Employees want socially conscious companies. Are you ready?
According to findings of the 2019 Global Human Capital Trends survey of nearly 10,000 CEOs and executives, future success means reinventing organizational approaches to human capital with a focus on employees’ continuous learning, accelerated development, and personal and professional growth.
More than three-quarters (86%) of survey respondents said they believe they must reinvent their ability to learn, and 84% said they need to rethink their workforce experience to improve productivity. At the same time, 80% said they believe that they need to develop leaders differently.
When asked to rate their most important measures of success in 2019, respondents almost unanimously said “impact on society, including income inequality, diversity, and the environment.” They rated this higher than customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction/retention, financial performance, and regulatory adherence. Social enterprise issues are growing in importance, according to respondents, and nearly half (44%) said that these concerns are more crucial to their organization now than they were three years ago.
CEOs recognize the value of being a social enterprise, an organization that—among other things—has mission that includes respect for its environment and stakeholders. However, they are still struggling with how to make this happen. Only 19% of respondents reported being “industry leaders” in their organization’s maturity as a social enterprise. The weak numbers, said the survey authors, are likely because leading a social enterprise is not just about practicing corporate social responsibility or engaging in social impact programs. Being a social enterprise is about recognizing that, while businesses must generate a profit, they must also improve the lot of their workers, customers/patients, and the communities. Fulfilling this aim requires broad-scale reinvention.
Elsewhere in the survey, some issues of particular interest to HR:
· 76% of respondents said that new tools and models for careers and internal mobility are important or very important.
· Only 11% said they think that their reward systems are highly aligned with organizational goals; 23% said they don’t really know what rewards their employees value.
· Nearly two-thirds (65%) suggested that technology is inadequate or only fair at achieving its objectives.
Among other findings in the survey:
· 64% of respondents said that automation is important or very important to amplifying continuous learning.
· Just under half (49%) of respondents said they believe that their organization’s workers are satisfied or very satisfied with day-to-day work practices.
· 38% said they are satisfied or very satisfied with the current work-related tools and technology available to them, and a similar number said they have enough autonomy in their jobs to make good decisions.
· One-third (31%) of respondents said their organization operates predominantly in teams within a hierarchal framework; and 45% said their company is “somewhat” team-based.
