"CHANGE", which knocked at our doors but was kept out for ages, has entered our lives. Fascinatingly, even after years of ignorance, it gave us the precise element to survive in odd times.

Pratyaksikrta : Made present or visible, manifested, displayed

The Sensex crash in 2008, more than a decade ago, provided every organisation with learnings about the importance of Financial Planning and Stability. It also made way for a window of opportunities for Finance Leaders to lead organisations. 2020 was the year of “Survival”.

The COVID-19 Pandemic created traumatic experiences for many organisations worldwide; putting everyone to test over the “Best Fit to Survive”. It tested Business Leaders to showcase their planning capability and successful execution in unprecedented situations. It also challenged HR Leaders to respond faster than ever. It exposed loopholes that remained hidden under fancy Business Plans and dented many aspirational journeys. 2020 will not be counted as one of the best years gone-by, but it provided the best possible learnings for everyone. HR Leaders, who quickly turned around with their survival strategies in a difficult time witnessed a remarkable turnaround from their respective organisations as compared to those who struggled with their strategies. It also provided us with ample time to introspect ourselves - a time to reflect on what we have been doing and what should have been done a long time ago. We talked endlessly about living in a VUCA World (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous) for the last few years, but unexpectedly experienced it in 2020. We understood the uncertainty of the world around us and learned to deal with it. Tough times are the Best Teachers and we learnt our Learning the hard way. Many myths got broken by defying the ‘Traditional Methods’.

“CHANGE”, which knocked at our doors, but was ignored and kept out for ages, has finally been able to enter our lives. Fascinatingly, even after years of ignorance, it gave us the precise element to survive in odd times.

 Leaders now understand and shift their focus to deal with a difficult situation. The year 2020 has shown newer opportunities for HR Leaders to lead the organisation in various unexpected, extraordinary, and unstable situations. Emotional Intelligence has become a scorching matter, which was never discussed so much as compared to the earlier times. HR Leaders comprehend the importance of Emotional Intelligence and have reformed their strategic planning to listen, understand, and connect more with their employees. It widened the vision and gave us a perspective to change ourselves in many areas. Some of them have been highlighted to support brainstorming in the fraternity.

Flexible And Virtual World

Many organisations had already begun to use more remote work in recent years, but the year of the Pandemic made flexible work a necessity. “Work from Home” or the socalled “E-presenteeism” had us ambushed with its tricky operational challenges. With these assertive experiences, employees are losing confidence in their work culture and trailing down their team solidity. Organisations may need to overcome this by focusing more on collaborating opportunities, team cohesion, and strong implementation support to make sure employees feel connected albeit virtually. Employers are looking forward to designing special Incentive/Reimbursements and other financial supports for a work-from-home office setup.

Employee Wellness

Employees are dealing with greater pressure than ever as they are dealing with an expectation that needs them to be available anytime in the work-from-home setup. HR must develop a culture to monitor the employees’ Emotional Quotient. It can also be managed by providing relevant training to deal with their challenges and demonstrate healthy behaviour. For many years, organisations offered employees health insurances to support issues concerning their physical health. However, many thoughtful organisations and leaders are now aligned with Emotional Intelligence. They discover more reasons than ever to offer better Mental Wellness support. To be more productive in this unprecedented and altered environment, an employee must be fit to WIN the RACE. To drive this agenda, HR must re-structure and re-discover the change opportunities in their policies to empower such changes into the core value systems.

Re-Learning Prospects

The pandemic had made Learning a must-have culture in every organisation. Employees are emphasising the ability to advance by developing them in this competitive world. The lock-down effect on learning was glorious and organisations have enlarged their focus on the developmental aspect of employees. There was a time when people had only anticipated training sessions as their off-site opportunities. With Physical Training being replaced with Virtual Training sessions and E-Learning modules, it has become all the more concentrated.

Provided there is so much content in the public domain on the Internet, people now demand to have specific skill development content so that their journey in acquiring a successful career goes to the next level. Several training organisations have now transformed their Business Model overnight to cater to the new demands. Virtual Sessions were never interesting, and now, it has become the most Engaging and Costeffective method to conduct Training Sessions. Traditional Training Programmes were time-bound, but Self Learning had pushed the wall further and made it more flexible and time-independent. HR Leaders must use this opportunity to drive the SelfLearning Culture even further. Both mobile and web-based Learning capsules for Employees will form higher Employee Engagement and agility for Change. While skilling is important, re-skilling is more important to keep the Development Journey intact.

Re-Modelling HR

With Technology HR Leaders need to take Digital Transformation to the next level aligning with the organisation’s digitisation strategies. There is a greater need to emphasise the more strategic aspects of HR and to invest in excavating the digital skills of HR folks to drive better decisions about the workforce. HR must improve the way to engage employees, communicate with them, and listen to them. Datadriven people analytics shall be the driving agent for Recruitment, Talent Development and Talent Retention. The attentiveness towards digital Learning by implementing SelfLearning modules and introducing BOTs in the learning content will gamify, engage and encourage those who pursue greater digital learning milestones. A centralised HR System to create one-stop solutions for all HR Processes like Performance Management, Grievances systems, Employee requests, Salary & Claiming systems will reassure better outcomes.

The pandemic largely impacted Recruitment and Training due to the pandemic since most of its processes are manual, face-to-face or person-driven. And this needs to be reformed for effective and smooth operations. HR must offer the best Recruitment and On-Boarding Experiences ever by using various technology-driven tools and techniques. As mobile/smartphones are the primary way to access the internet, recruitment processes need to be re-engineered to make them as mobile-friendly as possible. And also, it is available en masse, which will ensure that automation will bring about an extraordinary experience and a better response rate.

With many negatives, employees can count on at least one positive thing that has come out of the pandemic - the ability to find career options and choosing a place to work. To handle this, HR must re-work their Employee Experience for an engaged and motivated workforce.

 Achieving HR Transformation and making it a success is a shared effort of both Leaders and Employees. Adapting Technology into the DNA of the HR will be the next course of action. Even though we transform ourselves with strategic planning, maintaining Humanity in the virtual environment should be our ‘KEY Attention’ for driving the Future Agenda.