Post the turmoil of 2022, while one expected the harrowing experience behind us, 2023 is expected to be even more challenging. With employees returning to offices, the organizations witness a demoralized workforce, cost reduction pressures, and an impending recessionary environment.

Emily Rose McRae, along with a few others, in their article titled ‘9 Trends That Will Shape Work in 2023 and Beyond’ (published in HBR), predicts nine trends, based on Gartner research, that highlight the aspects of work that leaders must prioritize over the next 12 months. We list some of them below:

Employers will quite hire in-demand talent:

According to the article “quiet hire,” the opposite of the concept of “quite quitting” will be embraced by organizations as a way to acquire new skills and capabilities without adding new full-time employees. This will encourage internal talent mobility, provide specific upskilling opportunities, and employ temporary skilled workers for high-priority tasks. 

Managers will find themselves sandwiched between leader and employee expectations.

In our earlier blog, “Gratitude at Workplace,” we did refer to the Managers, who will be tested in terms of team management, struggling to balance employee expectations of purpose, flexibility, and career opportunities with performance pressure from senior leaders. Proactive and timely, the display will help raise themselves.

Healing pandemic trauma will open the path to sustainable performance.

Many organizations had initiated to provide mental support through external counseling to their employees during the Covid period. Emily and the team predict that this initiative may continue and extend well into 2023 to provide emotional support to the employees.

The authors further discuss that organizations will embrace hybrid flexibility for front-line staff, pursue non-traditional candidates, publicize audit data for the use of AI-based hiring and need to address workforce-wide erosion of social skills, among other trends.

In a similar instance, Aaron Terrazas, in his report - Indeed & Glassdoor’s Hiring and Workplace Trends Report 2023, many of the predictions mentioned above also find a place there. They have also touched upon the challenge of deep-seated and long-term supply dynamics continuing to be a significant force that will create a persistent gap between employer demand for new hires and the supply of candidates, forcing employers to embrace the ‘Quiet Hire’ concept.  

They also mention workers seeking higher pay and benefits across all industries, and happiness and well-being matter significantly to the employees. While salary and benefits remain top of mind for employees, creating a positive company culture is critical for employers to distinguish themselves further to be an ‘employer of choice’. The hybrid working and push of DEI (Diverse, Equitable, and Inclusive) to the forefront have also been mentioned in both reports.

Concluding the article, Emily and team say, in today’s environment, for organizations to differentiate and be ‘employers of choice’, they need to succeed at addressing the most critical aspects of work — acquiring and retaining necessary talent, supporting all employees holistically, and confronting how they ethically collect and use employee data. Organizations can position themselves for future success by designing robust future-of-work strategies that get ahead of these trends and address emerging challenges proactively.

The Hiring and Workplace Trends Report 2023, by Indeed and Glassdoor, echoes similar concluding comments - as employers continue to grapple with an aging and more competitive workforce, they must be innovative about where to find workers and how to set themselves apart. The strength of an organization’s employees is directly associated with its business success. Beyond a competitive wage, offering employees top-notch benefits, positive, engaging company culture, and commitment to DEI initiatives will remain incredibly important to help win talent in a competitive and changing labor market.

Thus, it is evident that organizations will have to scale up on multiple counts to survive through 2023 and beyond. This is just the beginning of a slow and long-drawn change in hiring and retaining employees.

References:

I Emily Rose McRa and others, (January 18, 2023) – 9 Trends That Will Shape Work in 2023 and Beyond - ( https://hbr.org/2023/01/9-trends-that-will-shape-work-in-2023-and-beyond 3)

II Aaron Terrazas (November 17, 2022) Workplace Trends 2023 (https://www.glassdoor.com/research/workplace-trends-2023)