnership, and less hierarchical.”

Ferguson advised organisations to be open to tweaking their current culture to a more relevant one suited to a digital or hybrid workforce. “A good culture is a culture that embraces change and is open to evolving,” he pointed out.

To foster a virtual workplace culture,

workers will also have to be provided with the appropriate tools, such as the right WFH setup. “This environment that we’re operating in right now has a high degree of ability to democratise experiences, so long as you have access to the technology”, Ferguson said, noting that diversity and inclusion have the potential to be more prevalent in a digital work environment.

Since COVID-19 hit, Ferguson has observed a change in the needs of his clients. While Globalization Partners used to help the bulk of its customers perform market expansion services — which include the likes of testing a market through a slow expansion of its local worker count — now 30% of service demand stems from onboarding talent locally.

Some businesses are now no longer interested in the market itself, rather, they are looking at a global supply of talent. “They’re not interested in the market at all, they just want the talent, and they want to hire that talent, so they can snag it before we lose it,” explained Ferguson. “The traditional method of finding the talent and relocating them to the mothership no longer works due to the pandemic.”

If organisations are changing their hiring strategies to adapt to the pandemic, it follows suit that some practices in a remote work environment should also be fine-tuned. “Management will need to understand that work performance should not be tied to a worker’s physical presence in the office”, said Ferguson.

With hybrid work emerging as an increasingly popular option, leadership must now take their learnings and adapt. “There will be a lot of bias and assumptions from people, around workers who go to the office, and workers who do not”, he explained. “Managers, leaders, and HR professionals alike are certainly going to have to identify new ways to deal with that.”

BY CHARLES CHAU

One company that has benefited from the WSDeg pathway offered by SIT is Inspire-Tech Pte Ltd, which has gained fresh perspectives and real-life work contributions from their apprentices.

Ting Teck Wei, Operations Director of Inspire-Tech, said, “SIT’s WSDeg apprentices are able to adapt and react quickly to new work situations, especially in a VUCA environment. For example, apprentices were able to quickly switch from working on an internal project to manage urgent external work from clients. They were also able to research for and help implement a company-wide data-protection project, which involved many departments such as marketing, finance, HR, and IT.”

The WSDeg pathway also creates a mutually beneficial scenario where apprentices bring what they have learnt in school back to the company, helping the company plug the gaps with the necessary knowhow. On the other hand, the students benefit from the apprenticeship pathway by honing the relevant skill sets that will not only help them in their current jobs, but for their future as well.

Moreover, when the company has a pool of apprentices who are at different development stages, the senior apprentices, especially those in their third year, can provide guidance to the junior ones. This will help the junior apprentices navigate their apprenticeship journey better.

Ting added, “Through the SIT’s WSDeg pathway, junior staff have been provided with opportunities to take on mentorship roles that would have normally been undertaken by managerial staff.” TING TECK WEI, Operations Director of Inspire-Tech, a Singapore-based company that has benefitted from the Work-Study Degree pathway offered by the Singapore Institute of Technology.

Ting also finds SIT WSDeg apprentices to be resilient and highly adaptable. They have good time management and problemsolving skills and can handle stress well. He attributes these traits to SIT’s trimester academic model, which may be intense but manageable. “You don’t often see such grit and adaptability, especially in interns. Having such crucial transferable skills will help WSDeg graduates increase their employability,” Ting said.

One of the most unique aspects of the WSDeg pathway is its practical-oriented, hands-on, and applied-learning approach. This approach enables third-year apprentices, after going through up to two four-month apprenticeship cycles, to be capable of handling work of a similar level as full-time employees of the company.

Since 2017, the company has been taking in apprentices under SIT’s WSDeg pathway. “The WSDeg pathway is an important way for us to build the company’s talent pipeline,” said Ting, who sees the pathway as one that establishes long-term relationships with apprentices.

By their second year, apprentices would have discussed the job role they would like to take up for their eight to 12-month credit-bearing work attachment with their mentors, as well as what their final-year industry-based capstone project would cover. This enables the partnering company to tap into SIT’s resources to jointly work on relevant projects, while allowing the apprentice to get a head start on gaining real-world experience, benefiting both parties. “This is a unique value proposition that other apprenticeship programmes seldom offer,” shared Ting.

“At the end, even if the apprentices do not opt to work with Inspire-Tech after they graduate, we make it a point to proactively keep in touch with them. In fact, we encourage graduates to try out roles with other companies to learn other skills,” Ting said. He believes that the deep bond developed during the threeyear WSDeg apprenticeship will facilitate continued mutual learning long after the apprenticeship ends.

