With more and more announcements around retrenchments and business closure, people are naturally becoming more concerned about the company’s financial ability to keep its workforce employed. Organisations should be more transparent in their communications with their employees and job candidates about the firm’s ability to stay afloat during COVID-19. Companies should reassure their employees of how the work they do can contribute to the firm’s long-term survival.
For example, employers can explain to interviewees why there is a role opening and how much of the job responsibilities have actually been affected by COVID-19. Job seekers would also need to be assured that there is no “last-in, first-out” policy within the firm, where the latest hire is usually deemed most at risk of being retrenched should things go south.
employees want internal training to upskill
With the current pandemic posing severe disruptions, we’ve seen companies having to reassess critical jobs and expand definitions of job roles. While COVID-19 may have temporarily halted the progress towards Industry 4.0, it does not change the fact that 9 in the top 10 emerging jobs are linked to STEM learning.
We’ve also seen anecdotes of companies ramping up their digital infrastructure, with tech quickly becoming the enabler for such collective efforts. For example, retail companies have started to pivot from their usual brick and mortar stores to e-commerce, whilst some retail staff have been reassigned to digital marketing teams to help develop new sales campaigns. We’ve also witnessed the rise of digital banking and insurtech in the past few months, with a greater focus on client engagement, cybersecurity and data protection.
Employees know that they are at risk of losing their jobs if they don’t take the initiative to upskill themselves. Those who have unfortunately lost their jobs during COVID-19 will also need to upskill and obtain new qualifications to better their chances of securing employment. Such programmes not only allow employees to build a variety of skills, but also enable them to exercise greater flexibility in their career development.
As unemployment figures remain high, the need to resolve the glaring gap between the current talent pool and the digital skills sought has undoubtedly taken centre stage. To secure jobs and livelihoods, many have demonstrated their interests for re-skilling and upskilling programmes. Such programmes not only allow employees to build a variety of skills, but to allow exercise greater flexibility in their career development.