Delivering the most effective operating model for public service organisations remains a complex challenge. This season will take a look as some innovative models and delve into the workforce impacts and the role HR & OD professionals play.
6. •
•• Financial, economic and political uncertainty
• Labour shortages
• Less traditional employment structures
• Quality and availability of workforce talent
• Digital and artificial Intelligence
• Increasing and ageing population
• Devolution of the Combined Authority
KEYREASONSFORTHECHANGINGWORLDOFWORK
9. •
PEOPLE
•
Over 600,000 residents
with a degree level
qualification
We are working to build our skills base and reform our education
system ensuring our businesses have the talent, skills and labour they
need and our young people are life and work ready
Home to five leading Higher
Education Institutes and over
100,000 students
Greater Manchester has a strong and diverse skills and
employment system
10. INVESTMENT IN SKILLS
•
£200 million investment in further education facilities
Vital to create a further education and training system
that meets the needs of employers
12. •
Investment in infrastructure
•
•
Making bus travel easier and more affordable
1 million more people
brought within 90 minutes of Manchester by Northern
Powerhouse Rail
Linking people to jobs
40 million passengers travel on the UK’s largest light
rail system each year
15. •
•
•
•
New ways of working
•
15
HR Transactional & payroll
services to over 20,000
employees / volunteers
Joint Venture Contracts i.e. to
deliver environmental &
infrastructure services
CCG Integration
16. •
•
WORKFORCE
16
Apprenticeships
Graduate Schemes
Targeting long-term unemployed
Work placements
Use of experts/specialists as required
Digital Officers
Staff retention and development
Health and well-being activities
New recruitment processes
Review of polices and procedures
Appraisal processes
17. •
•
summary
•
17
Understand the opportunities in the wider
environment
Collaborate and develop partnerships
Be creative and innovative
Know your workforce, skills and talents
Understand key challenges
Be a visionary!
22. Labour Shortage
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
1974 1984 1994 2004 2014 2024 2034 2039
Working-Age Population % % Population Over 65
Source: Office for National Statistics
0
500000
1000000
1500000
2000000
2500000
3000000
3500000
23. Labour Shortage
France -1%
UK -1%
Germany -23%
Italy -4%
Spain -3%
Russia -24%
Europe
Brazil -33%
Canada -11%
Mexico -8%
USA 4%
Americas
Japan -2%
Korea -24%
Indonesia 0%
India 1%
China -3%
Asia-Pacific
Source: Boston Consulting Group
31. Over to you…
What are the
major
challenges
your city is
facing in the
next 5 – 10
years?
Who may
hold some
of the
pieces to
the puzzle?
How can
you help
connect the
dots?
How can
you give
employees
the space
necessary
to
experiment?
Who do you
need to get
buy-in from?
What’s the
first tangible
step you
can take
when you
get back to
work?
How can
you help
employees
fail well?
What are
their needs?
How can
you engage
employees
more in
designing
the
workplace?
What can
you do to
encourage
employees
to share
their
learning?
32. Carolyn Moore
Director of HR & Corporate Services
cmoore@futurecities.catapult.org.uk
www.futurecities.catapult.org.uk
@futurecitiescat
Thank you
Good afternoon!
Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you about how the world of work is changing and how we, as HR professionals, can enable people to THRIVE and not just survive the changes this presents.
This is an area of passion for me. I commenced my working life as a Labour Economist, so I am ostensibly a nerd at heart but I hope to not get too nerdy on you today. My view is that the changes we are seeing now in the world of work represent the most significant challenges, not only to our profession, but to business, governments and cities. I’ve spent over 20 years working on how we can build workplaces that enable people to fulfill their potential and be engaged in the work they do – that is, building workplaces that enable people to thrive and find meaning in their work, rather that simply survive and view work as a means to a paycheque.
I can think of no other organisation in either the public or private sector that has the political complexity and level of responsibility for service delivery as local authorities do. Therefore, the challenges that are present by the changing nature of work are city challenges. City challenges are your challenges. As HR professionals in cities, you have a unique opportunity to meet these challenges and influence not only how local authorities respond internally, but also externally. Today we will look at what those challenges are and how you can position yourself and your city to thrive within this new environment.
About FCC
Our Mission: Our mission is to advance urban innovation, to grow UK companies, to make cities better.
