Navigating the new Work Paradigm

The onset of unprecedented calamity unleashed by COVID, caused a monumental and irreversible transformation in the way we work what is commonly referred to as remote working. Naturally, this led to a huge spike in the demand for online collaboration/meeting solutions.

Company names like Zoom became synonymous for online collaboration globally. No surprises, the market today is overflowing with software and solutions that promise to increase employee engagement and productivity significantly and are being continually enhanced by AI. New startups in this field are ballooning.

Observation

It seems that almost all companies follow a similar template for remote working which is rooted in the two basic techniques for collaboration – Online Meetings and messaging /collaboration tools. Together these seem to form the backbone of today’s remote work infrastructure.

Though companies are quick to adopt this new style of work which is climate friendly as it reduces endless hours of commute driving higher availability of productive hours. Despite all this, the debate around the efficacy of this new model never seems to rest and the corporate world seems divided over its impact.

Some prominent names from the corporate world as we hear from the media have this to say; These are big names and heavily influence as to how other companies draw their conclusions, develop their policies or simply apply the same templates that these companies use in their organization.

Prominent Quotes from Public Pages

(My comments are italicized)

?“Airbnb announced last year that it would?allow employees to live and work from anywhere without pay loss if they stayed in their home countries.

?Chesky said at the time that Airbnb "had the most productive two-year period in our company's history — all while working remotely." – Seems they got the winning formula and not only that; Kudos, they can measure productivity.

Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg – “Our hypothesis is that it is still easier to build trust in person.”- Absolutely true, on a lighter note, On those lines, people will never (or should not)?accept friend requests on Facebook or for that matter on any site.

Twitter’s /X’s, - Elon Musk - who said remote workers are just?pretending to work

– That’s why Elon is so popular, he does not mince words; But what he does not state explicitly but conveys implicitly is that profound changes on work definitions are needed before the trust can be built.

Goldman Sachs’ David Solomon called working from home?an aberration.

- Every industry vertical may not be suited due to concerns around data security and sensitive information leakage; A recent case of insider trading has come up last week in Texas with someone over hearing confidential information to make millions $$$$$....

Salesforce?chief executive?

, who even went so far as to lure workers into returning to the office by promising to donate $10 to a charity of a worker’s choice for each day they come in. But in the recent Dreamforce-23 he quotes – “I don’t work well in an office; it does not suit my personality”. – This reinforces the view that the dynamics around the new normal are being gradually accepted and understood.

So, what is causing so diametrically different and transient views; I think the reasons are many, but I see the following as the key influencers? ?

Some jobs are/were simply not designed to be streamed on the net; Work that needs frequent and random collaborations across varied stakeholders are difficult to accomplish virtually as the human mind struggles to grapple with a sense of purpose and acknowledgement. The phenomenon is relatively new as organizations try to wrap their heads around the paradigm shift in workplace.

• If I don’t see and feel your presence, I can’t relate to you or understand you or simply can’t trust.
• There is a perception of control, productivity and engagement in a physical setting –Actual presence is reflective of engagement, productivity, dedication giving a sense of work being accomplished (even if nothing gets done)
• Organization processes, design, work units, content and structures have never been redesigned for remote workplaces.

While the first 4 are something that nothing much can be done about and relates to changes in mindset; something that organizations, people and workplaces will eventually adapt as time progresses.

My focus is around the last bullet where I see no noteworthy and conscious attempt to decode and redesign organizations for this change. The evolution of corporate hierarchy and organizational design is a complex interplay of historical, social, technological, and managerial influences. Different eras and thinkers have contributed to shaping the structures we see in modern organizations today. It's time for a change as we look towards the new breed of thinkers for guidance.

Organizations today look and behave exactly the same for any onsite or virtual working arrangements thereby underscoring the fact that there is a lack of conscious effort and thought leadership to rethink the new workplace.

This is a huge risk which is reinforced by what the Stanford professor Nicholas Bloom had to say :"It's the Uberization of the workforce, The more remote you are, the more Uberized the job is, and the more you're just being paid for the day or for the week."- There is this Danger of organization losing their USP , USP will only remain in the brand and logo ; company becoming highly transactional

So, here we have to recast the workplace in a way that ensures that it does not become transactional but it’s a historic opportunity to create a data driven organization that enhances growth, innovation, employee productivity, morale and trust without becoming transactional.

Challenges- My Perspective

Information- Not sure how many companies realize that the moment you are in a virtual remote workplace, the only source of information is from the machine, all other informal modes of communication like personal interactions get cut out which hitherto played a huge role in forming one’s perception of organization culture, building camaraderie and team spirit.

So, what does a company do?

Information Overload – Random and innumerable source of information are unleashed that clamor for one's attention; Even within a typical organization, it's not uncommon to see 100’s of online channels, groups spitting notifications bombarding new information all the time; So, what’s in it for me or what’s in for whom; It is left to the prerogative of individuals to filter and consume information as they deem fit.

The number of reactions in an internal announcement reflects the level of engagement of employees- How do they look as a percentage of total employees at your workplace?

Behavior

With that the case, there are some fundamental rules of behavior that everyone has to abide by. The most important to me is the availability and response times of individuals. Unresponsiveness or rejection without reason are blockers to effective dissemination of information and creates random pockets of self-doubt and confusion.

