2017 Global Workplace Trends

Interview with Nebeyou Abebe, Senior Director of Health & Well-being at Sodexo.

Sodexo’s 2017 Workplace Trends Report is fresh off the presses with ten major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Nebeyou Abebe, Senior Director of Health & Well-being at Sodexo, to talk about the evolution of wellness in the workplace.

What is your take on wellness in the workplace today?

Nebeyou Abebe: Employers, large and small, and across all industries, are continuously evolving their health and wellness strategies to improve upon their programmatic outcomes. Changing human behavior is not an easy task. Some companies are making adequate financial investments and have the right personnel in place to design a comprehensive program that will achieve desired outcomes, while other companies continue to struggle for many different reasons. The conventional way of thinking about work and wellness is not sustainable. While improving employees’ physical health is important, more organizations are beginning to take a more holistic approach by also focusing on the emotional, mental, spiritual and financial health of their workforce. With that said, building a culture of health in the workplace is paramount and should be the primary focus of any wellness program. In my view, having a comprehensive strategy that is rooted in science, employee-centric, and leverages technology is the key to success.

Why is the shift to comprehensive wellness so important?

N.A.: According to Rand Corporation, only 13 percent of workplace wellness programs are comprehensive in nature, which is why many organizations are not realizing a significant ROI. A shift to comprehensive wellness takes a whole person approach and addresses all things that are stressors in an employee’s life. There is evidence showing that a comprehensive approach to wellness leads to higher levels of employee satisfaction, engagement and productivity. To really engage employees, employers need to provide the right balance of resources, programs, tools, and technology to enable employees to own and manage their health and well-being. Additionally, given the amount of time employees are beginning to spend away from work due to new telework and flexible work policies, it is extremely important for wellness programs to transcend the boundaries of the workplace. This is where technology can help an employer continuously engage their employees regardless of whether they are at work, at home, or on the road.

What benefits can employers expect to see as a result of a comprehensive strategy?

N.A.: When a wellness program truly supports a higher overall quality of life for the employee, there are so many benefits – from having a more engaged workforce, greater productivity, higher rates of employee satisfaction, greater employee retention. Wellness programs can even help a company position itself as an employer of choice which can reduce attrition and help attract the best talent.

We hear a lot about the impacts of the built environment. What role does it play in wellness?

N.A.: I recently came across a study conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health that included 109 workers at 10 buildings in five cities across the United States. They discovered that working in green certified buildings is associated with higher cognitive function scores, fewer sick building symptoms and higher sleep quality scores. So, in my view, establishing a healthy built environment should be part of an organization’s wellness strategy given the positive health impact it can have on the workforce.

What does wellness look like with a Sodexo lens?

N.A.: We surveyed our clients last year and asked them what they need to take their wellness programs to the next level.  And it’s quite simple, clients want innovation and best practices. They want more effective ways to engage with their employees to help them achieve their personal health and wellness goals and live a high quality of life. At Sodexo, we pride ourselves on being the global leader in Quality of Life services, and we have already conducted a significant amount of research to help us define what that means. Given our subject matter expertise in nutrition, health and wellness, and our ability to form strategic partnerships with clients and key stakeholders, we can design comprehensive workforce wellness solutions that deliver positive results. We are thinking outside the box to find new ways to leverage our existing health and wellness programs and services to help our clients (and ourselves) achieve their desired goals. That is our focus moving forward and that is what the company is investing in.

Interview with Neil Barrett, Group SVP Corporate Responsibility, Sodexo.

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is fresh off the presses with nine major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Neil Barrett, Group Senior Vice President Corporate Responsibility at Sodexo, to hear about how the SDGs will impact the workplace. 

You attended the UN Global Compact meeting where the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were presented back in July – What is your take on the goals?

Neil Barrett: What really impresses me about the SDGs is the participation of a wide sector of governments, business, NGOs, trade unions, institutions and civil society – I think that’s a big difference from their predecessors, the Millennial Development Goals, which were shaped by governments rather than a broad number of organizations, institutions and civil society. Increasingly, we hear from our clients and through conversations with different parties, that the SDGs have already taken a prominent place in the way businesses are thinking about their responsibility actions and aligning their business objectives with the goals.
 
How do you think the SDGs will impact the workplace?

N.B.: These 17 goals will have an impact in the workplace because they drive change in the way society, communities and businesses interact on the topic of sustainable development and corporate responsibility.

From a Sodexo perspective, goal 5, diversity and inclusion, clearly aligns with what we’ve been doing for many years. It also outlines how organizations can better embrace this goal and what actions need to be put in place.

On a personal level, I have two 7-year-old granddaughters. My hope is that with these goals in place, when they enter the workforce, they won’t even understand how we started off the 21st century in terms of gender inequality. They will walk into an environment where gender imbalance  is an issue belonging to the past. The goal in and of itself will one day seem ridiculous because it will be so engrained in their lives.
 
There has been this idea in the past that supporting sustainability may have an adverse effect on a company’s bottom line. But many companies today not only want to do it for themselves, but are being asked by clients. Thoughts?

N.B.: Increasingly people want to work for companies that are more responsible and are committed to improving their sustainable development performance, particularly millennials entering the workplace.  Moreover, as employee awareness grows, we need to continue to support the awareness and behavior patterns by improving their knowledge and skills, recognizing that these skills can assist beyond the workplace. For example, saving energy, water or eliminating food waste are not only examples of operational excellence within the workplace, but they can contribute to good sustainable outcomes at home.
 
From a global perspective, have you seen a difference between countries or regions in terms of embracing the goals or putting regulations in place?

N.B.: I don’t like to generalize, but I think we can say that there are emerging countries where this challenge will be greater. What I find fascinating is that 193 countries have signed onto the SDGs – this is unheard of in terms of such a global commitment across such a broad range of issues. That really is another reason why I’m very hopeful that there’s going to be a lot of progress on these goals. Right now, there are different levels of sustainable development maturity and parts of the world that aren’t as advanced.  Increasingly there are initiatives and projects that can help, encourage them, and provide knowledge and expertise they can adopt and act upon.
 
Are there certain industries that are adopting these goals faster than others?

N.B.: Today, many major multinational organizations are doing great things; they are driving change, responding to the SDGs and setting goals that are aligned. That said, one of the big challenges into the future is addressing globally, small to medium organizations that are less engaged.  In short, although large companies and governments are working to make a difference, some of the indicators are not moving, or not moving quickly enough on a global scale.  Somehow we’ve got to engage more extensively with small and medium businesses to bring them along on this journey.
 
How can that process begin? Can you provide any concrete examples?

N.B.: In the same way that the SDGs were formed in a collaborative way with governments, municipalities, NGOs, and business, I think we’re going to see through reporting, transparency and regulations, businesses adopting better practices. Looking at the issue of food waste for example, around the world there are now increasingly more and more municipalities or regions that are legislating and regulating against the dumping of organic material. This is a way to drive change.  To revise the way we think about the value chain. How we can we implement the notion of the circular economy where waste is eliminated – one where resources are valued and that value is retained? Rather than the more linear system we have today where we produce, we consume and we throw away what’s left over at the end. This is not sustainable and it can’t be part of the future.
 
How do these SDGs fit into Sodexo’s future?

N.B.: Most large organizations have their own corporate responsibility roadmap that determines what is important to them as an organization and to the stakeholders that are part of their ecosystem. Ideally, companies will align these commitments or goals with the relevant SDGs. For example, some years back Sodexo made the decision to only serve sustainable fish and seafood in all of our restaurants, on a global basis. This was Sodexo saying, protecting the environment is important to us as a company. I think this is part of the way forward – making good choices, well explained, well exampled and well defined.

