Every industry has been impacted by the pandemic, it is unprecedented. It has interrupted workplaces around the world, has brought productivity to a halt in many industries. Given the length of this disruption, there will be long-lasting repercussions on the way we work and the only way out appears to be transformation and evolution of technology to support the new way of work space and work ways.
People practice always relied on teams as its backbone with people in clusters or groups handling bundled tasks or aligned to achieve the objectives of an enterprise while working on several different aspects. COVID-19, made a volcanic disruption in the way people worked together and the daunting task of managing people warranted HR to hone new skills and discover novel ways of Tech to step up as the new normal ways of working. Organizations were pushed abruptly to reconsider their technology enablement and press ahead with creative ways of leveraging them. Many organizations did not place importance on HR tech being an essential and integral part of enterprise evolution; the pandemic has given them an ample opportunity and time to contemplate their working ways to realign to the situation.
In a calamitous situation like the Corona pandemic, the HR leaders and management have an extremely important role to perform. Over the last two decades, organisations had begun their journey of adopting tech as a means to operate and had learnt to experience disruptions in the technological advancements in the way companies work and operate. Today, we can see the transformation in HR function from being mere supporting business to that of enabling business. All over the world, across businesses, HR functionaries & their management are using different forms of tools to carry out the HR tasks of remote working. Employers are leaving no stone unturned in being more innovative while engaging employees, and the effort to reduce the impact of coronavirus on the morale of the workforce.
Amidst the challenges coronavirus has posed, it has provided HR functionaries and organisations some fruitful learning for similar times in the future:-
- The pandemic has taught them to focus on people first instead of the economics of the organisation
- To focus on needs of training and helping the employees to work from home smoothly
- A real-time data tracking tool that can measure activity and productivity enabling instant actions or decisions
- Make sure that all the communication lines are kept open and are multi-directional
- Align people to new roles and quickly analyze the roles that are out of date to make the organization flexible and dynamic
For the future of workplaces, the way the companies manage their workforce is going to change drastically. More and more companies are adopting a user-friendly AI-driven approach, as there is an increase in people working remotely, the focus has shifted to being more productive, good health and greater well-being. Work from home being the new normal, with changed work timings and schedules, newer business goals and operational modes are to be expected.
According to LeapPulse survey, the acceleration of digital in the workplace during the COVID-19 pandemic was measured and it explains that over 83% of the respondents said their organization had become more focused on digital during COVID-19 and 87% of respondents say the ongoing digital transformation in their organizations is making things easier and more streamlined for their workforce. Coronavirus advanced people’s work that was previously in movement and was unavoidable and to this, our response is to strengthen the need for the workplace in accordance with the workforce. This clearly demonstrates the needs of the audience and their personality to meet the current and future needs of the workforce.
Conclusion
In the post COVID-19 era, when the ways to operate will be mainly remote working, technology shall remain the backbone, be it for the enterprise or in managing people practice. With technological advancements, a mixture of digital skills coupled with a blend of human expertise are required to improve productivity and efficiency. The key to efficiently shape a path towards the workforce in times like the pandemic and the need to strike the right balance. The true power of HR tech can be unleashed by designing the workforce and the workplace in the ‘NOW’ time. Companies and businesses cannot wait any more for the future or even wait for everyone in the workforce to be on the same side. New opportunities can be created only by adopting technological innovations and understanding the change.
Subramanyam S - Founder, President and CEO of AscentHR is an entrepreneur with experience in Finance, Legal and Business management. He is a corporate lawyer and a fellow member of “The Institute of Company Secretaries of India”.