Accentuation

How does one be seen or heard / or for that matter become prominent? Online calls in such a set up then become the sole vehicle to get noticed unless work structure, roles, KPIs provide the pathway to glory. This leads to folks speaking more at the cost of others impeding teamwork and effective collaboration.

Detachment

Perhaps the most widely discussed has been the way the remote age has prompted workers to emotionally detach from their jobs. Some bemoaned it as quiet quitting; others celebrated it as a much-needed correction to the toxic demands of hustle culture. Either way, it's clear that people aren't feeling as connected and devoted to their jobs as they did when they were seeing their coworkers in person every day.

Collaboration

How do I ensure schedules alignment when the accessibility to anyone across time zones is possible?

It's not uncommon to hear folks – I collaborate during the day and work during the night.

This is a clear sign of the whole task scheduling going totally wrong; Calendars aren’t meant for endless collaboration; How do you complete a task while ensuring you are still available to collaborate?

Recreating the new Workplace

The new workplace paradigm needs a ground up approach. The entire mechanics of an organization needs to be designed to maximize the benefits it can bestow.

A survey, conducted by Wirthlin Worldwide, a global research firm, also indicated that companies have a lot of work to do in the areas of knowledge management, training and collaboration. On average, executives reported that one in five employees did not have access to all the information they needed to do their jobs well, and 35 percent said their employees did not understand the corporate strategy. Additionally, survey participants said that 31 percent of their employees were not able to collaborate effectively across team and organizational boundaries.

Extreme productivity and innovation can happen in the new set up provided the organizations follow these principles in its design of processes and culture.

Principles - Here are my top 5:

Approachable- Everyone is approachable and responsive within reasonable time, Feigning absenteeism or avoidance is discouraged through appropriate checks and balances – (Here engagement tool /AI algorithms can help ….)

Belief- Company policy and communication exude trust and belief.

Collaboration- Extreme Collaboration is encouraged.

Delegation- Fearless delegation- Harness hidden talent and prowess as everyone is accessible only restricted by extreme time differences. People who do not know delegation will continue to push your company into darkness.

Transparency- Total transparency and purposeful communication- Becomes highly critical in a remote workplace set up and is the linchpin for success in this format.

Redrawing the Organization

Organization design is a dying art and there is a visible void to redraw and design Org structures that energizes the new workplace that blends seamlessly with the old or a hybrid format. New work paradigm calls for a completely different set of hierarchy and role definitions.

?A new report from Accenture reveals that while CEOs view the combination of data, technology and people as essential to driving growth, only 5% of large, global organizations are effectively unlocking the value of this combination. Companies that realize this opportunity stand to gain a top-line productivity premium of 11%—the ultimate driver of profitability and revenue growth. This is the huge opportunity to gain the 11% premium provided we redraw the organization, work structures and performance metrics that ensures maximum engagement, energy and output.

The mantra is - Work Decomposition and Analysis – Thorough and rigorous analysis and decomposition of work tasks, task types and calendar scheduling; Each work profile needs to be decomposed and its attributes and outcomes understood to classify and allocate. Don't rely on the HCM solutions, they can only help so much with the new paradigm and are there to make you legally compliant. Beyond that, I think they are losing their luster in the new paradigm.

Employee Engagement

A misunderstood metric – employee engagement score - Companies take solace and publish with pride their scores. Yes, it is possible to compute but the analysis is highly nuanced and derived on the basis of a lot of assumptions. All engagement solution providers flash engagement metrics that their tools impacted positively; May be that’s right but I am highly skeptical.

Engagement happens for a reason and the tool is a medium to facilitate; As mentioned previously, if the motivation and drivers to action are not clear, no tool or solution cannot increase employee engagement.

What are the motivational pillars for an employee in the new paradigm is something that needs to be analyzed?

Here are my thoughts and recommendations:

·?????? Create a healthy and deliberate work tension (Slight overload) to engage employees? Do more with less; People may hate me for this, but I am sure they'll understand the intent here; Some companies are already pursuing this.

·?????? It is highly imperative that unambiguous ownership of work and roles is established that alone can improve efficiency and transparency

• Create groups of say 50 and interact with them on a bi-monthly basis to exchange and hear; Celebrate frequently; Communicate relentlessly.
• Align Virtual Calendar with the new reality.
• Align Compensation Goals and Targets to the new reality- More measurable goals instead of subjective; Say 20% is devoted to Online engagement.
• Local physical locations are now event centers- Monthly events are a must; Participation is compulsory- this is where team building is done, and relationships are built.

Future of Workplace

I will continue to reiterate that this is an unprecedented opportunity that unleashes collaboration. A fluid org structure that cuts geographies and time zones for efficient flow of resources, ideas and learning and helps employees to work smarter and be innovative represents a key competitive advantage for businesses in today's world and will separate the leaders from the laggards.

This trend is here to stay as the format opens up limitless opportunities for organizational agility and employee productivity.

Thanks for your time to read if you reached till this point.

I will be looking forward to comments and encourage folks sharing their story about transformative and innovative changes at their workplace that’s keeping them engaged and productive.

?(Disclaimer - Views expressed here are my own and do not reflect the opinion of my current or previous employer, all references are from public web pages)