Discussing the Future of Work with Jennifer McClure

There’s no denying that the last couple of years changed the way we work forever, exposing the truth that how we work is much more important than where we work. Looking to the Future of Work, we see a wealth of opportunities opening up for the modern workplace, with technological advancements driving changes to jobs, tasks and skills. 

For our bi-monthly #WorkplaceLIVE series, we invite thought leaders in the culture, leadership and employee experience space to discuss how leaders can successfully navigate through these swift changes. This year, we are driving conversation around the Future of Work and gaining invaluable insights from our guest speakers into how organizations can succeed in the rapidly changing world of work.

Jennifer McClure , CEO of Unbridled Talent LLC, Keynote Speaker and High Performance Coach, joined us for Episode 3. Read along to discover her top tips on how leaders everywhere can adapt and develop strategies that fully unlock the potential of their future workforce.

What does the Future of Work mean to you? 

“The future of work, to me, is really fluid and ever-changing. I don’t know that I can put my finger on something and say ‘this is what it means to be in the future of work’. I think for leaders, the future of work is today, tomorrow, it’s ever-changing.  I know 12 years ago, when I started my business as a professional speaker and trainer, I did talks on the future of work and I showed slides with studies about 2020 and the talent challenges that we were going to be having in 2020. And then [...] 2020 happened and a lot of these things didn’t come out, but we are experiencing these challenges today and the reality is talent challenges, people challenges are going to continue - but what has changed is the pace of change. 

Today, things could change from the way they were last week, they could change to next week - so the future of work is ever-changing and evolving.”

How do we continue moving the needle when it comes to remote working? 

“I think we have to understand how to do it well. [...] If you think back a year ago, [...] a lot of people were saying the office is dead. No one’s going to work in an office ever again - well I look [at you] today Abby, you look to be in an office - in a corporate office, right? So we were wrong, there are people coming back to the office and that’s going to change. As a leader, the future of work is today, tomorrow, next week and constantly evolving and ever-changing. You’re going to have to do your own research with your own workforce, you’re going to have to understand what the preferences are and also what your business requirements are. As leaders, we’ve got to be constantly looking at what’s new, what’s next, what our people are feeling today because that’s going to change.”

Hybrid working is strongly encouraged, but how can we better manage and upskill employees during this time? 

“Well, you have a lot of opportunity with technology. There’s certainly a lot of AI tools out there today that can help you understand the skills of your existing workforce that pulls from profiles that they may have online to the job description that they have compared to thousands of job descriptions. 

But also there’s the self-identification of skills. [...] Whether people are working in the office or remotely, it’s an opportunity for us to use technology and self assessments to be able to identify the skills as a starting place. You can always refine as you go, but getting a good database of the skills and an inventory of what individuals have is really critical - so just start. [...] Go ask people ‘what skills do you have?’, look at their LinkedIn profile - what skills have they identified? It’s a start.”

What do you think will be a high demand job 5 years from now? 

“You know, I’m going to go back to where I started decades ago - I’m going to say Human Resources. [...] The reality is the innovation, the adaptability, the change, even with more technology in the workplace, will come from the people that you’re able to attract and retain in your organization - and again, that starts with a good people team.”

Interested in hearing more about the Future of Work? 

Listen to the conversation here, and join us for Episode 4 with Jen Fisher 🦋 , Deloitte Chief Well-being Officer, by clicking here.