close

General Insights

The Age of Extended Workforce Technology Innovation

General InsightsSolution ProvidersTalent by Christopher J. Dwyer on

Nearly five years ago, the merger between Vendor Management System (VMS) giants Beeline and IQNavigator was a monumental event in the workforce management solutions industry. Two-and-a-half years earlier, software conglomerate SAP purchased Fieldglass for $1B, by far the biggest transaction in the VMS technology arena up until that time. And, just three years ago, business spend management leader Coupa purchased DCR Workforce, with the solution now integrated into the platform’s core offering and known as Coupa Contingent Workforce.

These were watershed moments in the history of workforce management software, with four major VMS players undergoing mass-scale transformations that would forever shape the future of the industry.

Late last week, enterprise software giant Workday announced that it agreed to acquire fast-growing VMS solution VNDLY in a $510M deal. The monetary terms of the soon-to-be-confirmed transaction sent shockwaves throughout the industry; VNDLY’s “vendor-friendly” and API- and integration-flexible software quickly became an enterprise-grade platform in a short period of time (it was founded in 2017), impacting the world of work by presenting both HR and procurement practitioners (as well as Managed Service Providers) with another technological option in a fairly mature software space.

The acquisition of VNDLY certainly seems like a market-shifting event, however, the world of work and talent is markedly different than it was even three years ago. Thus, we need to look at this event from a different lens than the ones we traditionally use to measure the impact of a major market acquisition.

Yes, this is a major score for Workday, no matter how we view the deal today. Workday invests half of what SAP did over seven years ago for the one the industry’s fastest-growing and most flexible VMS platforms. VNDLY’s strengths lie in its advanced cloud infrastructure, incredibly strong provisioning tools, robust SOW management and service procurement modules, truly agile analytics, and real-time workforce visibility. And, its core automation is incredibly configurable and designed to be a flexible VMS platform. The opportunity for Workday is clear: sell their HR clients on the merits of bringing procurement-led vendor management automation into the HR tech fold. A tall task, for sure, considering that one of several visions for the original SAP Fieldglass deal revolved around the synergies with SAP SuccessFactors (many of which have not yet been realized).

However, the workforce solutions industry is different than other business software realms. When SAP bought Fieldglass (remember, for a BILLION dollars), it was market-shifting. There were a handful of leaders in the space that felt the impact immediately. It was the same for the Beeline-IQN merger; it transformed the market heading into 2017 and opened the doors for a new way of looking at vendor management software. Coupa buying DCR was a move that spoke directly to the company’s appetite for addressing a major gap in the procurement technology market.

The VNDLY acquisition, and especially its price-point, are eye-popping. This is amazing news for the workforce management space, especially for a team that grew from startup mode to enterprise technology faster than anyone else. They deserve major kudos and the future is indeed bright for VNDLY and its technology as it arms itself with the power of Workday’s vast global reach (and deep, deep R&D resources). We cannot, however, get too focused on “prisoner of the moment” analysis here; there’s so much more to our industry than a single provider changing hands to the tune of a half-billion dollars.

It is critical to remind ourselves that we are truly living in an age of workforce technology innovation. Utmost is redefining the concept of total talent management and providing near-unrivaled workforce visibility to its clients. PRO Unlimited is actively transforming itself into a forward-thinking, end-to-end platform for all talent and workforce activity. Beeline morphed fundamental pieces of itself by offering extended workforce technology that traverses beyond its powerful VMS platform (and tapping into the reach of its talent technology ecosystem to do so). Platforms such as ELEVATE, Eqip, and Pixid are bringing unique viewpoints to the market.

We also need to look no further than the direct sourcing technology arena for even more instances of workforce management innovation. WorkLLama is one of the most exciting and groundbreaking platforms in the industry. LiveHire’s direct sourcing automation is revolutionizing talent pool strategies. Opptly is bringing a new technological voice to the market based on decades of workforce management expertise.

Companies like Upwork are reconceiving the role of digital staffing by blending a deep talent marketplace with innovative, end-to-end workforce management functionality. The Mom Project’s robust technology and deep talent marketplace position it as a truly unique and inventive solution. Talmix is bringing to market a unique blend of talent marketplace and direct sourcing functionality. Platforms like Prosperix are bringing a Future of Work dynamic into the workforce solutions fold.

To dig even further into what others in the space are doing, let’s revisit PRO Unlimited’s past 12 months of activity: the company bought leading rate management solution PeopleTicker, expanded its European MSP reach with the acquisition of Brainnet Group, entered into the industry’s first partnership with the unique Eightfold AI, bought fellow market-leading MSP/VMS hybrid Workforce Logiq, and then, most recently, acquired the dynamic direct sourcing platform WillHire.

