Making it count: Innovative solutions to keep employees happy, productive, and sticking around

90,000: by some estimates, that’s how many hours we spend at work over a lifetime. That translates to one-third or more of our time on this planet, underscoring the enormous impact of our work experiences on our lives outside of work.

?Motivated by global inflation and unprecedented labor market tightness, companies are searching long and far for ways to attract and retain talent by boosting employee happiness. While many employers have turned to pay raises—for example, T. Rowe Price Group gave roughly 85 percent of its workforce a special 4 percent raise effective July 1, while Exxon Mobil Corp. gave its U.S. employees a one-time payment in June equivalent to 3 percent of their salaries—they’re finding that employees are just as motivated by other incentives. Facing higher costs across the board, companies would be wise to consider alternatives. After all, happy employees are more productive and more likely to stick around.

?To help companies navigate the latest challenges in the world of work, AgileOne just released our Workforce Solutions Market Overview, Edition 4. Filled with economic data and insights, the report sheds new light on economic conditions across the globe and serves as a template for teams looking to bring innovation into their practices.

?The shift to skills

Reskilling, upskilling, hiring for skills: these concepts have gained traction in the vernacular of American hiring managers in recent years—and for good reason.

?According to a McKinsey Global Survey released as COVID-19 began sweeping the globe, 87 percent of executives said they were experiencing skill gaps within their companies. However, fewer than half of the respondents had a clear sense of how to address the problem. In other words, it might be more appropriate to characterize the so-called global worker shortage as a skills shortage—one with global consequences but where good solutions often seem out of reach.

?Building skills is the foundation of talent mobility, a term describing a company’s ability to move employees between positions to meet their changing needs. Embracing talent mobility has many benefits for companies, leading to less turnover and increased diversity.

?It improves employee satisfaction, too. According to The American Upskilling Study, a comprehensive study by Gallup of 15,000 U.S. adults who are either employed or in the labor force, a clear majority of workers who took advantage of opportunities to learn new skills or advance or upgrade existing skills reported improvement in other areas of their lives. More than seven in 10 report greater satisfaction with their jobs. Nearly as many say their quality of life has improved, while 65 percent report their standard of living has increased.

?At AgileOne, we like to walk the walk. As I wrote in a recent blog post, we’ve fully embraced talent mobility, ensuring that we’re in the best position to meet the evolving needs of our customers, suppliers, and internal stakeholders.

?For starters, we’ve deployed an internal training strategy to ensure our frontline employees are equipped with the technical know-how—in addition to the creative energy—to help our customers succeed. Additionally, we’ve realigned our internal teams to better support our customers and promoted leaders with in-demand backgrounds in strategic supplier engagement, data analysis, and engineering.

?To stay ahead of today’s challenges in the world of work, employers must learn to adapt to the expectations of their workforce while meeting the needs of their customers. Fortunately, talent mobility offers solutions that allow companies to do both.

Download AgileOne’s Workforce Solutions Market Overview, Edition 4 now!

?—Top five takeaways:

1. Record job vacancies are hurting global economies: The causes are complex and not only limited to disruption caused by the pandemic. Other factors include slow growth in the working age populations of some economies, a global shift in geopolitics that is sealing off job markets from immigrant workers, and a growing share of workers who lack the skills needed to fill scores of unfilled positions.
2. To stay ahead, companies must embrace talent mobility: Talent mobility describes the movement of employees between positions to meet a company’s evolving needs. Companies that implement talent mobility strategies are in a better position to attract skilled talent and curb attrition.
3. Talent mobility comes in many forms: It includes reskilling, upskilling, and hiring for skills. These strategies offer many benefits for companies, allowing them to constantly review and adapt their workforce as conditions change while empowering employees with new skills that keep them happy, productive, and sticking around.
4. AgileOne can help: Leveraging our award-winning suite of technologies and services, AgileOne is equipped with the tools to help you reduce risk and drive cost savings. This includes our managed services program (MSP), which allows companies to gain critical insights into their workforces.
5. Consider contingent—a flexible option for uncertain times: Contingent arrangements, like those offered by AgileOne, can provide long-term value for companies that recognize the potential for these workers to adapt to their evolving needs.