“We will continue to invest in this relationship so that it will help to contribute to our future talent-acquisition strategy,” said Ting, who highlighted how today’s young workers are keen to try different roles and work in different environments, especially before they reach age 30.

“I recommend other companies to take part in SIT’s WSDeg pathway. Take in more than one apprentice, preferably over different years so that the seniors and juniors can interact and exchange notes.” In turn, apprentices can provide updated information to their companies on changes, developments and trends on the academia front. “This mutually beneficial win-win interaction is what we appreciate most out of the WSDeg pathway,” Ting concluded.

A thriving workforce is a required ingredient of a thriving business. Tuning into what shapes and supports the whole person is an important exercise in driving engagement and overall wellbeing. It is time to abandon the notion that work and life are separate, that we somehow act, feel, and function one way at work and operate or feel differently in our lives outside of work. The ideal employer is a proactive protector and positive supporter of the lives of its workforce; it is the employer’s responsibility to care for people. Period.

Any organisation who did not believe this pre-pandemic is feeling the current talent crisis the most. People are hurting; in the midst of the pandemic, Gallup reported 7 out of 10 people globally were suffering or struggling. We made some progress in 2021, but parts of the world are still recording their highest COVID case counts yet. We have taken huge steps backwards when it comes to eradicating global poverty. Some of the world’s richest and most profitable companies are experiencing the highest levels of attrition because their people do not want to stay there. Those profits came at the expense of people.

People leaders who are having a hard time getting buy-in, approval or funding on programmes, technologies, or solutions that can help people thrive in your workforce likely still have not made the case that the #1 customer of your function and your business is your people.

Here in the United States, our military uses an expression: “Mission First, People Always.” It is a mindset, leadership, and training approach for combat readiness. The military knows a soldier will spend most of his or her career preparing for combat and very little time, if any at all, actually engaged in combat. Leadership is obsessed with maintaining the cohesion and care of its units so that people can perform optimally, both in wartime and in peacetime.

The global talent crisis is not a result of the pandemic; a number of compounding factors in multiple overlapping crises simply pushed humanity to the breaking point. The global talent crisis is a human outcry. People will separate from what no longer serves them, realising life is too short to struggle unnecessarily, to live in fear, to endure toxic culture or indifferent leadership, or to forsake happiness.

Organisations feeling the impact of the current talent crisis the most will rush to

hire more people as fast as possible. This is the wrong solution. Rushing to replace unhappy people does nothing to address core problems. The solution is just what I said above: make people the #1 customer of the HR function and your business.

People are the ultimate differentiator for business, so this should not be hard to do. When you use this principle as your guiding star, you will begin to identify and address foundational issues preventing you from delivering a people-first culture of connection, one where people can thrive, feel like they belong, and want to stay.

Mission First, People Always. Connect your people strategies to organisational purpose. Obsess over their experience, their care and wellbeing, their mental health and ability to thrive. Put their needs first; make them feel safe, cared for, and connected to your mission; help them find joy at work. They can and will rise to the occasion, but only if people leaders set the tone.

While it may sound simple to execute, for DEI to work successfully and meet everchanging employee needs, businesses need to fully embrace and integrate DEI as part of their culture. The return on investment can be realised throughout the business – from improved retention to a significantly more innovative workforce.

My calling has been to give people a fair shot in the workplace. This was even before I fully understood the power of DEI.

Early in my career, I met a rural agricultural entrepreneur in China. She had been very successful growing and selling oranges in her local community, but was looking to expand her sales market. I soon learnt that she had a young son whom she has not seen for seven years as she felt obligated to focus on growing her family’s business.

To her, knowing that her work would provide better future prospects for her son through paid education was what drove her to be successful and relentless in her work.

The conversation made me realise that economic equity, particularly for minority communities, had a significant ripple effect across broader society.

It reminded me that marginalised communities often have limited opportunities to tap on for better economic equity for themselves and those around them. It emphasised the immense amount of hard work, dedication, and tenacity that individuals draw upon to uplift themselves and others.

It spurred me to find a way to help people gain access to greater opportunities and tackle barriers which hinder economic equity for minority and marginalised communities.

At J&J, incorporating a culture of DEI starts in our Credo where we showcase our commitment to creating an environment that is inclusive. DEI at J&J means You Belong.

We foster a sense of belonging to unleash brilliance in our people. We do this most effectively through our Employee Resources Groups (ERGs). As an integral part of the new-hire onboarding process, the ERGs have been a platform for open, honest discussions for the past 46 years.