A company like Sodexo has a responsibility to tell the sustainability story of the food on the plate. A responsibility to raise awareness and encourage consumers to make healthy choices. Ultimately, it’s the consumer’s decision, but we have an increasing responsibility to inform, engage, and create awareness around the products we serve.

Interview with Dr. Michael Bazigos, Managing Director at Accenture Strategy.

Sodexo’s 2017 Workplace Trends Report is fresh off the presses with ten major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Dr. Michael Bazigos, Managing Director at Accenture Strategy, to talk about the growing need to adapt and be agile.

What does it mean to be agile in the workplace?

Michael Bazigos: When we look at agility, there are two parallel systems that people reasonably assume work against each other: velocity and adaptiveness on one hand, and a stabilizing backbone of structure on the other. But the evidence is that agile companies have both. Most companies need hierarchy and structure, as it is needed for coordination, scale, and control. “Blowing up” the structure would be counterproductive, so the question is: how do you become agile anyway? A small number of organizations have developed structures, processes, and an overarching mindset that allows leaders to make decisions quickly, adapt to a changing environment and move fast without disrupting the very structural support which provides the stability for high velocity. Only 8 percent of companies have the ability to optimize speed and move as fast as the market requires to capture value.

Take for example a one-shot-wonder start-up – one that quickly brings to market a great product but lacks the processes of a mature organization like knowledge sharing systems, and finds that it can never replicate that initial success. Sustainable performance requires replicable processes, not just velocity and adaptiveness. Organizations without either fall further behind every year.

So what can be done to ensure the right level of flexibility?

M.B.: A useful reframe of that question is: what are the barriers to being agile in our organization? Leaders perhaps. Leaders need to handle change and motivate people during periods of uncertainty, but the ones who have this talent are in the minority. Leaders need to enable quick decision-making, and to cut through bureaucracies that have multiple levels of approvals – in effect, cultures where checkers are checking the checkers. While some processes may need to be controlled this way, when all processes are, there is a performance cost.

Change comes in a wide variety of flavors. We may have a product or service that is at risk for commoditization. Strategic agility is required to decide between saving the product or exiting the market in favor of a higher-value growth. We may have invested in an acquisition, but find the integration stalled, destroying value because time to realize expected benefits influences analysts’ valuation models, their buy-hold-sell recommendations, and ultimately our company’s share price.

The agility mindset is put to best use building structures with “soft-hard” properties. One example is maintaining the hard structure but building “soft” flexible bypass options, like a new app built to work on the same hardware. For example, if employees in public companies wish to speak to higher management directly, they can bypass normal procedures and processes, using a hotline to do so. Ordinarily, this is a compliance process compelled by legislation. But this level-bypass idea has been put to use in some agile organizations, where employees with great ideas which their line manager may be too busy for can instead speak to a community including senior managers empowered with resources to adopt and fund the idea’s implementation, if it’s seen as holding promise.

Flexible bypass options thus become the innovation analogue to whistle-blowers.

Can you provide a concrete example of what this bypass would look like in the work environment?

M.B.: Absolutely. Think about Starbucks. The company innovated extremely rapidly on one menu item, discovering in the process that it could use its baristas as human market sensors. At the time, customers were asking for soy milk in their coffee, which Starbucks did not provide. Its employees would have to individually go to the supermarket to buy a carton of soy milk on petty cash. All of this was unofficial, and fell under the broad mandate to delight customers. Eventually, word of this practice reached management, who then decided to offer soy milk options on their set menus. The company used its employees to harvest more richly what they were seeing and hearing on the front lines. They never dismantled their structure in the process; baristas were still baristas, and management was still management, but they invented soft processes around hard formal structure.

What does agility mean at the individual employee level?

M.B.: Employees need to step up and embrace ambiguity. One example is the employee resistance triggered when high-priority demands are made by management only to have a new high-priority request come along which may conflict with the earlier priority. The routine becomes running around and putting out fires, or picking one and avoiding the other, with results of burnout and/or low responsiveness over time. But what we really need is to flex with the situation, involve our managers in finding a good workaround, and change our expectations about a strictly defined and unchanging job role. Some employees are energized by that while others are not. People need to identify their tolerance to uncertainty and find ways to adapt at a personal level.

The new workforce is, to a greater extent than prior generations, more comfortable responding to multiple simultaneous stimuli, including technology, and they demonstrate a greater ability to multi-task. Flexibly toggling attention between several demands is an exercise in personal agility. In a competitive market, we need to accept that everything we believed about how success could be achieved may change suddenly and sometimes all at once, requiring us to rethink our entire plan.

Interview with Laurent Cousin, Group Senior Vice President Research & Development at Sodexo.

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with 10 major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Laurent Cousin, Group Senior Vice President Research & Development at Sodexo, to talk about how robotics is changing the way Sodexo does business.

Would you provide a brief background on what robotics means today?

Laurent Cousin: Sodexo has done quite a bit of research to qualify and define the term “robot.” It is important to clarify the different types of robots to avoid lumping them all into the same category. From our perspective, we identified four different categories of robots. First, robots used for observation – they measure, capture and transfer data and information. The second are the robots we classically see in the industrial sector – they perform industrial actions, transform and manipulate matter. The third type, service robots, execute tasks such as vacuuming, cutting grass, etc. And lastly, the robots that do not conduct physical tasks, but rather interact and communicate – whether through voice recognition, face identification, or interacting directly with end users. Of course, these categories are not strictly delimited, and there are many robots or robotized solutions belonging to more than just one category.

We also identified three generations of robots: repetitive, reactive and adaptive. The first generation, or repetitive robots, can repeat what they have been taught to do. Reactive robots capture data, recognize detail in external environments, and adjust their behavior accordingly. Their reaction is still based on a series of predefined algorithms, but the robot will make a decision based on the data collected, and react. The third generation, adaptive robots, represent a very large open field – a blue ocean of artificial intelligence where the robot learns from experience and builds new knowledge.

Can you tell us about Sodexo’s perspective on robotics, and what the Group is doing in this area?

L.C.: There are several key reasons why the use of robotics makes sense for us. Robots can help to improve productivity, quality and the regularity of the service, along with the delivery. They also ensure safety by helping us conduct some dangerous tasks without risk to human lives. And lastly, robots allow us to increase our sales offer – whether that means selling more in volume or value terms; developing our existing business, products and services; or developing something completely new - designing and offering a new service that was just impossible to deliver otherwise.

What aspects of robotics in the workplace are a cause for concern?

L.C.: If you think about robots, especially first or second generation robots that perform repetitive or reactive tasks, I clearly see there might be a risk of dehumanization. For example, if a human being provides a service, they are capable of noticing if a consumer is happier or sadder than usual and can adjust their behavior accordingly. At present, not many robots can do the same, even if face recognition is already improving... This is where we risk losing a big dimension of humanity – attention to human beings, capacity to customize, to specialize the service and enrich the services we perform.

That said, if we talk about the third generation of robots, those that are adaptive, those that have a so-called “intelligence,” then we can start to imagine situations where we won’t lose sight of this ‘’human” factor. The human factor is at the heart of what ultimately improves quality of life – which is not so much driven by just excellence in service delivery. This is where we want to remain very attentive. If the price to pay for robotization is to lose this human factor and attention to human beings, then I believe we should consider that price too high.

