I remember meeting someone from the fashion industry who had explained to me the many shades of black that she could differentiate. All through that flight, my co-passenger educated me about the different shades — carbon black, ebony, charcoal black and outer space black, to name a few. The specialist can see the subtle differences while a novice like me would describe all of them as ‘black’. Maybe the same goes for the people agenda.
When a crisis of trust hits the organization, the public relations machinery swings into top gear and tries to tame the media before they go on a rampage. In this mayhem, it is easy to forget that the bruises and dents also affect the employer brand. The most valuable employees of the organization may worry about future prospects and jump ship. Potential candidates may think harder before joining the firm. I was with a food and beverage company during such a controversy. That crisis taught me powerful lessons on how to protect the employer brand during a crisis. Leaders need to address this from two perspectives – the head and the heart.
The world will open up for the new learner who does not depend on being nominated to a corporate training program to beef up their skills. They are curious learners, who learn by trying out ideas. Those will be the most sought after in the job markets of the future.
It helps build humility to say that you need to learn something new and the courage to acknowledge that anyone, even someone junior, could be their teacher. So courage and humility are two great signs of an internally-motivated person.
Every business is now beginning to become a technology and data business. A sector like e-commerce is expected to grow at 50% in the next five years. The online retailers generate terabytes of data every day and need to build data science capabilities that can help them sell better. Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) will continue to have the most opportunities. Women techies should make active plans to build successful careers.
The digital workforce uses technology to buy, sell, rate a product or service and share their ideas with the world. They are opinionated and are unafraid of rating anything from their managers to their increments and HR policies on the net for all to see. They create content for the social media by constantly uploading pictures of their activities, their selfies and whatever is on their mind – everything is just a tap away on the smartphone. No process has a defined beginning and end. Everything is ongoing and continuous and this speed of continuous and open communication leaves the analog colleagues dizzy.
Apple and Samsung trade charges of intellectual property infringement. But you have never heard of anyone stealing the culture of another company. Culture is a proprietary secret that is hard to hide because every employee knows what it is. Yet, even after you know everything about a company's culture, it is impossible to replicate.
With so many millennials entering the workplace, one thing is very clear - their view of a career is very different from what the world has been used to. We will see the rise of people who specialize in helping millennials craft careers. It will be all about speed and agility. Here are my predictions for talent in 2015
Look at the ranking of the top ten companies in the Fortune 500 list. Then compare it with the list over the last few years. You will find that some companies that were among the most successful in the world have either disappeared or withered away. Many have been dislodged from their rankings. So when viewed over time success and failure look different. Celebrating failure is a necessary lesson to be learned. Failure is liberating. Success shackles.