Through face-to-face and virtual meetings, our ERGs focus on shared identities and affinities. They serve as a network to connect minorities such as Asians, women and the disabled with other like-minded colleagues keen to support their causes. These ERGs directly support greater education and employee engagement, driving better outcomes on behalf of our people, our marketplace and our communities.

Our 12 global ERGs have successfully impacted policies and benefits that our employees are passionate about. These topics range from mental health issues and parental leave policies, to enabling girls in STEM – important benefits and support that underpin our employees’ engagement and well-being.

Over the last two years, we have engaged 21,000 colleagues through our ERGs and have created an inclusive environment that empowers our employees to share their unique perspectives and learn from one another.

I used to think DEI was a very niche HR conversation, but now I recognise the critical role it plays in driving sustainable economic growth for businesses. It’s not just me that sees the value DEI brings in helping employees and companies thrive – companies with diverse teams are 45% more likely to improve market share and 70% more likely to capture a new market.

Incorporating DEI in the workplace can also increase productivity, creativity, and cultural awareness that in turn bring out the best in employees – increasing retention rates and enabling them to reach their full potential.

As employee needs continue to change rapidly against the backdrop of COVID-19, it is vital that we, as leaders, embrace authenticity to ask the right questions (no matter how difficult they may be) and allow employees to bring honesty to the table, without fear of judgement.

It is also essential to keep the momentum alive. Integrating a culture of DEI is an ongoing practice that needs the support of everyone in the workplace. Set benchmarks for the team and continually measure progress through surveys and informal catch ups with teams and managers alike.

The fruits of DEI labour can indeed be sweet – retaining talent by ensuring employees feel heard and seen, while driving better business outcomes because of a more diverse and creative workforce.

SOPHIE GUERIN is Head of Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion, APAC, Johnson & Johnson.

Do your leaders look beyond your industry for inspiration? Do you hire people from other industries or (better yet) multiindustry people?

Cirque du Soleil (CDS) revived a dying industry (circus) by taking ideas from ballet, cabaret, opera, pop-music concerts, street performance, and live theatre.

By understanding deeply what customers want and receive elsewhere, CDS integrated the best bits into a USD $1.5 billion company -- the world’s largest contemporary circus, with up to USD$1 billion in annual revenues. Collecting diverse ideas and talent then became the launchpad for new ventures in TV, videos, digital media, fitness, corporate events, and gaming, with partners like Disney, Reebok, and Bell Media.

Should you be looking further afield for inspiration - and talent?

Are your leaders looking deeply at what customers really need and want -- not just what you are giving them? Are you looking deeply at what employees really need and want -- not just how well they fit into an org-chart box?

Google won out over Yahoo! by introducing a search engine that more deeply finds what people are looking for -- with search modelled after academic citation rankings, not library cataloguing.

Design Thinking (DT) is a successful field because designers dig deeply into what users are really trying to accomplish. Instead of tweaking today’s tool, they open up to radically different ways of achieving the same goal -- and produce winning products, services, and employee experiences thereby.

In fact, one simple way to enhance customer satisfaction is to enhance employee satisfaction. They are highly correlated. Are you using DT to enhance both?

Have you created such a collection? Have you made it easy (and worth-their-while!) for employees to use it and contribute? Do you reach into other companies’ collections?

Six months before launching the iPhone, Steve Jobs was using a prototype and realised it would get scratched by keys and coins in users’ pockets. He called Corning’s CEO, and they revived and commercialized a strong windshield glass that was researched but not released in the 1960s. Since it was already partially developed, they could speed past the usual 2-year development schedule. Gorilla Glass enabled part of iPhone’s “magic” and is now designed into more than 6 billion devices by over 45 major brands.

The point is not to plan for synchronicity. The point is to prepare for it. As Louis Pasteur said, “Chance favours the prepared mind.” It also favours prepared companies.

Are your employees trapped and rule-bound in an office or free to explore how to serve customers better?

No one does Design Thinking successfully while trapped in an office. You have to be there where people live and work, sharing their experiences, sensing problems and opportunities.

When IDEO went to people’s homes to observe how they handled money, they generated an insight that enabled Bank of America (BOA) to help people save USD$3.1 billion. They noticed things people did not reveal to BOA in earlier in-office focus groups.

everything. Millions of dollars were spent trying to make nuclear submarine hulls smoother for energy-efficiency and speed. Then someone asked how the fastest “fish” in the ocean -- the shark -- is so fast and yet so rough. It is covered in little teeth (denticles) that catch the water and create a slipstream effect. Immediately, research turned 180 degrees towards making rougher surfaces.