Simply put: the workforce solutions arena is in a much different place than it was several years ago. Innovation is rampant today, and, the greater workforce technology ecosystem (VMS, EWS, direct sourcing, digital staffing, talent marketplaces, etc.) are collectively reimagining how businesses 1) drive efficiencies around the engagement and management of the extended workforce, 2) derive workforce scalability through dynamic engagement automation, 3) augment the inherent flexibility of extended talent, and, most critically, 4) aid how businesses get work done.

On the Thursday afternoon edition of Mad Money (with Jim Cramer), Workday’s Chief Strategy Officer, Pete Schlampp, stated that the focus on the VNDLY acquisition was “attaching to this trend in the pandemic; workers want more flexibility and companies want to have more control over their extended workforce.” He added that businesses want “to be able to flex and expand quickly” and the VNDLY acquisition will allow Workday users to execute total workforce optimization.

Schlampp is correct in the sense that businesses want more scalability and that workers want more flexibility, however, linking these major workforce attributes solely with the COVID-19 pandemic is absolutely selling short the continued growth, evolution, and impact of the extended workforce over the past several years, as well as the vast amount of innovation that has been developed and offered by a wide variety of platforms for the years before the public health crisis hit. Consider that:

  • Ardent Partners and Future of Work Exchange research pegged the penetration of the extended workforce at 43% of all business talent…before the COVID-19 pandemic. Today, that statistic has grown to 47% and will soon hit 50%.
  • Our research found that, prior to March 2020, 21% of the average company’s workforce was working remotely or in a hybrid model (with that number expected to double by the end of 2021, according to those same businesses).
  • “Workforce agility” was the main focus of workforce and talent management for consecutive years in Ardent and FOWX research dating back to 2017 through our most recent research study (summer 2021), and;
  • “Total workforce management” and “total talent management” have, for the past decade and long before the pandemic, been major goals for businesses that want to blend contingent workforce management with human capital management and truly optimize how talent is found, engaged, sourced, and managed. As we learned with SAP Fieldglass and SAP SuccessFactors, just simply owning two distinct pieces of that total talent management puzzle does not equate to a easy “switch” that can be turned on for businesses that want to manage all enterprise talent under a single solution.

The ultimate point is this: today, it’s not just about managing suppliers and vendors and merely augmenting a contingent workforce management agenda on the world of talent, but rather looking at how to manage the workforce effectively in optimizing how work is done. Several years ago, a VNDLY acquisition by Workday would be the biggest transformative shift across the workforce management technology landscape. Today, it represents one of many innovative approaches to getting work done.

read more

FOWX Notes: November 19 Edition.

General Insights by Christopher J. Dwyer on

Some picked-up pieces from around the world of talent and work:

  • Big news out of the workforce management solutions arena yesterday afternoon, as Workday announced that it had agreed to acquire VMS provider VNDLY for $510 million. There are several implications of this deal (which is expected to close in early 2022), including the “total talent management” factor (HRIS functionality plus VMS technology), VNDLY adding an HR edge to its core range of contingent workforce-led offerings, and how it enhances VNDLY’s integration- and API-friendly platform. (Additional coverage of this deal will be featured on the Future of Work Exchange next week.)
  • Elevated Resources’ flagship VMS product, ELEVATE, recently announced its Customer and Supplier Automation Platform, a staffing platform as a service (SPaaS) that is aimed to enhance candidate sourcing and engagement management for the staffing supplier industry. “Customers are demanding more intuitive automation as they look towards the Future of Work and how they interact with staffing firms. ELEVATE is providing its staffing suppliers with a delivery platform for their customers that do not already have a VMS in place. With this enhanced platform, staffing providers can manage the entire fulfillment lifecycle,” said Rob Morris, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder at ELEVATE.
  • Twenty months into the pandemic and there are still major discussions of in-person vs. remote work. However, now that (most of) the dust has settled on what works and what doesn’t work in the hybrid work environment, there’s an overlooked discussion at hand that could play a significant role in the continue volatility: geo-differentiated vs geo-neutral compensation. In short, companies that allow their staff to work remotely could alter salaries based on where their talent lives (Facebook was one of the first major enterprises to float this idea back in 2020). A London-based tech startup may not want to pay London-based rates for a worker that lives across the world in Iowa, however, what some executives fail to realize is that this mode of thinking is a literal backpedal to the candidate experience. Companies that are feeling the burn of the so-called “Great Resignation” need to eliminate this idea…immediately.
  • The four-week rolling average of unemployment claims has been hovering around 272,000, which would be a pandemic-era low. This is yet another encouraging sign that the labor market, in theory, has technically “recovered.” However, with millions more job openings and hundreds of thousands of workers quitting/resigning monthly, the ground gained just doesn’t feel as welcoming as it should.
  • Dr. Ashish Jha, Dean of Brown University’s School of Public Health, writes in The Atlantic about why vaccine boosters will be required for all adults moving forward. “[Boosting adults] in the United States makes sense as a matter of both minimizing risks to individuals and protecting the health of the population as a whole,” he writes. This also makes sense from the business standpoint, as well; last winter’s COVID surge was horrific, with nearly 250,000 daily cases, thousands of death each day, and unimaginable disruption. If businesses want to keep whatever momentum they have right now flowing into the colder, darker months of winter, it would behoove them to encourage fully-vaccinated workers to consider a booster dose. The one tool that we did not have last winter that we do now will be the strongest weapon to ensure businesses weather the next coronavirus surge.
read more

FOWX Notes: November 5 Edition.