The media coverage we see regarding robotics in the workplace often runs the gamut – from excitement and innovation to doom and gloom about the effect on workers. What is your overall perspective?

L.C.: We see several economic analyses that try to measure the number of jobs that could be at risk because of robotics. I can understand how this can be threatening, but it won’t affect all jobs in any given industry, and even the jobs that will be affected will not completely disappear. Getting rid of painful, dangerous tasks is just the story of humanity, and positive progress. If there are components of a job that are painful, repetitive, or lack considerable added value, having a robot take over that part is a positive step forward. But we can’t be naïve – we must ensure that this transition is supported by the right training programs and service design, and that it is correctly managed and accompanied, in a meaningful manner.

Robotics, when done correctly, can eliminate painful and dangerous tasks, lower the risk for human beings and create opportunities for workers to transition to richer tasks and interactions. We don’t just want to chase after higher productivity. We know how rich our strategy can be: keeping the focus on Quality of Life for our employees, consumers and stakeholders can only end in being good for the whole of Sodexo.

Interview with Bob Doyle, Director of Communications, Association for Advancing Automation (A3).

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with ten major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Bob Doyle, Director of Communications at Association for Advancing Automation to talk about how robotics can pave the way for humans to take on more exciting roles in the workplace.

There is a lot of talk about “collaborative robotics” in the workplace. What exactly does that term encompass?

Bob Doyle: Collaborative robotics first came onto the market a few years ago. It basically refers to robots or technology that can work side-by-side with humans – a big development compared to traditional industrial robotics. Think about an automotive line where these big robots are moving fast and welding parts together. Fences around these robots are often mandatory to safely separate them from human workers. The notion of collaborative robots means that with certain newer robots, you can take the fence away. But there are tradeoffs. In order to work safely around humans, they are slower. At the same time, they also bring in lots of new opportunities – they are much smaller, they don’t take up as much space on the manufacturing floor, they are easier to program and implement, they open up a whole new wave of opportunities – especially for smaller or medium-sized companies that have never used robotics.

How does the development of intelligent machines affect the workplace?

B.D.: Today, autonomous robots and machines can move around warehouses and, for example, take product from a shelf and bring it to someone. In the healthcare sector, robots are roaming hospital hallways delivering pharmaceuticals, food and bedding and allowing nurses to spend more time with patients rather than spending time moving things around. In the hospitality industry, Savioke’s robot, Relay, is now the newest employee at certain hotels. Imagine that you get to your hotel room late at night, and you forgot to pack a toothbrush. Rather than someone having to leave the front desk and run it up to you, they can now have the Relay robot to deliver the item directly to your room.

What would you say to people who are afraid that artificial intelligence will one day replace human intelligence?

B.D.: The words “artificial intelligence” are often thrown around a lot without really defining exactly what that means. I think the general media talks about artificial intelligence as if machines will soon start thinking on their own and start making decisions and that is definitely not the case in today’s workplace. Not yet, and not in the foreseeable future either. Yes, there is amazing technology out today, but robots are still a long way away from actually having some sort of intelligence that could make them smarter than a human.

Robots and automation are definitely allowing companies to be more productive, develop products that are more innovative, of higher quality and faster. That said, this notion that robots are taking jobs away is untrue. What we actually see is that they augment and create jobs. They allow people to work in better jobs that utilize their brain rather than these dull, dirty and dangerous jobs.

Can you discuss some of the barriers or obstacles that need to be addressed?

B.D.: There are still a lot of challenges in the robot industry that are perhaps not as well known. For example, the ability to do something a human can do so easily with their hands is very difficult to create in the robot industry. If a robot handles like-type products or if there is a repetitive task, then yes, it can easily be programed. But when you have a container of loose products, it’s still hard for a robot to figure out which product it wants and how to pick up that particular product. It’s getting a lot better but it’s still not like a human hand that can just go in and see a product and move it around.

What about on the wearable technology front? Are there innovations that engage people in a more individual way?

B.D.: There is a lot of pretty amazing stuff coming out of this area. In healthcare, a company has created a “robot” suit, which allowed a paraplegic person to walk again. In the military, there has been some research creating a type of suit to carry heavier loads without tiring. In the workplace, companies are developing a type of robotic device that provides support for manual workers. Say you’re a worker who stands all day drilling holes overhead into a ceiling. It’s a tiring activity. But this new invention provides support, allowing them to tire less quickly, making the job much better for them.

Any predictions for the future of robotics?

B.D.: A “helper” type robot for the home is something that people have been dreaming about for 50 years. A robot that could help a person get out of bed, put together a meal, help out with cleaning or allow the elderly to stay in their homes rather than be put into care facilities. But in all the robotics research, which has been going on for so long, the most difficult environment for a robot is in the home. People watch movies and think that we’re pretty close to a robot working amongst us in the home but there has really only been one successful home robot so far – the Roomba vacuum cleaner! But there is definitely interest and research going into this area so someday in the future there will be some type of home robot that can do these different tasks. But it’s a long way out there.

Interview with Jean-Christophe Dumont, Ph.D., Head, International Migration Division of the Directorate for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs, OECD.

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with ten major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down Jean-Christophe Dumont Ph. D., Head of the International Migration Division of the Directorate for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs at the OECD, to talk about the role businesses play in integrating and valuing migrant workers.

What’s your stance on migration?

Jean-Christophe Dumont: Migration is part of our lives and it’s here to stay. Some arrived after a corporate promotion, others escaped conflict, some relocated temporarily, others will stay permanently, and many have great-great grandparents who made the journey. Migration, whatever form it takes, if well managed, can be beneficial for all of us. At the moment, we are witnessing the highest level of forced displacement, clearly the highest level of humanitarian need since World War II. We must share in the responsibility of supporting successful integration.

Can you offer some pointers on successful integration?

J.C.D.: There’s no escaping that public policies are central to discussions about migration but the business community has a key role to play in helping to facilitate the integration of migrants.  It is in the workplace that people use and develop their skills and make a living to support themselves and their family. Labour market integration is central to migrants’ successful integration in society as a whole.  It is crucial that recently arrived migrants invest in new language skills but also that they are supported in this – and the workplace is ideal.  It is also important to assess migrants’ professional and informal skills to identify the right employment or retraining opportunities.

What are some other examples of ways that the business community can facilitate the process?

J.C.D.: Successful integration of migrants and their children, and more efficient labour migration management systems responding to real needs, are necessary to strengthen social cohesion as much as they are to maintain and enhance economic competitiveness. This objective cannot be achieved without engaging more with employers, who are making on a daily basis the recruitment decisions.

Engaging with employers can help identify skills gaps to design more effective public policies aiming at better using migrants’ skills. However, this dialogue with employers should go beyond making the business case for migration and should build notably on the corporate social responsibility of employers to convince the public opinion that labour migration is also in the best interest of the local population.

In the context of the unfolding refugee crisis, the OECD, together with UNHCR, has sought to understand better the barriers that businesses face to hiring refugees and asylum seekers.  As a result, we have identified issues relating to labour market access, access to information from both employers and refugees, but also to international transferability of skill and qualification transferability.

Competition for skills is intense and there are some shortages in host countries; how helpful is migration?

J.C.D.: There are more than 35 million migrants with tertiary education in the OECD, which represents an unprecedented increase of 70% over the past ten years. More than 25 million of them are of working age. However, although migrants bring skills, unfortunately our labour markets do not yet utilize them to their full potential. One out of three migrants with tertiary education in Europe and in the United States is over-qualified for his or her job. One in two is inactive, unemployed or overqualified. To make the case for easier access to skills from abroad, it is important to better understand why credentials and professional experience acquired abroad are strongly discounted in the host-country labour markets.

