Does Work Have a Future?

Organisations and leaders are operating in the largely unchartered waters of the post-pandemic world. A world that is also facing economic, political, environmental and workforce challenges that many of today’s leaders have not yet faced in the context of their roles. The 2023 Future of Work Outlook published by PwC (read it in full here), aims to equip leaders for navigating these challenges by focusing on 8 key areas for 2023.

The report suggests the following 8 trends for 2023:

1. Tightening the purse strings

Rising costs and wage pressures will likely mean organisations are more cautious with their finances. The word of caution here is to not forget about long-term strategy altogether, especially investment in learning and development. It is hard enough to get staff in the door, but we need to keep them once they are in!

• A shifting job landscape

With unemployment rates hitting their lowest levels in decades, the race is on to secure talent with the right skills. A couple of factors impacting this include a decline in immigration over the pandemic years, and an ongoing decline in the number of school leavers choosing to study at university. Having a workforce plan that supports your talent management strategy over the coming years is key.

• A post-mortem for the old office

The feedback from employees is clear: hybrid work is here to stay. Free food and superficial perks are not enough to entice workers back to the office long-term. It is about an environment of collaboration and connection that a person can only get from being in their office with their colleagues.

• The Anti-Work Movement

The AWM is 2023’s answer to the Great Resignation and ‘quiet quitting’. People are continuing to create and enforce boundaries around overwork with poor conditions, in jobs they feel are not purposeful.

• A trust economy

This refers to the struggle of monitoring employee activity while working remotely. For example, using monitoring technology on company computers. The argument in this report is that it does not facilitate an environment of trust and needs to be reconsidered.

• Work-life boundaries

A reminder that businesses now have a legal obligation to manage the risk of psychosocial hazards in the workplace. These include things like job demands and clarity.

• More Lego, less Jenga

A suggestion that rather than continuing to cut things away (which in turn, increases workloads), let’s take the opportunity to review whether our foundations and design are actually still correct. Is our structure and job design optimized for success, or are we still playing Jenga when we should be playing Lego?

• The network effect

The bottom line…we need to rebuild our in-person networks and communication. These formal and informal networks are such important levers for organisations.

One thing common to all these trends is a return to basics. Coming out of a tumultuous period and into another, it is more important than ever to ensure we are doing the basics of business and management well. The key questions at the end of each section in the report were particularly helping from this angle.