General Insights by Christopher J. Dwyer on

Some picked-up pieces from across the exciting world of talent and work:

  • Yesterday morning, the Biden administration announced more details regarding sweeping vaccine mandates for businesses with over 100 employees. In short, employees that are not fully-vaccinated by January 4 will have to produce a verified negative test on a weekly basis and wear masks in the workplace beginning December 5. Positive cases must be removed from the workforce. Fines are hefty: approximately $13,653 for a single violation, and nearly ten-times that amount ($136,532) for businesses that “willfully violate standards.” There is no clarity on the burden of testing costs, however, it is noted that some unions may negotiate employer-paid testing.
  • Employers must provide paid time off for employees to receive vaccines and for any potential side effects. This is an encouraging rule, as there are many, many workers across the country that were vaccine-hesitant only because of the inability to take paid time off. This opens up, potentially, the opportunity for millions of people to comfortably schedule vaccine appointments and not be forced to worry about an unpaid day off.
  • Great quote on the future of hybrid work by Zoom CMO Janine Pelosi during an interview with Digiday: “That word is getting thrown around a lot, but it goes back to the consumer having choice in when or where they spend their time physically or virtually. It’s taking breaks. It’s understanding, at this point in the pandemic, what I do with my time. If I’m going to have a really early start and I know I’ve got some later things, you can bet I’m going to workout in the middle of the afternoon and I’m not going to have a stitch of guilt about it. It’s taking time to go for a walk, have meetings over Zoom phone. I don’t feel that everything always has to be on video. I prefer video, because you miss those connections and it definitely helps to bring those together. But it’s thinking about your day a little bit differently than what you would have if you had been in an office, physical environment.”
  • Congratulations are in order for Talmix, who recently celebrated their five-year anniversary. The solution provider, one the market’s leading digital staffing marketplaces, were recently featured here on the Future of Work Exchange. Check out some highlights from their five years in a blog post by Talmix CEO Sandeep Dhillon.
  • Many businesses often forget that independent contractors and freelance professionals are attempting to get their own businesses off the ground. HoneyBook’s $250 million in Series E funding will go a long way towards contributing to the platform’s main objectives, such as enabling these workers with automation for workflows, client list management, and, most critically, payment and cash flow management.
  • Fiverr continues its reach deeper into the B2B realm by acquiring Tel Aviv-based Stoke Talent, a Freelancer Management System (FMS) that specializes in providing users with both online and “offline” freelancer management benches. The $95M transaction will allow Stoke Talent to operate independently while subsequently supporting (and vice versa) Fiverr’s new products and services regarding agile talent.
  • I’ll be presenting (virtually) on Day Two of the Checkr Forward conference next week. “Are You Missing Half of the U.S. Workforce?” will feature commentary from both Scott Jennings (Checkr’s Director of Industry Strategy & Market Development) and me, as well as some new Ardent Partners and Future of Work Exchange research on the evolution of the agile/extended workforce. Do check it out!
read more

Talent, Technology, and Transformation are the Future of Work (Upcoming Webinar)

Contingent WorkforceGeneral Insights by Christopher J. Dwyer on

For the past several years, the simplest way I could define the Future of Work was the optimization of work via talent, technology, and transformative thinking. While the Future of Work has evolved mightily given specific accelerants and the advent of innovative new tools and strategies, the foundation is the same. This year’s Future of Work Exchange Report for 2021 (formerly titled The State of Contingent Workforce Management) found that:

  • The pandemic’s main effects on enterprise talent were squarely focused on a series of interconnected attributes related to the workforce, especially in regard to the type of worker required to meet fast-changing needs and requirements of the business and the means in which to manage it effectively.
  • Traditional workforce management required new approaches to assure ongoing operations, given the mighty (125%!) increase in the utilization of remote and hybrid work models.
  • Going into 2020, 43.5% of the average organization’s total workforce was considered “contingent.” In 2021, that number sits at 47% and there are strong indications that this percentage will grow as the transformation of talent and work continues forward.
  • 82% of businesses stated in our study that the agile workforce enabled flexibility and scalability at a time when it was most needed. As markets recovered, enterprises had the ability (via talent marketplaces, talent pools and communities, as well as traditional staffing suppliers, etc.) to ramp up hiring to meet growing demand.
  • The impact of workplace culture evolution in 2021 means that more workers, having experienced more individual control and responsibility over their work days, would like to retain some level of control over when and how they get work done – from the hours that they work to how they physically address their workspaces. As businesses push deeper into the realm of digital transformation, the remote work-specific facets of worker and workplace flexibility are not only better-enabled (via enhanced collaboration tools and unified communications), but more realistic pieces of the Future of Work movement, and, most importantly, a central asset to overall work optimization, and;
  • The enterprise’s renewed focus on its human capital and overall depth of skillsets across the greater organization (as 62% of organizations are prioritizing in 2021 and beyond, according to FOWX research) means that businesses require the necessary tools, solutions, and strategies for engaging, managing, and driving value from their extended workforce.