This includes recognising that in some cases it is necessary to build on existing skills rather than to ignore them because they don’t quite fit. For example, a car mechanic originating from a less developed country may be excellent in his job, but may lack some of the skills needed to repair a car with lot of electronic devices.  Even in the most highly regulated professions, such as medicine and law, the transferability of knowledge and experience can be lengthy and costly, but worth investing in. Employers can help to enhance the overall offer for bridging professional training courses.

How would you summarize the case for business engagement on migration?

J.C.D.: My view is that an inclusive, skilled and engaged labor market with high levels of participation is more likely to be resilient, adaptable and competitive – and all of these things benefit businesses. Those that make demonstrable efforts to promote a sense of belonging among their workforces will be better equipped to fill talent shortages. Whatever their activity, businesses can to help manage the hopes and aspirations of some, the fears and concerns of others.

Interview with Crystal Kadakia, speaker, author, thought leader, and consultant.

Sodexo’s 2017 Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with 10 major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Crystal Kadakia, speaker, author, thought leader, and consultant, to get her take on millennials in the workplace.

 

What inspired you to write The Millennial Myth: Transforming Misunderstanding into Workplace Breakthroughs?

Crystal Kadakia: Around five years ago, I started hearing a lot about millennials. At the time, I was at a Fortune 100 company designing training for new hires at a global level. I remember thinking that the stereotypes didn’t line up with what I was seeing in the workplace. As a millennial myself, I became very interested and started doing some of my own research, which eventually led to me start my own company, Invati Consulting. We research different millennial trends and stereotypes and look at where these trends intersect with workplace culture. The millennial topic resonates really well with a lot of people because many are really confused about generations. It’s a very polarizing topic and a lot of people feel like they can’t work with “kids these days”.

The way I see it, there’s got to be a different way to think about millennials other than what is typically represented in the media – for example, articles such as Top 10 Reasons Why We Hate Working with Millennials. In trying to grow awareness around these ideas, it really sparked me to write The Millennial Myth. The book focuses on five of the most common stereotypes and finds a modern interpretation.

Can you provide an example of one of these myths?

C.K.: A major millennial myth that I address in my book is that millennials are lazy. But they aren’t, they are just redefining productivity. Consider that when today’s twenty-somethings were students they succeeded by becoming digital experts – they learned how to work anywhere and at any time that was most productive for them. They figured out their personal productivity tools. And when they came into the workplace, there was this huge expectation that they could still use their own means of personal productivity, versus following the guidelines set by someone else. This is really where the conversations around working from home or flex schedules and the idea of work-life integration came into play. In the traditional mindset, this appears to be lazy and unwilling to do the work. In the modern mindset, this is the way that work gets done in a digital world.

Digital seems to have defined millennials in many ways – do you agree?

C.K.: The advent of digital technology is one of the key differences with millennials – they are literally the last generation to remember what the world was like without the internet. As such, millennial traits tend to stem from looking back at the impact of digital as they were growing up as well as their expectations in the workplace. Digital has caused globalization and it has impacted how we all work. Millennials are a very pivotal generation because we can study what life was like before the internet and what life was like after. But most folks aren’t doing that – because they are hung up on the biased, stereotypical view of millennials.

Broadly speaking, how do you think millennials have transformed the workplace?

C.K.: I think the workplace is still so boomer-heavy that a lot of these transformations and trends are still hanging in the air. We will only see if it actually takes hold when Gen Z enters and more boomers start to retire. There is also such a negative perception about millennials and until we manage to shed this negativity, we can’t make the real transformations that need to be made. We need to go back and question these stereotypes. This is really what my research and book addresses, because that’s the starting point: we need to transform those misunderstandings and then reestablish effective, modern workplace changes.

What are the implications of the arrival of Gen Z in the workplace? Will this generation reinforce the trends that millennials have started to create?

C.K.: Today, 30 percent of millennials are already in management positions. It’s funny, because as millennials become managers, some of the traits that bothered boomers and Gen X also start to bother millennials themselves. I’ve had millennial managers call me saying when I was a millennial employee this was all well and good, but now as a manager I’m starting to struggle.

At the same time, at an organizational level we haven’t yet figured out how to modernize the work culture based on changing digital behaviors. Until we figure this out, we’re going to see similar expectations and lack of engagement and lack of retention from Gen Z.

Any advice for employers in regards to managing a multigenerational workforce?

C.K.: We are very contradictory in the workplace. On one hand, leaders want to attract and retain the best and brightest millennials; but on the other hand, many categorize the entire generation as lazy and entitled. But no millennial wants to work for a company that thinks they are lazy and entitled. So my best counsel is to remove that contradiction altogether and make sure you are transparent about your goals to modernize the workplace, not just for millennials but for everyone working in the digitally-enabled word. I am convinced that you cannot hold a negative stereotype and want to do positive things with it, it’s an inherent contradiction. Until we address these stereotypes, we can’t really move forward in a discussion about workplace trends.

The Millennial Myth is available for pre-purchase or to learn more, head to themillennialmyth.com

Interview with Jeanne Meister, Founding Partner of Future Workplace LLC.

Sodexo’s 2017 Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with 10 major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Jeanne Meister, Founding Partner of Future Workplace LLC, to understand the importance of personal branding.

What is a personal brand? And how can individuals improve their own brand?

Jeanne Meister: Individuals need to be aware of the breadth and quality of their LinkedIn connections, be proactive in joining groups and contributing qualitative posts, have a presence on Twitter and be someone who is well respected for sharing high quality content in their area of expertise. All of this contributes to the personal brand you’re developing. And that’s what is going to get you your next job – not your resume, not looking at head-hunter firms. You are now ultimately and thoroughly responsible for being as desirable as possible to any number of organizations that are on the prowl, looking for people with your expertise. All of this creates a public persona which is really a measure of ongoing employability in the job market. I believe this is really a new skill and, moving forward, people need to understand how to excel at it.

This is something that is so important, but we have to ask ourselves ‘Where do you teach it and where do you learn it?’ Because you don’t really learn it in school and it is unlikely that your employer will provide training on personal branding. Individuals need to pull the pieces together themselves. I believe that this is one of the new future job skills that cuts across all levels. It’s as important for millennials who want to grow and develop in their jobs as it is for boomers, such as myself, who want to continue growing and developing in their field of expertise.

How has personal branding changed in the workplace over the past five years, and how is it continuing to become a crucial skill for both employees and recruiters alike?

J.M.: Conventional wisdom says that there are active job seekers and passive job seekers. Traditionally, employers have always been focused on the passive job seekers because they are more desirable as they are happy in their jobs. But today, technology has created a third segment, which we call continuous job seekers – individuals who are constantly keeping their eye on the job market and applying.

We now have mobile apps that follow the Tinder model; meaning you create a profile – what you’re looking for, where you want to work, what your level is – and just like Tinder, you can “swipe right” and be considered for a particular job. So technology has created this notion that is debunking a lot of recruiting myths. Additionally, people aren’t waiting to be approached – they are creating a presence on social media and LinkedIn and developing their personal brand.

Have you noticed any upcoming trends in recruitment methods in the US and abroad?

J.M.: Based on market studies, as well as our own proprietary research, some of the big trends that we’re seeing involve having a mobile-first strategy, which mirrors how retailers manage their strategy. It involves video interviews, which is now overwhelmingly the course of action to sort through numerous candidates who all address the same questions, and the use of predictive analytics, where companies search social media to identify people who have the skill set and personal branding they are looking for in the marketplace.

