PLLI, a leadership-focused organisation has restated its relentless efforts aimed at bringing a much-needed solution to building a close-knit intimate corporate culture with remote workers as well as understanding and leading the Millennial & Gen-Z in the workplace.
With the pandemic ushering in a new normal that has disrupted outlook to work and ushered people into a new phase – perhaps the future of work, one of the key components of work undergoing a major shift is the question of where people work – from home, in the traditional office or a hybrid (or a mix of working from home or in office).
As people move through the current situation and keep their eyes towards the horizon of recovery, it is essential to equip managers and leaders for the needed management and leadership in the new normal which presents unique opportunities and challenges.
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One of those challenges includes leveraging various work systems to generate the best results for the organization and employees.
In developing this roadmap, successful companies are looking to adopt a flexible yet productive, adaptive, and resilient work style that sustains the interest of the workforce while achieving corporate objectives.
The pandemic has broken through cultural and technological barriers that prevented remote work in the past, setting in motion a structural shift in where work takes place at least for some people – McKinsey.
The new normal also brings forward questions on workplace productivity and employee engagement. Vital questions in this regard include: how do you maintain a close-knit workforce in remote work? How do you keep employees engaged and productive? How best do you deliver coaching and other human capital development efforts virtually? What technological tools are required to make remote work yield the best results for the company (both in terms of delivering on bottom-line demands as well as delivering on the corporate culture and team-formation goals?
The question of technology is more pertinent in today’s multigenerational workforce.
Experts say while the younger generation of the millennials and the Gen-Zs are more comfortable with technology and require little training to leverage it for productivity, the older generation of workers seem to be struggling with it or rather stuck in their analogue and paper working mode of result delivery.
Therefore, this generational diversity in the workplace is not just technology-related.
The different behaviors and perceptions of each group have also been a course of concern for HR managers and business leaders. Leaders have realized that productivity depends on all these generations working together and leveraging the strengths of each generation but very few leaders can boast of knowing how to make this happen.
To answer the question of workplace productivity and employee engagement, a lot of company policies and culture will need to be restructured to embrace current realities. Old and known principles will need to give way for data-driven insights. Attributes like trust, empathy, openness will be practiced at all levels of the organization with the leadership leading by example. Stereotyping must be avoided, and employees must be treated as unique individuals.
No doubt, these are challenging times, leaders are called upon to embrace the change and make the best of it.
To do this, leaders must acquire practical insights and working knowledge of how to lead and maximize a multi-generational workforce and make the best of virtual/remote work.
Participants of the PLLI 2-day virtual executive course will be exposed to all these and more.
The training is intended to equip mid-level managers and CEOs for the future of work, develop their leadership and management skills to drive organizational performance, balance diversity and inclusiveness with long-standing organizational culture and values. Participants can visit: https://www.plli.org/ldp/register to register for the 2-day executive virtual course.