I’m excited to join Beeline’s Judy Bumgarner (their Director of Product Strategy) on an exclusive webcast TOMORROW at 11am ET to discuss the new research, the above bullets, and, of course, the Future of Work today and into 2022. Click here or on the below image to register.

read more

FOWX Notes: October 8 Edition

General Insights by Christopher J. Dwyer on

Some picked-up pieces from across the industry, which we call “FOWX Notes,” for the week ending October 8:

  • The Mom Project raised $80M in Series C funding, the provider announced this week. This is not only a huge win for the digital staffing industry (which is garnering the attention it deserves as an innovative series of platforms and marketplaces that can revolutionize how talent is engaged), but also for the millions of U.S. working mothers that had to leave the workforce in 2020. Look for extended coverage of this exciting news next week on FOWX.
  • HR has so much to manage these days, including many of the Future of Work attributes that are guiding workforce management today. I’m excited to join Utmost for an exclusive webcast on October 28, Five Things Every HR Executive Should Include in 2022 Planning, that will help HR and talent acquisition executives enhance their 2022 planning while keeping in mind the transformative shifts that the Future of Work is bringing to this evolving function.
  • Beeline’s partnership with iValua is a signal that spend management and procurement-led functionality is still critical within the world of contingent workforce management. Although “cost savings” as both a metric and a focus item aren’t as high on the priority list as they were years ago due to the talent-led shifts in CWM, they are still critically important via supplier optimization as it relates to non-employee workforce spend management. This integration will enable a single channel for automated data control, talent spend intelligence, invoicing, and payment.
  • “Trust” will become a key Future of Work element in 2022 from various workforce management angles. Trust was one of the early non-tech Future of Work attributes that came to attention when businesses were forced to enact on-the-fly remote work policies and business leaders were concerned about worker productivity. However, trust slices so much deeper than whether or not a manager trusts its staff to stay in-tune with its laptop screen for eight hours; trust is now a factor in how businesses view their candidate pipeline and talent pools. In the Future of Work Exchange’s upcoming Direct Sourcing 2.0 research study, we write that part of an advanced talent acquisition strategy, especially within the confines of a direct sourcing program, must include next-level skills validation, expertise assessments, and talent proctoring.
  • Interesting to see the unique partnership between TAPFIN and Qwil earlier this week, which represents a supply chain finance-like experience for suppliers within the TAPFIN MSP’s network to gain early access to funds. It’s always exciting when an innovative arena in another industry realm (such as “ePayables,” which Ardent Partners uses as a catch-all term to describe invoice and payment automation) converges with the world of workforce management technology and solutions. This partnership should be the first of several to follow, as more and more suppliers lean into various financing options to continue to grow and thrive their businesses.
  • Do falling U.S. COVID caseloads in conjunction with soon-to-be-vaccinated youngsters mean that return-to-office plans could shift closer? There’s been much discussion (and something covered frequently in The New York Times) regarding the “two-month cycle” of COVID surges; with the U.S. on the tail-end of the Delta variant’s mid-summer push (now that we are in autumn) could that translate into business leaders feeling safer to inch up return-to-office plans? With 5-to-11-year-olds in line to inoculated as early as the first week of November, will that also contribute to a change in thinking? If working parents that are currently battling with daycare and remote learning struggles in COVID hotspots have additional peace of mind if their children are vaccinated, it could mean a shift in how some professionals structure their short-term career paths now that more safety is baked into the world around them.
read more

FOWX Notes: September 24 Edition

General Insights by Christopher J. Dwyer on

Some picked-up pieces from across the industry, which we call “FOWX Notes,” for the week ending September 24:

  • The business implications of the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate, whilst expected to be effective in boosting lagging inoculation numbers across the United States, are already (as to be expected) creating plenty of questions for executives and enterprise leaders. Who’s on the hook for COVID testing? Will businesses offer more PTO for vaccine appointments and potential side effects in the days after injection? What are the OSHA implications of non-compliance in enterprises? How do businesses manage competing vaccine exemptions (i.e., multiple workers in the same unit)? There are so many potential issues here that are about to slip to the surface and it will be interesting to see how both businesses and states handle the weeks ahead, especially as more and more businesses begin to include vaccination status in job requests and job descriptions.
  • The Gig Workers Collective has asked customers to delete the Instacart app from their devices in what could be the first of many similar moves for gig workers’ rights. The collective, representing a group of nearly 13,000 Instacart shoppers, is fighting for equitable treatment and compensation for Instacart workers. Nearly half a million contractors work for Instacart, a figure that is 2.5 times bigger than it was before the pandemic (and before on-demand food and grocery delivery became a necessity in the era of social distancing, lockdowns, and quarantines). Batch order payments and default tipping percentages are two of many demands from the collective, which had also pushed for better working conditions during the beginning of the pandemic (especially concerning PPE and paid time off). The group is also asking for occupational death benefits given the risks of working during a pandemic. As Instacart flirts with the idea of going public, groups like the GWC will fight even harder for equity, protection, and better compensation (and benefits) in the months ahead.
  • “Worker burnout is not a mental illness” is a phrase that needs to be eliminated. Nearly every industry now faces worker burnout and fatigue, even without a pandemic backdrop. What the past 18 months have done, however, is transformed businesses in such a way that some sectors (healthcare, veterinary medicine, shift-based work in light industrial and manufacturing) experience workers clocking 50-hour (or longer!) work-weeks, with professionals in remote environments having trouble balancing an “always on” mentality with a laptop frequently within vicinity of wherever they are within their homes. Business leaders are not therapists, nor should they be the ones to diagnose mental health issues. However, worker burnout has become so prevalent that it’s time we reassess its validity as a true mental health issue and how exactly managers and other enterprise leaders can give their workers they support they need.
  • Nearly 80% of businesses plan to transform their workplaces into more attractive destinations for candidates over the next year. New Future of Work Exchange research finds that the vast majority of enterprises are laser-focused on turning their offices into more alluring places to work. Given the personal, professional, and societal changes happening in the greater market, as well as the ongoing “Great Resignation” that started in the spring, businesses face a more expansive war for talent than they ever have before. While there is no cure-all to this transformation, enterprise leaders only have to truly listen to what candidates want to begin this process: flexible working environments, inclusive workplace cultures, clarity on career paths, opportunities to hone key skills, etc.
read more

Key Providers for 2021: RightSourcing

Contingent WorkforceGeneral InsightsSolution Providers by Christopher J. Dwyer on

The Background:

The healthcare industry often operates very differently from other key verticals, independent of major global trends and the challenges that plague the average business. The COVID-19 pandemic hit this sector the hardest in terms of staff shortages, worker burnout, safety and health concerns, etc. Future of Work Exchange research finds that while 90% of businesses believe that a semblance of “business normalcy” will be within reach sometime in early 2022, executives within the healthcare industry are not as convinced: 98% of healthcare businesses believe that normality is, at the earliest, two years away.

The extended workforce has long been a high-impact, high-value generator of true business agility. However, prior to 2020, the healthcare industry lagged behind their peers in regards to utilizing this type of labor to its maximum value, perhaps owed to insufficient supply channels, internal barriers due to archaic thinking, and the complexities in finding the right skillsets and expertise. The past eighteen months have brought about a change in thinking, largely due to the pressure put on healthcare facilities to shift talent to different locations, bring in on-demand talent when staffing shortages arise, and better plan for a quickly-evolving pandemic that continues to strain resources. FOWX research indicates that 98% of enterprises in this industry believe their non-employee workforce will be critical in the months and years ahead.

Enter RightSourcing.

Why They Were Selected:

RightSourcing, the healthcare-focused MSP arm of PRO Unlimited, has long been a dominant player in this industry due to its unique blend of managed services augmented with the power of the Wand VMS platform. RightSourcing may operate as a “specialty provider” in regard to its healthcare focus, however, the solution reflects the innovative approaches of its parent company in how it provides a wide range of services to its customers, including SOW management and services procurement, direct sourcing, and payrolling.

In addition to these offerings, RightSourcing also leverages a robust advantage through its data-driven analytics and market rate intelligence capabilities, two differentiators that are tailored for a complex and evolving healthcare workforce.

In Their Own Words:

RightSourcing provides a single, integrated platform of high-touch services and innovative technology solutions to help healthcare and higher education organizations increase cost savings, improve talent quality, mitigate risk and drive effectiveness within their contingent workforce program.

We are NOT a staffing company. We are not owned by, or affiliated with, a staffing company. We are PURELY vendor-neutral, which ensures true goal alignment with our clients. This vendor-neutral MSP approach leverages a nationwide network of clinical, IT, and business/professional staffing partners to provide the broadest access to talent at competitive market rates.

We provide clients with accurate, up-to-date labor market rate guidance. Historically, a lack of market labor rate intelligence has prevented healthcare organizations and higher ed from fully optimizing their hiring decisions. This results in significant unnecessary spend by paying higher market rates by role and/or location.