When we think of personal branding, how much of it is personal versus professional?

J.M.: I think the lines are blurring just like our lives – we no longer work from 9-5 and our work lives are now integrated into our home lives. That said, I think a personal brand that someone creates should be the essence of who they are, both in their personal and professional lives.

I can remember just five years ago when I had clients both on LinkedIn and Facebook and I got emails saying “don’t take it personally, but I’m de-friending you on Facebook because I’ve decided that Facebook is for my family and LinkedIn is for my professional colleagues.” Well that doesn’t happen anymore. Everything is seamless and integrated. This is the brand and the presence of who you are putting out there to the world. If you are authentic, it should be the same brand you’re showing the world.

It sounds like the personal branding trend is really pushing for more authenticity. Does one lead to the other?

J.M.: Definitely. I think authenticity is so important these days. Take for example Marc Beinoff, who is making a case for closing the gender gap. He has made it part of his personal brand, as well as the employer brand of Salesforce.com. There are several other CEOs that have become social activists – involving their personal brand and employer brand in key issues because they know they have the power to start a conversation. Another example is the CEO of H&M, who has begun discussions with the prime minister of Bangladesh on wage laws. One third of H&M clothing is made in that country and the brand is now focused on ensuring the safety of the workers. I think we’re going to see more of this. We see it at the CEO level and we’re going to see it at every level. It’s almost gotten to the point where if you don’t take a stand on an issue that’s really important to you, people start wondering what’s the matter with you?

There seems to be a certain level of optimism that these trends are going to make the world a better place as opposed to a more superficial, distant place. Can you share your thoughts on this?

J.M.: I definitely agree. I am very optimistic. This is a case where technology is favourably impacting people’s lives. We hear so much about technology taking people’s jobs away and disrupting. This is an example of that not being the case – it has the potential to really make lasting change.

 

Jeanne Meister, Partner, Future Workplace and co-author, The Future Workplace Experience: 10 Rules For Mastering Disruption In Recruiting and Engaging Employees
Follow Jeanne on Twitter at @jcmeister

Interview with Rachel Permuth, Global Vice President of Research, Corporate Services at Sodexo.

Sodexo’s 2017 Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with 10 major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Rachel Permuth, Global Vice President of Research, Corporate Services at Sodexo, to talk about the growing expectations around experience design in the workplace.

What exactly is experience design?

Rachel Permuth: Experience design is a term best known in the hospitality, travel and tourism sectors where people seek out different types of experiences - beyond the ordinary. In the workplace, experience design is the overall practice of designing products, services, journeys or environments with the endgame of focusing on the quality of the employee experience. It is paramount to ensure that whatever we design is also culturally relevant – in terms of geography and the type of business. It also needs a specific type of research tactic to hone in on the uniqueness of the employee.

Experience design can also extend to the environment created for visitors to the workplace – people from another geography or local clients. So our goal is to help tailor solutions that really surprise them, delight them, make them more productive and essentially make their life easier and better. The term experience design is somewhat new and a lot of people still haven’t put that hospitality lens on it yet. But at Sodexo, we pride ourselves on having a history in hospitality. So when we create an experience, we can draw on the expertise that we already have in terms of social interaction.

What does this look like in a typical workplace?

R.P.: Let’s say I have a broken light in my office. Experience design asks: how could a service make the repair process easy for me? The answer is in having a number to call or text, or an email address; getting a prompt response; being assured that the issue will be handled in a timely way; and afterward, receiving a follow-up to ensure that expectations were met.

Experience design looks at every aspect from an employee’s point of view, from the time they wake up and get into the car or use public transportation. How easy or hard is the commute? Is the parking accessible and available? Is the snow shoveled in the parking lot when they arrive? Once they are in the office, do they have a pleasant experience in the breakroom? Is the coffee high quality? Are there chairs in the area? Are they the right chairs? It’s all about different touchpoints along their journey in the work day – and even before and after – that can either be facilitated or be the cause of a great deal of stress.

What about in a less-typical office environment, such as a manufacturing plant?

R.P.: The touchpoints are the same, but the way we handle them is different. For example, take the security in a manufacturing site parking lot. Shifts often end in the middle of the night, so that presents the opportunity to create a positive experience – one with onsite parking, on-duty security guards to ensure safety, etc. Similarly, shift workers may not have traditional meal schedules because everyone eats at a different time. So the focus can center on having hot food brought to them via a kiosk, instead of building an entire café or restaurant.

How do you see this field evolving in the coming years?

R.P.: I definitely think there’s going to be a big push towards measurement and understanding the effects that experience design has on user behavior, employee behavior and outcomes. There’s also a lot of pressure to recruit the top talent and address the expectations from the millennial pool. In terms of personalization and experience customization, I’ve never seen such a high demand. And we’re not even sure yet what Gen Z is going to expect from us, so it will behoove workplace strategists to really understand individual behavior across different generations as well as cultural and industry nuances. Workplace strategists will need to add a new skill set to their repertoire. I think you’re going to see more change management, behavioral science and people1 who work in design to help craft these experiences. Overall, it needs to become a much more interdisciplinary practice, informed by all stakeholders.

There is a lot of talk about millennials in the workplace. Do their expectations for experience design differ from previous generations?

R.P.: Yes. With millennials, communication needs to be very quick, very easy; the language needs to be tailored to this generation – so information has to be given succinctly. Management needs to know when to reward and recognize individuals, and to use culturally-relevant items, such as an Uber ride. We need to consider an employee’s ability to give feedback – they have grown up with technology that gives them a feedback loop, literally at their fingertips. As a result, they feel obligated to provide feedback.

Any final thoughts on the importance of experience design in the future workplace?

R.P.: We need to think about experience design from the point of view of employees. If companies don’t invest in this area, what does it say? It says my company has thought about this and they don’t care. Creating an easier, more enjoyable work environment will motivate employees – and in turn that leads to more participation and more collaboration.

Interview with Mariano Sánchez Martínez, Professor, University of Granada.

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with ten major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Mariano Sánchez Martínez, Professor at Universidad de Granada, Spain, to talk about a new approach to generations in the workplace.

From a sociology point of view, how is longer life expectancy changing the workplace and our lives in general?

Mariano Sánchez Martínez: As our life expectancy lengthens, the question arises: how should we re-think the life-course? If we live longer, we need to consider how we are going to change our approach to life.  For starters, we must accept the challenge of living ever more uncertain lives as the pace of change – much of it technology-led - accelerates.  Today, it is not unusual in Spain to come across the situation of someone in their 60s who is already retired but decides to go back to work to support their children and grandchildren.  This is not evident as many still come from a generation whose grandparents used to think that everything was and had to be planned well in advance. Uncertainty of this type – that has impacts on the life-course, the role and responsibilities of generations – is now also a consideration for business.

How does this evolving landscape affect employee learning in the workplace?

M.S.M.: Firstly, it is time to banish the old idea that ‘intergeneration’ just has to do with old people working with young people. Generations have little to do with chronological age but rather the passing of time, trajectory, skills and experience.

Secondly, intergenerational learning can’t be linked to the idea of, for example, one person from Gen X being linked to one person from Gen Y; we all have multiple generational identities. For instance, I am an experienced father so I belong to that identity group. However, I also recently started to learn how to play the piano, so I am a beginner in the musical identity group. I have multiple generational identities within me. The traditional bilateral and linear way of thinking is over-simplistic; we need a much more complex and dynamic approach to intergenerational learning. So far, we have mentoring and reverse mentoring, only two ways; the issue at hand is much more complex than that.