Speedo caught ahold of the idea and made sharkskin-like swimwear. The year they were introduced, 98% of Olympic medals were won by swimmers wearing Speedo Fastskin. The suits were immediately banned as an “unfair advantage” but are still available to consumers.

Have you crafted a culture that embraces deep questioning and radical innovating?

Chance really does favour the prepared mind -- and creative corporate cultures that use these keys to unlock new value with radical innovation.

DR C J MEADOWS is Director, The Innovation & Entrepreneurship Center at SP Jain School of Global Management. For more behindthe-scenes stories of these and other companies, as well as loads of innovation tips and tools, read her newly released book Famous Business Fusions: Ideas that Revolutionised Industries and its introductory “living book” (multimedia material + community) Famous Fusions: Behind the Scenes Intro to Companies, Inventions, and Innovators.

This seminal time in the history of work has numerous unique outcomes. Among those trends and technologies now here to stay are profound process changes to talent acquisition, talent management and even the backbone of why we work: payroll. Here are some of the emerging trends that HR needs to consider when planning for a successful 2022 and beyond:

disruptions: While unbeknownst to them at the time, those organisations that had achieved a degree of digital readiness were better prepared for the impact of the global pandemic. Apart from jobs that cannot be executed remotely because of physical proximity requirements – such as healthcare, retail, or restaurants – many businesses experienced less significant interruptions having already invested in collaboration and conferencing tools. Additionally, companies could provide access to critical applications, databases and conversational chatbots via a single knowledge source have been able to support employees no matter where or what hours they worked. Employees have come to expect this consumergrade experience at work and expect it to continue and grow. of COVID-19 is a growing labour shortage. According to research by Emsi, there was an exodus of three million baby boomers in 2020. In September 2020 alone, 865,000 women dropped out of the U.S. workforce – four times the number of men did. Recordlow participation in the workforce is so dramatic that it has been coined the “Great Resignation.” The U.S. has experienced the lowest birth rate in its history. Other countries including Sweden, Hungary, Japan, and South Korea have declining birth rates. All these stark numbers are making it harder to attract, recruit and hire qualified talent. In an effort to speed timeto-hire some organisations are replacing the CV with assessment testing to predict potential instead of relying on professional credentials. Others have relaxed background checking requirements.

The on-demand economy: Perhaps the

epitome of epoch-making change has been the rapid evolution of earned wage access. HR professionals – and their counterparts in finance – will find 2022 to be the year of “EWA” (Earned Wage Access) whereby employees can have timely access to wages for the work they have done instead of waiting for a set pay date. By alleviating the uncertainties created by financial stress, employers can help retain valuable talent, reduce absenteeism, and even decrease workplace accidents. Employees can address day-to-day financial obligations without waiting for a monthly pay date; plus, pay can be issued directly on cards versus traditional pay slips. 2022 will be a year of rebuilding, revising, and reimaging. Few organisations were prescient enough to prepare for what transpired in the last two years; however, smart employers are rapidly embracing the technologies and process changes that will enable them to thrive through what lies ahead. Building organisational resilience – especially in a newly hybrid work environment – necessitates evolving policies and adapting processes. One thing is for certain: the employee experience is at the center of these decisions since what has not changed is the importance of qualified talent.

Founder and CEO of The Devon Group, Jeanne Achille has helped launch thousands of HR tech products and companies including sourcing, recruiting, onboarding, HRMS/payroll, relocation, talent management, succession planning and coaching solutions. Chair of the Virtual HR Tech Conference, she also chairs Women in HR Tech Summit in the U.S. and Singapore. Follow her on Twitter and connect on LinkedIn.

The role of HR is becoming more important because CHROs need to deal not just with technology, but also with human emotion, or the human side of things that might not have been that much of a focus in the past, said Sandra Kokasih, Human Capital Managing Director, Sinar Mas Land.

Speaking at CHRO Indonesia, she highlighted three pressing tasks for HR leaders in a climate of change: rethinking whether an organisation is filled with workers with the right skills; restrategising human capital by identifying where to source and hire such employees; and reconstructing mindsets that will pave change in the way people do things.

It is also crucial to adopt a mindset of smart risk-taking, said Pambudi Sunarsihanto, HR Director, Bluebird Group Indonesia. Sometimes, this means stepping away from measures like key performance indicators to key development indicators, which he describes as what an employee will develop for a company in the future, be it “the development of the product, people, culture, or leadership”.