Bundling RightSourcing’s MSP experience with our industry-leading Wand VMS technology and actionable analytics makes RightSourcing fully accountable for the entire scope of an organization’s non-employee workforce. An integrated workforce management platform is more cost-effective, more agile, and maximizes efficiency to ensure the success of the program.

The Outlook:

The majority of healthcare staffing and healthcare HR/talent acquisition executives plan to invest more time, resources, and energy into optimizing the impact of the extended workforce, including tapping into direct sourcing (and talent pool), alternative talent channels, and talent marketplaces. With the continued weight of the pandemic forcing staffing shortages and worker burnout, healthcare enterprises must drive true workforce agility through today’s evolving contingent workforce.

RightSourcing is well-positioned as a powerful MSP that can blend progressive service offerings, a nimble VMS platform, and forward-looking, data-fueled solutions to transform the way the healthcare industry finds, engages, and manages its contingent workforce.

read more

FOWX Notes: September 10 Edition

Business LeadershipGeneral InsightsTalent by Christopher J. Dwyer on

Some picked-up pieces from across the industry, which we call “FOWX Notes,” for the week ending September 10:

  • The Biden Administration yesterday announced its most sweeping vaccine mandate measures thus far in the pandemic, requiring all all federal workers and contractors to be vaccinated (with limited exceptions in specific cases). Furthermore, all private businesses with 100 or more employees must require vaccinations or weekly tests for its workforce. These measures will affect nearly 100 million Americans and is seemingly a result of a rightfully frustrated government that wants to control the wild and raging Delta variant. Expect lawsuits galore over the coming weeks, as well as push-backs from unions and similar labor groups.
  • The truth is that the Biden Administration was left with no choice; while the Delta variant has caused some vaccinated people to spread the virus, this is still a pandemic driven by the unvaccinated. For a vaccine campaign that is considered the most important and biggest in world history, only 54% of the American population is fully-inoculated. A mandate such as the one announced yesterday will hopefully get the United States to a safer place going into 2022.
  • There needs to be more discussion and focus on non-medical leave for working parents, especially “bonding leave.” Child bonding leave is a separate entity from maternity or paternity leave; for example, in Massachusetts (where FOWX headquarters is located), parents may “take up to 12 weeks of family leave to bond with a child,” which must be taken within the first year of a child’s birth. Currently, only eleven states in America currently offer this type of leave.
  • “Massachusetts’ paid bonding leave is late to the dinner party but a welcome guest. As an HR professional, I have seen too many low- and middle-income employees struggle and in despair to learn they didn’t have disability pay benefits at all, or only had enough for a maternity leave of six weeks postpartum. This was even more heartbreaking of a reality to me when I took my own maternity leave and couldn’t imagine having to bring my new baby to daycare at 6 or 7 weeks old,” says Caitlin Klezmer, Senior HR Business Partner at JLL. “I was fortunate enough to have paid leave far in excess of those previously mentioned. As a working mother who recently returned to work from her bonding leave, I encourage anyone who may think they are eligible to look into these benefits – birthing and non-birthing parents alike. I reserved my bonding leave for the end of my child’s first year, taking it for the last two months before he turned one. The opportunity to temporarily pause my focus on my career unburdened some of my mental load that was becoming overwhelming. This leave allowed me the guilt-free space to focus on my family, including my relationship with myself, my spouse, and my children, while also allowing me to recharge for my return to work.”
  • U.S. jobless claims hit an 18-month low, according to Reuters; this is the lowest weekly figure since March 14, 2020, which, for those keeping track, is the lowest during the pandemic. This may signal optimism that the labor market will continue to grow even in light of a summer surge of coronavirus infections. There are some expectations that the conclusion of federally-expanded unemployment benefits, plus a 2021-2022 school year that is focused on in-person learning, could spark additional growth in the immediate weeks ahead. All of this, however, underscores the fact that the “Great Resignation” is still very much a stark reality that hangs over any labor market news. There are still millions of unfilled jobs/roles, with a standoff between employers and potential candidates (many of which are demanding more flexibility and better benefits). Engagement is going to continue being a critical issue in the months ahead as both businesses and workers haggle over aspects like remote work, work/life balance, and other non-compensatory aspects. (The Future of Work Exchange will feature an exclusive piece on labor market disengagement in the coming weeks, so stay tuned!)
read more

An Uncertain Start to the School Year Means Uncertainty for Business, Too

Business LeadershipGeneral InsightsTalent by Christopher J. Dwyer on

This week, both of my children began their 2021-2022 school years. My daughter (eight, heading into third grade) and son (five, heading into kindergarten) waddled onto the bus with masks on their faces and and anticipation in their hearts. For both of them, and this is something that surprised me as a parent, wearing a mask is commonplace: at the grocery store, at Target, at indoor activities, and, of course, at school. For children that are similar in age to mine, there’s a constant worry that nags at both of my wife and I’s minds, and that’s that both cannot receive any of the three available COVID vaccines.