What does it look like when a business gets it right?

M.S.M.: The closest example that I can think of is an intergenerational shared site that provides care for older adults and children. They tend to use a single approach in terms of how many generations are being gathered and in terms of intergenerational learning. I see a clear erosion of age in deciding what to do as well as an emerging generational intelligence. True generational intelligence is the capacity to be aware of generational positions and approach workforce management with a generational lens. That doesn’t mean organizing activities for different generations but rather activities that link generations and make them work together taking advantage of both their similarities and differences.

For instance, I would challenge anyone to think of a workplace for adults and older adults where children had the possibility to be included, in an organized way. Now is the time to innovate in this field. If we don’t do it now, we’ll see in a few years how the power and novelty of this idea may be wasted. Let’s promote business where all generations can be purposefully involved.

Do any concrete examples come to mind?

M.S.M.: In Spain, we are piloting an intergenerational school, a lifelong learning place for all ages. The idea is to cross the adult need to keep learning throughout the life-course with children’s educational needs. This is how we should also think of the workplace: a lifelong learning place where people from all generations are invited and engaged. This is the time for crossing and intersections; since we live longer lives we have much more time to be interconnected.

Do you see any cultural differences in approaches to intergenerational learning?

M.S.M.: I’ve noticed that relational literacy is very different across cultures. We are all relational beings but the way in which it is articulated varies widely. For example, the acceptable physical distance between two people will vary across cultures. Also, the meaning of family can vary. In my environment for instance, we tend to separate the family from the rest of the world. In other countries, the distance between the family and non-family may depend on a variety of factors. A real challenge for progress is providing organizations with a new language for generational inclusiveness. In the same way we act for gender inclusiveness, we need to become generationally-inclusive – and that begins with a new language to serve this purpose.

We also need to ask ourselves why we are so concerned with ‘differences’. We should be focusing on what we have in common. To do so, we need a language that promotes connections. So, instead of using ‘I’, let’s move towards ‘us’. This is particularly important in the workplace: we must pay close attention because if we don’t, we may be promoting two or more generations to preserve and strengthen their particular identities instead of inviting them to accept a generational transformation of those identities as they collaborate and work together.

Interview with Aaron Sherinian, Chief Communications and Marketing Officer of the United Nations Foundation.

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with 10 major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Aaron Sherinian, Chief Communications and Marketing Officer of the United Nations Foundation to sum up the year following the launch of the organization’s SDGs. 

Would you provide a bit of background on what went into creating the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)?

Aaron Sherinian: The UN Foundation has been involved with the SDGs not only since their adoption but also well before, during the inception and consultation. We were part of that very open political and consultative process of bringing together 190+ countries and defining the goals a year ago. The idea was to get the world talking about the goals themselves, to understand them and to help connect them to civil society groups across the planet.

An important aspect of the goals is that public input was solicited and they were essentially crowd sourced. At the time, one of the world’s largest surveys, the “My World” survey, asked people about their top priorities – such as education, healthcare, conservation, issues related to climate change, etc. And the goals were in part born out of this process.

What were some of the challenges involved in such a broad international approach?

A.S.: The fact that we launched 17 measureable targets around health, wellness, people and the planet required a bit of branding, so that corporations and organizations would want to align what they’re doing around some of these goals. We needed branding around them, not to make them clever, but to make them acceptable.

The SDGs are intentionally approachable so they can be just as easily understood by policy experts as by a person on the street, or a person in a boardroom. They are also intentionally multi-sectoral so that a great variety of organizations can attach themselves to the goals and work towards a larger plan at the same time. The only way we’re going to get to zero hunger is if everyone sees zero hunger as part of their day job. The only way we’re going to tackle climate change is if everyone sees climate change as part of their day job. The SDGs allow people to see this interconnectivity.

What major steps has the UN Foundation taken since the SDGs were agreed in September 2015?

A.S.: The UN Foundation has been very closely involved, supporting the community of partners who work with the UN in making sure that the goals were launched with considerable support in the corporate, public, media and civil society sectors.

The Foundation also measures everything we do against the SDGs, both in terms of raising awareness and in program investments. The goals also give us a set of concrete KPIs against which we can measure results – particularly in areas that many people, until recently, felt were intangible. There is now this idea that these things really matter to people in our society, so we must measure them. In short, we count what we measure and we measure what counts. And it’s encouraging as we’re now seeing more and more enterprising companies and NGOs coming up with platforms and measurement devices, providing different ways to measure progress on hunger and poverty, etc.

Have you begun to see organizations and companies that have already started to align their strategies with these goals?

A.S.: One of the most visible examples of a company really adopting these goals is Pfizer. They have not only begun linking their internal and external communications with the goals, but Pfizer literally covered its international headquarters in Manhattan with the SDGs. That sent an important message to their employees, their B2B partners and really anyone walking through their doors during the first six months after the launch.

At the same time, we’ve also seen faith groups from around the world using the global goals as a way to communicate to their pews. This is more than just Corporate Social Responsibility using the SDGs as a helpful platform, this is about people realizing that it tells a good story. If I care about malaria, how does that link up to a goal? If I care about underwater life, how does that link up to a broader set of targets?

Are the SDGs being adopted more quickly in certain types of organization? Or is there a wide diversity?

A.S.: I’m happy to see that the social entrepreneurial sector really gets it. Social entrepreneurs tend to live in an era where they know that measurement matters. For example, ENACTUS, the largest group of university student entrepreneurs in the world, retooled their entire competition around the goals. So whether you’re dealing with a student project or entrepreneurship project in another country, everything had to involve the goals.

Technology companies have also been particularly active. They understand that in the social media reality, you have to be able to talk to your customers and you have to have a sustainability story that is not tucked away in chapter 10 of your annual report. It needs to be part of your everyday feed. The short answer is that the savviest companies are the earliest adapters and they are moving ahead.

Any key takeaways when you look back over the past year?

A.S.: Goals of these kind make it clear that measurement isn’t a fad, it’s a way of getting things done in a smarter way. For example, when we launched the Millennial Development Goals (MDGs) back in 2000, there were moments when we knew we were behind on certain indicators and that allowed for the world community to come together and surge together. The UN, corporations and coalition groups united to get us back on track.

We need to use the SDGs, not only to talk about how well we’re doing, but also to point out where we need to do better or go faster, to measure progress. It’s not just about patting ourselves on the back, it’s about showing us where we need to be doing more.

Interview with Dr. Glorian Sorensen, Director and Principal Investigator of the Center for Work, Health and Wellbeing at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with ten major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Dr. Glorian Sorensen, Director and Principal Investigator of the Center for Work, Health and Wellbeing at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, to talk about the shift towards comprehensive health and safety practices in the workplace.

 

Would you provide a bit of background on your work with the Center for Work, Health and Wellbeing and the Total Worker Health program?

Dr. Glorian Sorensen: We focus on finding ways in which policies, programs and practices can protect workers against work-related hazards and injuries while also promoting the overall health and well-being of employees. We make it a point to look at working conditions and try to understand how a range of on-the-job factors could have a real impact on health outcomes.

From the occupational safety and health perspective, there’s a long tradition of looking at occupational injuries and illnesses that might be related to slips, trips and falls and exposures to hazards; but we recognize that the work environment also impacts the risk of non-communicable or chronic diseases, as well as mental health outcomes. For example, harassment on the job is associated with psychological stress and poor sleep habits are associated with a range of health outcomes including obesity.

