The concept of “humanity in the workplace” is not entirely new. While there are plenty of leaders that merely view their workforce as numbers and faceless drivers of productivity, there are also many leaders that prioritize the physical and mental wellbeing of their talent. So, what sets aside 2023 as an outlier for focusing on these attributes more so than in months past?
As the COVID-19 pandemic expanded and ultimately disrupted billions of lives, many workers used this time as an opportunity for personal introspection, reevaluating their goals in life and at work (and their career journeys to date). Workers newly entrusted within their organizations also felt empowered to take ownership of their careers. Many discovered renewed passions for social causes, a need for work-life integration, and career journeys that defined their sense of self. Those pursuits began playing out at the end of 2021 — referred to as “The Great Resignation” — and continued throughout most of 2022. The millions of workers who left their jobs during this period sent a message to their employers that a new set of workplace criteria was being considered. Issues like empathy, diversity, equity, inclusion, and other business culture considerations were identified as critical needs of the new-normal enterprise. Suddenly the need for a strategy to develop, communicate, and realize corporate values became an important way to retain current talent and attract new workers.
This sets the stage for 2023 as a critical year for “the human factor,” as businesses now have to contend with managing through economic uncertainty, an increasingly-tightening labor market, and a delicate balance between hanging onto pandemic-era reliance on remote and hybrid workplace models and desiring workers to return to in-person collaboration. Simply put: leading with a human edge might be the only way for enterprises to truly enhance talent retention while improving the ways they get work done in a challenging business environment.
Throughout the past 18 or so months, many business leaders were anxious to call their workforce back to the office out of fear of waning productivity and a loss of visibility and control over their teams. What they discovered, however, was a sense of empowerment that had been missing from the ranks of professionals for far too long; while compensation and benefits will always, always be critical factors in selecting (or staying at) a job, aspects such as flexibility, better working conditions, transparency into career journeys, etc. became top-of-mind and non-negotiable attributes of their roles. While we know this as “The Great Resignation,” this was, in fact, a true “talent revolution” that signaled a new era of work and labor.
Throw all of these concepts into a blender marked “2023” and what we get is a workplace environment that requires so much more than just appreciation and empathy. Leadership in the year ahead does not just need to implement more humanity, it requires it to truly be effective in what would be (yet another) watershed year for the business arena.
While not all industries fear the specter of a recession, there are many workers are shifting their mindsets from “revolution” to “survival,” a sharp turn from the months past when, on average, over four million professionals voluntarily resigned from their positions for a 16-month period. This type of thinking can wreak havoc on already-stressed professionals who are facing burnout and wellness issues, leaving leaders with only one option: infuse humanity into core leaderships strategies in order to develop a stable workplace that is supportive of its talent.
“The human factor” has been oft-discussed since the pandemic began. Many of us faced personal reawakening in the face of mortality and sickness, watching as the world faced a public health crisis unlike anything we had experienced before. People reevaluated their lives and the role of their careers as part of their identities, meaning that there was much more at stake than just “work.” Workers desired purpose, craved flexibility, and wanted an overall sense of alignment between their human personas and workplace characters. This translated into the need for business leaders to be more human in their management approaches.
Which, of course, leads us to a new year and new vision. Upcoming Ardent Partners and Future of Work Exchange research found that nearly 70% of businesses see worker burnout as a core challenge, in addition to another 74% who perceive recession risks as a driver for worker anxiety. This all means that leaders have to strike a balance between managing costs and driving productivity and ensuring that they emotionally support their talent in a more deliberate and meaningful way. Empathy-infused management, flexible workplace options, more appreciation, and enhancing worker wellness and wellbeing (especially mental health) are all critical attributes in this regard.
However, there is one overarching strategy that leaders can adopt to ensure that their workforce is engaged, productive, rested, and stable in 2023: place humanity in the center of all business strategies. By doing so, enterprises will create a workplace environment in which talent feels trusted and valued. In the wake of uncertainty, this is the most powerful approach of all.