We are partially funded by central government to enable the development of cities and the economy. We also receive funding for CR&D projects and for commercial work.
What we do: Horizon Scan Megatrends and global risks; scope opportunities for cities and businesses to respond to these risk, increase capability of cities and businesses in innovation: so we build the market, we work with cities to build demand-side capabilities, and we identify companies that are able to innovatively service the market.
Example: Belfast
The first major trend we need to explore in respect to changing world of work is that of Labour Shortage. It is important that we understand what is driving labour shortage, where the labour shortages exist as it has implications for certain professions more than others, and – especially for cities – what can be done to attract labour to your area – not only to work within your council, but to ensure your local area thrives.
This slide shows the population distribution statistics published by the Office of National Statistics from 1974 and projected to 2039. The green bars are the percentage of population that are of working age, which is between 15 and 65. The blue bars are the percentage of population aged over 65 and moving into retirement. We can predict with accuracy the projected figures into 2039 because everyone who will be of working age then has already been born.
What you notice is that in 2034, the working-age population drops below 60% for the first time in history. And it continues to reduce in 2039 to 57.9% of the population.
The retired-age population reaches 20% for the first time in 2024, and continues to climb, reaching 24.3% by 2039.
When you look at this chart, you need to consider the implications for your local authority. When I have spoken to some HR professionals in cities, they mention to me that the average age of their employees is in their 50s and that they struggle to engage younger workers long term. Millennials will make up 75% of the working population by 2025… That’s only 7 years away. Local authorities have to act now to build working environments that will attract and retain this new generation of workers just to survive the broader labour market changes that are coming as the Baby Boomers progressively retire.
Let’s now look at the pink line that has been superimposed over the chart. The pink line represents UK GDP, including a projection of GDP to 2039 based upon an average annual GDP growth over the past 15 years. So what you can see is that the UK economy is likely to continue to grow over this time, but there will be fewer people of working age to maintain that level of economic growth.
So, what does that mean?#
The economy may stagnate simply because there’s not enough labour to do the work required to keep it growing;
Businesses need a mechanism to keep people in the workforce longer to ensure that there is a labour supply to meet demand;
We may need to attract labour from other countries, or offshore work – implications of this in a post-Brexit world
Organisations may need to find ways of being more productive and less reliant on labour – new ways of automating jobs and tasks.
This is not just a UK problem. It is a global problem.
The Boston Consulting Group conducted this very same labour-economic modelling for the top 15 economies around the world and found that nearly all of them will have a general labour shortage by 2030, if they are to continue their same rate of economic growth.
So, if organisations are going to look to attract foreign talent or offshore work… where is the labour for that going to come from? The fact is, that it will become a more highly competitive global labour market.
There has been an increase in reports about how Digital, Cyber-Systems and AI is going to profoundly change the world of work. Much like the MegaTrend of Labour Shortage, the increase in digital and AI technology has different impacts for different roles and professions.
The World Economic Forum cites AI and Digital as one of its top 4 predictions for the world of work. How Digital and AI impact different professions and sectors is important for us to understand.
We have entered what is called The Fourth Industrial Revolution. And like every industrial revolution before it, it has and will continue to cause irreversible disruption to how work is structured, managed, and undertaken. There are some key differences that set the Fourth Industrial Revolution apart from previous industrial revolutions:
The acceleration of technical development between the third and fourth industrial revolutions is significantly faster than previous workplace changes. Technical development is measured in the time it takes for a quarter of the population – the tipping point – to uptake new technology. Consider that when electricity was first made commercially available in 1873, it took 46 years for 25% of the US population to take up electricity. Compare that to when the web was made commercially available in 1991, it took just 7 years for 25% of the population to engage with the technology. So the pace of technological change is increasing exponentially.
During all previous industrial revolutions there has been fear that new technology will take over jobs, and the same is being said now about AI and cyber-physical systems. Every industrial revolution has actually created more jobs than it has displaced. The same will be true for the fourth industrial revolution. The key difference is that the complexity of the jobs created will be significantly higher than those of previous industrial revolutions, to the point that we cannot predict with accuracy what some of those jobs will be in 5 years time that do not exist now. Consider however that jobs like Social Media Marketing did not exist just 10 years ago.
