Major labour market shifts

How will you adapt?

You may be aware of the major shifts happening in terms of how, why, when and where we work, and what we do. These trends are not new but the pace of that change has dramatically increased as we’ve adapted to the presence of COVID.

I’ve gathered a brief summary of global and New Zealand conversations around these trends for your reflection. How are you making sense of these for your situation?

Major stories from around the world include:

• Forget Going Back to the Office—People Are Just Quitting Instead (Wall Street Journal  – 13 June 2021)

• The ‘Great Resignation’ is here. This is how employers should prepare (Fast Company – 15 June 2021)

• It’s time for leaders to get real about hybrid (McKinsey Quarterly – 9 July 2021)

• Millennials are worried about job security, but many would still quit over a clash of values (Fast Company  – 19 July 2021)

• The Future of Work in 2021 (Qualtrics)

The story in New Zealand, while with a different COVID context, has aligned themes:

• Hot labour market good for workers but problems ahead (NZ Herald – 5 August 2021)

• Immigration and the puzzle of New Zealand's tight labour market (NZ Herald – 14 June 2021) 

• Handling staff shortages (Tony Alexander – 16 July 2021)

• The Great Resignation: nearly 40% of Kiwis looking for new jobs ( RNZ – 27 June 2021)

A Q3 Future of Work debrief (30 July 2021) by Tech Futures Lab went further, and offered their take on what this all means:

• A massive shift is happening – how, where, why, when we work and how we learn

• Around the world, organisations are grappling with an unprecedented talent shortage as economies recover and pent up consumer demand explodes

• Globally, 70% of employers report challenges hiring in high demand areas

• NZ is facing a digital skills crisis (and talent crisis across industries)

• Emerging generations forecast to have 17 jobs and 5 major career shifts over a lifetime

• Covid has accelerated innovation – and created a massive labour market shift – hybrid work, digitisation, casualisation

• Millennials are employing Gen Z in preference to older workers even for more senior roles

• We're seeing a massive upshift in contingent/casual/contract work that will continue to increase

• Anecdotal stories about employers literally knocking on home doors and offering talent $500 - $50,000 as a joining fee, or on a similar theme, substantial employee referral programmes

• Similar stories of overseas employers successfully head hunting NZ talent with large offers - a NZ brain drain is a big threat

• Lifelong learning is increasingly an essential reality

• 4 day working week – will be commonplace in 5 years

• Major shifts in labour market demographics

• More focus on widening lens of diversity (gender, ethnicity, age range, disabilities)

• Increasing demand for flexibility, hybrid working options

• Mental health at work concerns accelerate

• Housing affordability is a risk impacting NZ’s ability to attract and retain talent

• Culture and development, including external and individualised development, are the top two priority areas for retention and engagement

• Hybrid and remote working models have productivity benefits

• More attention on diversity (Diversity brings benefits)

It’s a hugely challenging and complex situation and made even more so by wider contexts such as the climate crisis, falling birth rates, increasing inequities, supply chain disruptions, rapid innovation and many other factors. What's required to meet these challenges is likely not simple answers. How might you learn what works with your team,  when they themselves may not know?

Take offering hybrid work as just one example of a way to retain talent. Is an arbitrary decision about the number of days in the office going to work when there are so many unknowns? McKinsey advocates an experiment and learn approach,  with no finish line and offers a few ideas on what that might start to look like.

Similar questions could be posed across many facets of working life.  How much do we pay,  how do we make it equitable, how do we deal with advancement and development opportunities, how do we support a sense of community and belonging,  of meaning and wellbeing? How do we all think about problems? How, why and when do we really talk to each other? What's enough to keep our people here and engaged and how might we sense when they're not? How might we think differently and make an impact, systemically, to our society and our environment?

A significant shift in approach is going to be needed for organisations that want to thrive. How are you making sense of this? Sign up for a complimentary chat with me, or enquire via my contact form, if you’d like to explore what this means for you.