For the millions of children under the age of 12, the first few months (at the very least) are going to have to leverage the same non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) used during in-person learning last year, including masks, social distancing, better ventilation, altered activities, etc. Once one of the major vaccines (most likely Pfizer’s or Moderna’s) is approved for children under 12, the game changes tremendously. But for now, we’re experiencing increased anxiety as working parents.

This uncertain start to the school year translates into uncertainty for businesses, too (something I talked about during a recent (Contingent Workforce Weekly podcast episode). If we take a quick trip back to a year ago, many of us remember the first day of school as the first day of “remote school,” in which we, as working parents, would simultaneously pop open two laptops and start the day. We would shuffle around conference calls and video meetings, frequently checking in on our children to ensure that they had the proper modules up on their screens. No doubt that this had a tremendous affect on productivity, consistently, and morale within our roles at our respective enterprises.

A year later, none of us want to go through that experience again. However, the reality is clear: the vast majority of school-age children are not yet qualified to receive a vaccine, meaning that those aforementioned NPIs are all we have to combat infection in the classroom (although vaccinated teachers are certainly helping the cause, it still is only one vaccinated person in a room filled with upwards of 12 or more bodies). And again, as discussed on the Contingent Workforce Weekly podcast, there are major ramifications if things get out of hand and we are forced to contend with a hybrid schooling model.

Behind the uncertainty for the new school year is also a ripple effect due to the Delta variant’s rampage. After-school programs, activity centers, and daycare facilities are all dealing with their own staffing shortages and workforce issues. This extreme gap in both daycare and aftercare has a direct influence on whether or not working parents who cannot perform remotely wade back into the labor pool. Although 70% (or more) of the jobs lost during the pandemic have been restored, those difficult-to-fill positions may remain that way for some time as high-contact roles (restaurants, hospitality, retail, etc.) fall out of favor due to the increasing impact of the Delta variant.

Business leaders must approach the coming weeks (and months) with a balance of empathy, flexibility, and strategic planning in order to thrive this wave of the pandemic:

  • As always, lead with empathy first. Empathy, as stated here on the Future of Work Exchange, is the only way forward. Personal and business lives have converged in such a way that the world around us has forever transformed the human elements of our persona. Emotions are apparent at work, and work bleeds into our home lives. Working parents have a level of anxiety over unvaccinated children heading back to in-person learning. The upcoming school year is a perfect time for leaders to approach with empathy, understand where their workers are coming from, and develop a positive experience that doesn’t add to the already-rampant concerns. The talent experience is still paramount, no matter if workers are at home or in the office. Leaders can alleviate a great deal of stress by being empathetic (even more so) during the next several weeks.
  • The flexible workplace is the ideal workplace. Businesses should be used to this by now. During the more optimistic spring months, execs were tinkering with reopening plans amidst a wash of vaccination campaigns and superior weather. Although many of those return-to-office plans have been put on pause, the typical business should have no problem operating in a virtual, digital, or hybrid environment. There are challenges with remote working and hybrid models, for sure, but a few more months can be a major asset in both seeing how a return-to-school looks for working parents and a possible decline in Delta-driven COVID cases.
  • Communication is key with worried working parents. Leaders should be proactive in how they communicate with their workforce, especially during these next several weeks. Working parents, as mentioned, are already nervous enough about the health and safety of their children…they shouldn’t have the stress of what will happen at work on top of that. Managers and leaders must facilitate conversation now about what processes are in place in the event that the work day is disrupted due to child quarantines or a lack of daycare, and stick to a plan that can be executed in an agile manner. Can workloads be balanced? Should projects have additional team members that can “tag in” if someone needs a few hours to attend to their children?
  • Experiment with new and innovative work models. If full return-to-office plans have been put on hold, now is the ideal time to experiment with new work models. “Task context” is a critical piece of this strategy, and if more time in remote settings has no negative ramifications on projects and initiatives, then leaders know that a quick shift to fully-remote can support business goals. If the opposite is true, leaders should begin strategizing around how to get work done in a challenging environment; should specific team members be in the office while others are at home? Who requires access to in-office resources, as well? The months ahead are mired in uncertainty, however, enterprises can utilize this time to continue evaluating which work models are right for the organization in the long run.

In addition to the above elements, there is another notion at hand: the range of enterprise skillsets and how they can be shifted within a digital environment. Many businesses have poor visibility into their available skillsets and expertise, including both full-time workers and non-employee talent. Understanding where and how these skills are deployed company-wide can be a crucial advantage in developing new work models. Businesses that operate on a digital scale can easily push skills to where they are needed, and, as an uncertain fall looms (due to both the return-to-school and Delta variables), this dynamic approach can alleviate some of the productivity gaps that may arise if working parents experience disruption.

