Future of Work: 4 Predictions for Talent Management

We are living in the era of talent disruption that will transform the world of work as we know. The confluence of technology, like cloud computing, machine learning, predictive analysis and artificial intelligence have contributed to disruptions in the science of managing talent.

Here are the top 4 predictions for the future:

Prediction 1: The use of ‘analytics’ and ‘big data’ will intensify

End-to-end measurement and effectiveness of a company’s talent pipeline activities is essential to the success of any organization. The integration of social profiles and behavioral and advanced online skills measurement tools along with competency management frameworks will allow for organizations to get a better fit and alignment of inbound talent into an organization. New ways of measuring engagement, performance and interests will lead to more productive high performance teams. Goals alignment and survey tools will allow for self corrections. Ubiquitous connectivity, massive processing power, focus on personalization and cloud technologies will allow even smaller organizations without adequate resources to leverage the power of “big data” and “analytics”

Prediction 2: Managing a remote workforce will be the new norm

Telecommuting has already arrived. The general prevalence of the internet and digital technologies and easy reach and access to the general population has spurred its acceptance. Crumbling infrastructure and overcrowded public transport and roads has further fuelled its need. A recent survey conducted at the Global Leadership Summit in London found that 34% of global leaders believe more than half their company’s full-time workforce would be working remotely by 2020. Work from home programs are an essential part of attracting and retaining talent. Wim de Smet, CEO of Exaserv, predicts that “New technologies will be used to analyze the work production instead of the working time. Results will become more important and business will expect talent management to be producing more result-driven performance analysis.” Enterprises will have to effectively deploy and use collaboration technologies to make distributed work “work”.

Prediction 3: Annual performance review will be replaced by continuous, real-time feedbacks

2015 has seen companies like Deloitte, Accenture and GE bin the annual performance review in favor of continuous, real-time programs. By banking on technologies and apps that help employees, managers and co-workers share feedback, 2016 will see many other organizations follow suit. The annual employee engagement survey, which is a sibling of the yearly performance review, will also be insignificant in the near future. The employee engagement market is experiencing serious disruption at present with the emergence of next generation employee engagement and leadership development tools. People analysis and regular sentiment surveys will enable organizations to listen to their people’s voice in realtime and take immediate actions.

Prediction 4: Talent Management will become as core as strategic business functions

Talent management will increase its strategic value to business by making accurate projections based on understanding the goals of the business and the right people with the right competency to accomplish the task. Engaged employees lead to happy customers will be embraced by all to become employers of choice. Differentiators here will become leaders that embrace the new era of engagement tools and platforms that help constantly improve and engage employees by leveraging analytics and digital technologies to create real and lasting changes in the workplace.