Would you say that there is an overall shift in the workplace towards a more holistic approach to worker health and well-being? If so, what is your take on that?

Dr.G.S.: Today there are certainly many organizations, practitioners and academics that continue to focus on a traditional health promotion approach. However, I feel that a more comprehensive approach is extremely important. We need to recognize that when people are at work, their health behaviors, as well as their overall health and safety risks, are very much associated with what they experience on the job. So, the social context matters, the physical context matters, the workplace experiences, the job environment – all of that makes a difference. If we offer programs that address certain health behaviors without recognizing those broader factors that hugely influence health behaviors or safety risks, we’re missing a huge opportunity to be effective. At the center, we focus on marrying the traditional occupational health and safety approach with an expanded understanding of the ways in which work influences a range of health outcomes for workers.

Our work has also started to look not only at worker outcomes but how employers might view these outcomes. We are beginning to look at how some of these same factors influence work absences or turnover rates, healthcare costs, other related factors that are clearly important to employees but also a major concern for employers. For example, we’ve studied the effects of bullying or harassment in the workplace and its relation to increased mental healthcare claims. This is just one small example where we see that workplace experiences may matter in terms of cost outcomes – whether directly measured through healthcare costs, costs associated with absence or presenteeism, turnover, as examples.

Can you think of any areas that need improvement?

Dr.G.S.: In some ways, we’ve focused so much on risk and prevention and maintaining a minimum level of health, but maybe we haven’t paid as much attention as we could have to ensuring that workers are actually thriving. What does it take to be really happy at your job and enjoy being there? I think there’s an increasing need to expand our focus to look at positive elements – not just addressing some of these negative aspects. For instance, let’s not just focus on reducing bullying, but rather creating an environment where people really look forward to coming to work.

In terms of measuring success, this field has been so used to thinking about ROI. Is there another way to measure success in this type of new holistic well-being environment?

Dr.G.S.: Experts in the field are increasingly saying let’s not just look at the costs but let’s look at the added value. Sometimes the added value goes beyond what you see in terms of cost – especially when that value includes factors such as improved morale or the designation of being a company that positively draws talent.

Let’s zoom out and look at this issue on a global scale. Do you see differences around the globe?

Dr.G.S.: We’ve been having conversations with people in a lot of different places. In Europe, they have been thinking about some of these organizational level factors and thinking about the psycho-social dimensions of work for a long time. Colleagues in Australia are taking an integrated approach to addressing the conditions of work as a core component of their approach – not only of safety but of health outcomes as well. We are working closely with people in Chile and Brazil around some of these approaches as well. These are examples of the growing global conversation moving in this direction.

Interview with Tom Stat, Innovation Expert, Design Thinker, Strategy Consultant and Entrepreneur.

Sodexo 2017 Global Workplace Trends Report is hot off the press with ten major trends that will impact our workplace today and in the years to come. Today we sat down with Thomas Stat, Business and Design Strategist, to learn what it means to be a design thinker.

What is your definition of design thinking?

Tom Stat: Design thinking leverages the diverse mindsets, capabilities and experiences of people in more holistic and generative ways. Design thinkers have a set of qualities about them that are relatively predictable at high levels: courage, optimism, imagination, curiosity and persistence. Mere creativity is rarely an essential force. Design thinkers have the courage to investigate, fail and learn; they think outside of the fixed box of known problems and solutions; they are excited to explore curiosity outside of their immediate domain; they are persistent. They create from a generative rather than evaluative place.

Design thinking is fundamentally about understanding outliers and their more extreme behaviors to generate insights and inspirations as opposed to focusing on the prevailing norm or the established trend. As a generative process, design thinking is about synthesizing something entirely “next” or assembling existing parts into entirely new offerings. Take for example the original iPod – it didn’t have any new technology, but rather the synthesis of existing elements into a new holistic platform of a product, a business model and a data infrastructure.

Can you speak more about how design thinking can fuel innovation?

T.S.: The history of innovation is filled with things that sounded completely ridiculous at the time – and, none of these “inventions” (innovations brought to fruition) were born out of solving an obvious or even newly established “problem.” People weren’t begging for a 24-hour news channel before CNN launched. We were perfectly happy with catalogue shopping and garage sales before Amazon and eBay. No one asked for a $5 cup of coffee to be sold in thousands of coffee shops around the world before Starbucks. Uber and AirBnB were not borne out of an obvious want or problem voiced by consumers. Ultimately, yes, these innovations met unmet needs, but they didn’t solve an obvious or widely-voiced problem. Of all the startup ideas I’m fortunate to review, if I feel they are solving an obvious problem I almost never think it’s a good idea. There has to be a bigger, more systemic and more fundamental opportunity to seize. You’re not going to create success or establish a big sustainable company out of solving a problem. History has proven that to be the case. Henry Ford famously said, “if I asked people what they wanted, they would have asked for a faster horse.” Skating to where the puck will or may be (as Wayne Gretsky once said) is part of the mindset that is fundamental to design thinking.

Does design thinking have a set process? If so, would you please explain?

T.S.: Most innovators and design thinkers follow a generative research methodology. This means that instead of conducting focus groups among hundreds of people – a traditional evaluative research method – design thinkers tend to look for insights and inspiration from very few sources – often only three or four people. The essence of generative research is not to try to determine if something is a good, bad or even valid idea, it’s about trying to have an idea. In order to do that, you tend to go to the extremes. If I’m looking for an idea for a new hotel experience, I’m not going to speak with hotel managers or people who frequent hotels; I’m more likely to get insight or inspiration if I talk to a homeless person, someone who’s never been in a hotel or a hotel doorman who’s often deeply connected to the guest experience. It’s about getting to the root and the underlying behaviors, not the surface problems or wants.

Can you provide another concrete example of generative research?

T.S.: Let’s look at leading-edge healthcare environments, like hospitals – who are always trying to innovate and define their futures for better experiences and outcomes. Emergency rooms are a classic target for innovation. To imagine the future of an emergency room, you could study and observe ERs across the country or around the world, looking for best-in-class ideas. But design thinkers often deconstruct a situation, reducing it down to its fundamental essence and imagining analogous situations where you could have entirely new insights, novel inspirations and learn something new. So in the case of ERs, the environment involves tightly orchestrated teams, a sense of urgency, time constraints, space constraints, a lot of equipment, life and death situations. So design thinkers seek a similar situation with similar characteristics that is also completely different. NASCAR pits and pit crews could be a rich source of analogous learning. Design thinkers, using a more observational and generative research process could learn more about making better ERs by studying the way that pit crews work together and manage their time and equipment. This same research approach and logic can be applied to any product, service, experience or environment – including the workplace.

How exactly does this apply to the workplace environment?

T.S.: We are intensely social beings and yet we tend to create environments that fight against this. What we need to do is design spaces to be as social, tribal and collaborative as we actually are. While in many ways business is a complete abstraction, people working together for a common purpose is deeply embedded in our behavioral DNA. Workplace environments should support our deeper nature including our ability to focus, learn, work together and alone and fail – the more adult version of play. And we need to monitor and measure workplace, team and business success in entirely new ways. That’s not to say that more traditional metrics like productivity aren’t important, but year after year when I talk to well-intended people about challenges within the workforce, they talk about people who can’t work in teams, are socially awkward, can’t communicate ideas clearly or are too risk adverse. The environment they built and ask their employees to succeed in, often supports all of the counterproductive behaviors directly related to these challenges.