No matter what the next several weeks brings to the world of talent and work, business executives can act now to ensure that empathy, flexibility, communication, and innovation are at the forefront in how they lead their organizations to success during uncertain times.

read more

FOWX Notes: August 27 Edition

Business LeadershipGeneral Insights by Christopher J. Dwyer on

From time-to-time, the Future of Work Exchange will feature various thoughts and commentary on the evolving world of talent and work. One of Boston’s greatest sportswriters, Dan Shaughnessy, publishes a collection of various commentary on New England sports in The Boston Globe and calls it “picked-up pieces.” So, here are some picked-up pieces from across the industry, which we call “FOWX Notes,” on the Future of Work Exchange for the week ending August 27:

  • Now that the FDA has given full approval to the Pfizer vaccine (with Moderna’s vaccine expected to follow suit shortly), it gives more businesses the necessary leverage to mandate vaccines for its staff and workforce. With cases and hospitalizations soaring across the country, many businesses will err on the side of health and safety and begin to mandate that their employees (and contingent workers) be inoculated for in-person work. I fully expect an incredible amount of conversation about this topic in the months ahead as those that choose not to be vaccinated have to grapple with their beliefs versus their jobs.
  • There’s a question here that we’re missing, though, that may arise beginning in September: will boosters be mandated for those workers that are eight months past the date of their second Pfizer or Moderna jab (or their one-dose J&J vaccine)? A casual scroll through a personal Facebook feed tells us that there are some individuals that were open to being vaccinated months ago but will draw a hard line at a booster dose. Something to watch, indeed.
  • Worker wellness, well-being, and burnout are all very real and very counterproductive issues that are plaguing the business world today. The time has come for business leaders to truly prioritize worker wellness and mental health if they are also prioritizing productivity and better business outcomes, since the two sides cannot converge. With a return to school for working parents, it remains to be seen what types of disruption the Delta variant will unleash. This could add another stressful load to the remote workforce if there’s any type of return to the models that schools had to employ for the 2020-2021 year. Mental health is more important than ever, and businesses must be conscious of their wellness plans well into the latter months of the year (with empathy continuing to be at the forefront of core management approaches).
  • One thing that many businesses miss regarding the remote and hybrid work models is how they play into talent acquisition and talent engagement strategies. Remote work isn’t just a Future of Work transformation for the existing workforce, but also a valuable tool in how companies attract new, future talent. The days of early pandemic levels of unemployment are long gone (knock on wood) and “The Great Resignation” that has been ongoing since the spring is resulting into the re-emergence of the long-vaunted “war for talent.” Businesses that are beginning to think about return-to-office plans must keep in mind that, in a world where there if fierce competition for talent, they must offer more than compensatory perks if they are going to attract top-tier workers. Remote options are alluring to today’s highly-skilled workforce, and, many talent acquisition execs will quickly realize that the remote/hybrid models also enable access to new candidates that may not have been historically considered for roles based on their location.
  • Proposition 22 was the most expensive ballot measure in California’s history ($220 million, by some estimates) and was recently ruled unconstitutional by Alameda County Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch. Gig tech apps like Uber, Lyft, and others bankrolled the ballot measure, but the rebuke was a decision based on the fact that Prop 22 does not allow “gig workers” to collectively bargain or unionize (hence the “unconstitutional” ruling). Although nearly 60% of voters passed Prop 22 back in November during the general election (which is essentially an exemption to AB5, which was passed in 2019 as a measure to determine a worker’s status as an independent contractor or an employee), the ruling thrusts the measure back through the California court system, where it could take up to a year to reach the state’s Supreme Court. Within its ruling, the court stated that Prop 22 was more about the proponents’ economic interests as well as having a “divided, un-unionized workforce.” Uber, Lyft, and DoorDash are fuming and vowing to appeal, which will provide more fodder for discussion as Prop 22’s now-unconstitutional status slithers through the California court system well into 2022.
  • The upcoming Future of Work Exchange Report for 2021 (an Ardent Partners and FOWX research study) finds that the top Future of Work accelerant due to the pandemic was the increase in remote/hybrid work and distributed teams (noted by 72% of businesses), which is not surprising given the environment in which we now live and work. What was interesting and of note is that 70% of organizations that participated in our study also noted that greater digital transformation efforts were accelerated over the past year. Businesses learned very quickly that a flexible technological architecture was a necessity during evolving times, and even greater so as the global market faced incredible challenges. Whether it’s the automation of manual- and paper-based tasks (which became harder to execute in a remote environment), a deeper data-driven approach to core business functions, or a future-ready organization that is equipped to be more agile and dynamic in how it responds to the challenges of tomorrow, becoming a “digital enterprise” should be a top priority for today’s organizational leaders.
read more
1 … 10 11 12 13
Page 12 of 13