As economies reopen, HR and business leaders are also prioritising the safety of their employees as they return to traditional workplaces. One challenge that needs to be addressed, said Teguh Purwanto, President Director, PT Alere Health (Abbott), is to provide a safer environment so every employee can go back to the office with peace of mind.

Another issue that companies will have to grapple with is the presence of hybrid work, a likely practice in the future workforce, suggested Guo Yujing, APAC Client Partner Lead, Facebook. She shared Facebook’s efforts to differentiate remote work from work-from-home, including tweaking employees’ insurance coverage plan as they move to work in another country with a higher cost of living.

As technology disruption accelerates, employees will require new skills, and there will be a lot of focus on digital to keep up with the place of all the changes and opportunities that many companies are going to try and take advantage of, said John Antos, Vice President Strategy, Global Payroll & Asia Pacific, ADP.

To that end, he pointed out three emerging roles in HR: technical roles that transform and digitise HR processes, specialist roles filled by power users who drive forward, design, and onboard operations; and cross-functional roles for leaders who are going to glean insights from the data and analytics that come from the technology and drive transformation of an organisation.

As businesses go digital, it is crucial to take a “whole-person approach” when designing solutions for the workforce, said Jason Averbook, Co-Founder and CEO, Leapgen. Utilising a design-thinking concept, HR leaders should know who their audience are and design solutions with empathy, he added.

Averbook also spoke at CHRO Malaysia, where he described how the pandemic has forever changed the “now of work, and how CHROs are in a unique position to reshape what the HR function looks like.

To do that, CHROs must first understand that successful digital transformation in HR starts with the “mindset and vision”, followed by the “persons/audience” involved and their “journeys” before finally deciding on a “technology solution”

In Malaysia, 33% of companies are looking to increase their headcount, while 66% of professionals are expected to seek new employment next year, meaning CHROs will need to focus more on talent retention than talent acquisition, said ADP’s Antos.

Drawing on findings by the ADP Research Institute, he also highlighted how the need for digitalisation has permeated entire organisations with the focus

being shifted from digital productivity and remote working skills to technical skills like data analytics, cybersecurity, cloud computing, digital marketing, and software development.

Today’s CHROs are faced with the unprecedented challenge of managing four generations of workers – each with their expectations of what work should look like, observed Chella Pitchai, AVP & Head, Talent, Learning and Organisational Transformation, Biocon Biologics.

Koljit Singh, Senior Manager (HRM Excellence & IR) of BASF Petronas Chemicals, added that cultivating a sense of belonging, providing opportunities for internal mobility and flexibility at work would be good ways to deal with that challenge, especially when it involves Gen Z workers.

As leaders, CHROs need to shift from a positional authority to one of moral authority, said Fong Tuan Chen, Chief People Officer, Berjaya Corporate Berhad. What this means is that CHROs must champion the concept of the often-used phrase “people first”, and not just pay lip service to it, he explained.

Agreeing, Nadiah Tan Abdullah, CHRO, SP Setia, added that leaders need to practise self-discipline and, be resilient and empathetic when managing staff remotely during the pandemic. She added that the CHROs of the future need to have a “renaissance” mindset – being a versatile person with a broad range of skill sets to deal with employee experience, emotional and mental-well-being issues.

Vaccination remains the most effective way to control the spread of COVID-19, with workplace adjustments being the second-most effective measure, said Dr Mohan Ravuru, Director, Medical and Scientific Affairs, APAC, Abbott.

He proposed a “Swiss cheese model” of defence against COVID-19, where multiple layers of protection, including testing and vaccination, act in unison to block the spread of the virus.

Rounding off a successful CHRO Online Series 2021 was CHRO Singapore, where Peter Hadley, President, ADP Asia-Pacific, discussed how sentiment towards work and the expectations of the workforce and workplace continue to evolve.

He also shared his views on Asia’s business outlook and what to expect through endemic conditions in 2022.

Participants also heard from Pip Lyons, Senior People Scientist, Culture Amp, who provided key insights into how organisations can retain their best talent during the ‘Great Resignation’.

To reduce attrition and retain talent, she asked organisations to consider a few issues, including if they have the data and insights to make critical decisions about the new world of work.

APAC organisations are making progress in almost all areas focused on People Strategy. However, there is room for growth when looking at wellbeing practices, said Billy Elliott, Regional Director APAC, Top Employers Institute, and Ammara Naeem, Head of Client Success, Top Employers Institute.

HR leaders in APAC have a unique opportunity to achieve rapid and positive change in this area, they highlighted, before going on to provide examples of how leading organisations worldwide are becoming bolder in their experiments to drive and support a more holistic approach to wellbeing.

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