So, the key challenge here is that not only is the pace of change faster, but the roles that are being created by those changes are significantly more complex. The Bank of England estimates that technology, and more specifically, AI will displace up to 15Million jobs by 2030. That means that the evolution of jobs – and the skills required to support them – is accelerating. Oxford University ran a study on what roles (out of 700 studied) are most and least likely to be replaced by AI, and found 12 roles that have a 99% chance of being replaced:
Data Entry Keyers
Library Technicians
Account Clerks
Photographic Process Workers
Tax Prepartion Accountants
Cargo and Freight Agents
Watch Repairers
Insurance Underwriters
Mathematical Technicians
Hand Sewers
Title Search/Examiners
Telemarketers
Some good news: there’s less than 1% chance that senior HR roles will be replaced by AI, although a 90% probability that payroll and HR administration will be. Looking at a few other key roles within cities:
An 88% probability that planning clerks will have their roles automated, but only a 13% probability that urban and regional planners will find their roles taken over by AI
Child, Family and School social workers 2.8% probability, and Social and Community Service Managers 0.7%
Environmental Technicians 77% chance, whereas Environmental Engineers 1.8%
Another major trend that is impacting upon the world of work is the growth of the gig economy. An alternative way of looking at the gig economy is also the devolution of the workplace as more and more people will be looking to work for themselves, or in small groups, rather than in traditional employment structures. The rise of places such as WeWork that support entrepreneurial micro-businesses with high level business infrastructure is also indicative that this mega trend is going to continue to grow and be highly influential – and potentially highly disruptive – to workplaces, businesses and cities.
There are presently around 1.4million freelancers in the UK. This area of the labour market has grown by 14% in the last 10 years and is set to grow further.
The flexibility offered by Britain’s freelancers is worth £21 billion to the UK economy in added value
Three key points to note about the gig economy:
Whilst many associate the Gig Economy with brands such as uber or Deliveroo, they actually make up just a small market share. The majority of people who are presently working in the gig economy are highly educated professionals, with in-demand skill sets:
The Labour Force Survey, conducted by the Office of National Statistics, showed a breakdown of the self-employed by sector:
Senior Managers – 15% self-employed
IT Professionals – 13% self-employed
Engineering Professionals – 12 %
‘Media and Design Professionals– 40%
‘Skilled tradespeople’ in construction – 56%
2. The gig economy is highly attractive to millennials.
A February 2014 report on Gen Y and the Gigging Economy looked at “the transformation of UK graduate career aspirations and what this means for businesses”. Here are the key stats from the report:
Freelancing is now seen as a highly attractive and lucrative career option by 87% of students with first or second class degrees
21% of graduates with first class honours say they have already chosen to work as a freelancer, suggesting that the freelance economy’ is beginning to take hold among those graduates with the strongest degree results
29% of all graduates say freelancing is part of their career strategy for the next five years, a fact that suggests the freelance economy will continue to gather pace in the UK
The flexibility offered by freelancing is cited as the biggest career draw, with over two thirds (69%) of all graduates saying they feel independent work offers them a better work-life balance.
The opportunity to work on a variety of different projects and across sectors is also appealing, with over a third (38%) saying this is a significant pull
3. It is a high growth sector of the economy, and cities will need to work out ways of better engaging with the gig economy to take full advantage of the skills and professionals that operate within it:
According to a report by freelance job site, Elance:
In 2013, the number of businesses hiring freelancers online increased 46%
Payments to freelancers increased 37% year on year
We can also see the rising influence of the gigging economy with the increased number of tribunal matters being brought in the area to determine worker rights. Last year’s matter that determined UBER drivers were employees and not independent contractors, and this year’s recent decision regarding Deliveroo riders are two of the most high profile matters.
Another of the major predictions made by the Work Economic Forum is that Cities will be competing for talent – not just companies. As we have already seen, there will be a general labour shortage, a widening skills gap with a greater skilled labour shortage, and the impact of Digital and AI will also reshape roles. All of these influences will make it critical for cities to have talent plans that look beyond how they staff their own roles, and more broadly to how they attract and build talent in their communities.