I’m not saying everything has to be foosball and playground slides, but it turns out that trusting people and giving them the creative confidence to fail in order to learn is not only good, but essential. Companies that create environments that support the right behaviors and allow people to experiment, prototype, fail and iterate tend to be ahead of the curve, keep people longer, have greater success, have their brands admired and respected AND have happier, more fulfilled employees.

Can you discuss the idea of design thinking on a more global scope?

T.S.: I believe that the underlying human needs and fundamental social nature of our being is not that different from one part of the globe to another. Human beings have a wonderful habit of being human, regardless of race, religion, culture, politics, etc. That said, I have noticed that there can be cultural differences around the world that need to be respected. For example, many people in India have a whole different perspective on life. Their belief in karma and reincarnation tend to make them less dissatisfied and they tend to have a completely different model and time frame of organizational hierarchy, self improvement, life long learning and career advancement. Other cultures place different values on structure, promotions, etc. And, in every case, workplace environments tend to either support or hinder these underlying cultural values and principles.

No matter where you are in the world, it is critically important to get the most diverse input and perspective possible and to look to the extremes for insights and inspiration. And, if your goal is to imagine the next big thing, as opposed to merely incrementally improve what already exists, getting outside of your existing paradigm and traditional frame of reference is the best way to force a new experience.

Interview with Jeff Malcolm, Senior Director of Private Sector Engagement at World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

As the 2017 Quality of Life Conference date approaches, we sought out experts to address some of the key topics that will be discussed during the two-day international event. Jeff Malcolm, Senior Director of Private Sector Engagement at World Wildlife Fund (WWF), provides some insight on the role that big businesses can play in overall sustainability for our planet.

Why is it so important for WWF to engage with the private sector?

Jeff Malcolm: WWF partners with companies because we believe that business is a part of the solution when it comes to addressing the challenges that humanity is facing. Bold action is required, and rather than trying to educate 7 billion consumers directly, the most efficient way to affect change is to work with a handful of companies. We work with companies on their direct operations and sourcing of materials – in particular, commodities related to food, forest products and seafood.

What sparked the partnership between WWF and Sodexo?

J.M.: One of the reasons we wanted to work with Sodexo, and have continued to do so for the past seven years, is because of the impacts of food production on the environment. Food production is responsible for about one-third of greenhouse gas emissions, is responsible for around 70 to 90 percent of global freshwater use, and is the biggest contributor to deforestation and loss of habitat for species that WWF is trying to save.

Through our work with Sodexo, we’ve helped the Group create sustainable and healthy menu choices through sustainable sourcing. Our actions have also focused on reducing food waste and working towards a global carbon reduction target of 34%.

Speaking about setting goals, the UN launched its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in October 2016. How have these collective goals changed the way that companies address sustainability?

J.M.: Many companies had already set sustainability targets for 2020 before the global SDGs were officially finalized and launched. But ever since the SDGs came out, more and more companies have been looking at changing their metrics, or targets, to align with the UN’s 17 goals. The reality is, there are a lot of things we could work on – from addressing the use of chemicals to stopping waste from going into landfills – but the SDGs help us to recognize that a lot of these challenges are intertwined and we’ve got to focus on a specific set of them.

What are the main environmental issues that will challenge quality of life in the years to come?

J.M.: At WWF we identified three big topics and environmental issues that we believe require major attention moving forward: climate change, water and the sourcing of food and other commodities. Focusing on these topics helps frame the actions a company can take, ranging from how they can educate and communicate about these issues and what actions need to be taken in light of them. For example, we can work with companies to identify ways to decarbonize their electrical systems and energy, on a more general scale, ensure that they maintain a fresh water system, or even find sustainable ways to produce or capture food. It’s imperative that we look at this holistically and depending on where anyone is within that value chain, there are actions they can take to help address these issues, whether it is turning off the lights to help with energy efficiency or buying more sustainably sourced fish.

 

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This interview was carried out in June 2017 in the context of Sodexo’s 2017 Quality of Life Conference dedicated to exploring new solutions around future quality of life needs.

Interview with Dan Schawbel, Partner and Research Director at Future Workplace and Author, Promote Yourself: The New Rules for Career Success.

As the 2017 Quality of Life Conference date approaches, we sought out several experts to address some of the key topics that will be discussed during the two-day international event. One of the topics to be explored is the new drivers of engagement in the workplace, and how companies can anticipate and best respond. Dan Schawbel, Partner and Research Director at Future Workplace and Author, Promote Yourself: The New Rules for Career Success, provides some insight specifically on Millennials in the workplace.

Can you give us a snapshot of the current Millennial presence in the workplace?

Dan Schawbel: Millennials make up the largest percentage of workforce – as much as 70-90 percent in some industries, such as consulting for example. Whereas in more traditional industries, such as utilities, manufacturing or energy, the percentage is much, much lower. In terms of hierarchy, today, anywhere between 20-35 percent of Millennials are already managers with direct reports but fewer than 5 percent have reached the level of director or above.

There’s a lot of media buzz around “Millennials in the workplace”. In your research have you found any general misconceptions about what millennials value?

D.S.: Over the past two years, my consulting group has conducted more than 6,000 interviews and one thing we’ve found is that Millennials want to work in a physical office space. Contrary to what you may read, the “office” is actually not going to die. Research shows office space is declining per employee but at the same time, people don't only want to work from home.

Today, 35 percent of the American workforce are freelancers, and this is going to continue to rise to 40-50 percent in the next four years. A lot of Millennials don't want the same all-encompassing careers as their parents and some may even struggle to find a fulltime job, so many are seeking out the flexibility of freelancing – which is becoming a lot easier to pull off thanks to connectivity. But moving forward, we’re going to see a new type of workplace diversity. We’ll see more freelancers and full-time workers working in unison.

Is there any advice you can give to employers looking to engage with this younger generation?

D.S.: Yes, I would encourage them to revisit their approach to training. A lot of companies remain so focused on online training and trying to scale training and learning as quickly as possible to as many people globally as possible. But our research shows that only about 10 percent of workers are looking for that – it’s just not how they best learn. Millennials, in particular, want in-person training. They best learn from human interaction and in-person classes with peers around.

There will always be this general hunger for human contact and Millennials thrive in environments that offer meaningful relationships. They view their co-workers as their work family and their managers as their work parents, and they prefer to work in teams.

Have you seen any noticeable changes in the workplace that can be directly attributed to Millennials?

D.S.: We found that Millennials are more open than the older generations to talking about how much they earn and talking more freely about money with their managers – so that salary information is now revealed in the workplace. I think that one of the big mistakes a lot of firms make, is they think that providing flexibility is enough to retain talent. The truth is, if you're not paying your employees fairly, they're not going to stay with you. One of the interesting things we're starting to see is that the younger generation is closing the pay gap – especially between genders – because of this closeness and openness.

You mentioned fair pay as a strong retention practice, are there any other practices that can help employers keep top talent within the company?

D.S.: We often ask employees what qualities they look for in a leader. Two years ago, honesty was the most important quality. This makes sense because the younger generation doesn’t trust politicians, banks, wall street, CEOs, etc. Just think about what most influenced this generation: wars, terrorism, technology – but the biggest one is the recession. The recession connects to their spending habits and to their career choices.

Interestingly enough, this past year, one thing overtook honesty: communication. A leader's ability to communicate effectively and often is only going to become more important. This ties into our research on how the annual performance review is dying. More and more companies, from GE to Adobe are ending their annual review policy. Today, it's more about continuous feedback. In short communication is King.