The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated changes in the way we work. Since the pandemic hit the world, there has been a paradigm shift in where and when we work and how we measure progress. The past couple of years have changed the rules of the game.
Gartner surveyed more than 500 human resources leaders across 60 countries and all major industries to identify HR trends and assess HR priorities and expected challenges for 2023.
Building critical skills and competencies tops the list of priorities for the fourth straight year, but many HR leaders will also prioritize change management, leadership, and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
Gartner research also shows that 90% of HR leaders want to either maintain or increase their technology spend, while one-third intend to slash their budgets.
Responding to a survey by Gartner, almost 60% of HR leaders said building critical skills and competencies will be their top priority in 2023.
Listing below HR trends, we feel will create challenges and opportunities for all HR professionals in 2023.
The shift to hybrid work
This expected shift by 95% of the HR managers surveyed to the hybrid work model will be a massive driver of transformation and one that HR leaders must be prepared to support.
This has 2 type of new approaches
- Partial remote where part of the team works onsite and part offsite. This is mostly due to the fact that some companies cannot move certain of their processes to remote due to security or hardware limitations
- Remote days or hours here they try to manage their work depending on tasks and necessity to work out of office.
Focusing on worker well-being
According to Gartner, 85% of employees said they experienced higher levels of burnout while 40% reported adverse impacts on work-life balance.
The pandemic revealed that mental health and wellness is important to everyone. No one is immune to stress, especially during uncertain times. Some companies provide programs offline to online experiences like Zoom-driven team building parties, fitness and yoga classes. Some provide mental health days as part of paid time off (PTO).
Reskilling, Upskilling, and Flexible Development Opportunities
According to the World Economic Forum, more than one-third of jobs worldwide will be transformed thanks to workplace technology. So many companies provide internal training or sponsor the training undertaken by their employees towards upskilling tracks that promise a new career in information tech or other fields. In addition, organizations must map the internal skills that they have.
Diversity, equity and inclusion are the rising needs.
The pandemic has created a need for greater empathy as well as a more humane and inclusive work environment, which has inspired organizations to focus on diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I)
In addition to the expectation of more empathy and a more human workplace, there is growing pressure to increase equity and inclusion in organizations. Mainly, all stakeholders in HR, both internally and externally, are pressing for real progress towards diversifying leadership. This will help create a better workplace and enhance productivity.
There is a shift from people analytics to data literacy.
Businesses realize that it is more challenging to implement analytics in HR departments. Understanding data is one of the major bottlenecks HR business partners face while implementing analytics effectively in the organization.
HR managers must access dashboards to retrieve the relevant data to provide better advice. Additionally, HR analysts will be more efficient when combining financial and business data to support their analysis.
Coming up with sufficient strategies on how to collaborate, forge bonds, conduct performance measures, and attain desired results is a must. Of course, there are dreaded conversations to be had about masking up and getting vaccinated. Take a holistic approach, make sure the strategy matches your values, and consider the risks associated with whatever decisions you make.