The start of this city-based competition for talent can already be seen in a few examples:
This picture shows the New York skyline with the Empire State Building lit up in “Amazon Orange”. This was part of that city’s strategy to try and attract Amazon investment after the company announced $5Billion investment in a second US Head Quarters. Cities in North America were required to apply to Amazon for the investment. With the prospect of drawing a large company and significant investment into their local economies, many cities in the US and Canada made applications to Amazon for consideration. In so doing, the cities entered into a high stakes competition with each other to attract the investment – some cities offering reduced business tax rates for Amazon as they believed that the jobs that would be generated would more than offset the loss of tax revenue. Ottawa’s Mayor made a point that Amazon has 9,000 engineering roles they are presently unable to fill, and Canada has much more liberal immigration policy than the United States. Philadelphia engaged Wharton Buisiness School students to prepare the pitch for Amazon.
Against the backdrop of this competition, the Mayor of San Jose in California wrote an Op-Ed for the Wall Street Journal entitled “Why I am not bidding for Amazon’s HQ” in which he explained that “big companies like Amazon want to be where tech talent is”. I believe this too. Luring new corporate offices like those of Amazon to cities would only perpetuate an unsustainable cycle.
City competition for talent is not just for their own employees. And this is where you have a unique remit as HR professionals in cities. Placemaking to attract talent is becoming increasingly important.
The World Economic Forum argues that as technology frees up society and remote working will become the norm. This will mean that people will live in the city of their choosing, rather than necessarily the cities nearest their work. People will therefore be looking for more lifestyle choice from their city – offering attractive living options and tech-friendly environments.
Another example is how the city of Toronto is engaging Google’s urban development organisation, SideWalks Lab to help redevelop a 12-acre section of waterfront, as part of a long term urban renewal plan that is looking to build a smart city that is attractive to smart, tech-savvy professionals.
When you look at the trends around skilled labour shortage, developments of technology and AI and the devolution of the traditional workplace represented by the gig economy, the challenge for cities to attract, retain and develop talent in their local areas becomes very clear. If the city succeeds, the local authority succeeds and vice versa. This is where your people plans need to be plans not only for how you will staff your local authorities, but how your city can address the key challenges effectively because they will impact every business and every citizen in your local area.
The Workplace of the Future is Arriving Now…
But what does it look like?
In three years, over 50% of the workforce will be born after 1984… This is the Millennial generation. By 2025, they will represent 75% of the workforce.
Many people will be working longer – well beyond the traditional retirement age – but work for these people (and others) will be structured differently. Australia has just announced an increase in the retirement age to 73 years old – what do we think of that?
There is greater global mobility of labour.
Working will be more flexible and there will be greater flexibility of engagement of workers.
Talent engagement will be networked.
Change has become a constant process. We are moving from change management to agility and adaptability as workplaces continuously change.
The workplace is augmented: digital tech, AI and robotics become commonplace.
The creation of the “planning paradox”: organisations will need to embrace experimentation and innovation within their business planning.
The skill sets required to operate effectively in this new environment are significantly different.
Importantly, the future isn’t fixed and it can be shaped by those in this room, and those brave enough to make bets and investments on innovative development.
The competencies required to thrive in the workplace of the future are very different to those that were required in first three industrial revolutions. They can be broken down into three core areas:
Innovation & Experimentation
The accelerated pace of change means that cities need to innovate in order to provide services that continue to meet the needs of businesses and citizens.
This includes the ability to accelerate learning, future scanning, data literacy, digital and technology literacy and systems thinking, along with creative thinking.
2. Adaptability
Change is now an organizational constant. Old methods of change management which viewed change as a project with a beginning, middle and an end, are less relevant as a result and only seek to make people change wary and weary. We need to build the adaptable organisation, which requires focus on skills around political awareness, intrapreneurship, ROI, story-telling, advocacy and change resilience.
3. Collaboration
Innovation and sustainability, particularly for cities, relies upon individuals and organisations to effectively collaborate.
This includes developing the skills in co-creation, creative facilitation, mediation, and stakeholder engagement.
The good news is that most of us already have these skills. We use them sub-consciously every day. To demonstrate this, I want you to think about what would happen if tomorrow you woke up and the broadband infrastructure in the UK had disappeared over night.
For me, I would most likely wake up late, as I use the alarm clock on my phone. That would be followed by a cold shower as my boiler system runs of an application on my phone. Getting to work would be more difficult as I use the contactless payment service on my phone to pay for the train. We are innovating and experimenting with technology in our lives every day. We have adapted to emerging tech in our personal lives, and many of us collaborate on and with technology to manage our daily routines.
The challenge is how we promote and develop these skills in our workplaces, especially where there are “rules and regulations” for how things get done.