Resilient Workforce: Building the Future of Work
Around the world, the post-pandemic work revolution has provoked a sea of change in employee values. Many now prioritise flexibility as they plan their long-term careers in a new business landscape. Between employee resignation and digital transformation, Companies in turn worldwide are challenged to respond innovatively to the needs and values of their workforce. What is the future of talent in the post-pandemic workplace? How can resilience foster the evolution of workplace culture?
We speak with Gwen Wong, Human Resources General Manager for FUJIFILM Business Innovation Asia Pacific, to learn about how HR can harness the power of mindset, culture, and continuous skills-building to cultivate a resilient workforce.
Workstyle, Workplace and Workforce
What's the #1 talent challenge that your sector is facing? How does it vary from market to market?
Gwen Wong: With the rapid acceleration of technology, it’s an uphill battle trying to keep up with the demand in terms of attracting and retaining talents. One major challenge is upskilling and reskilling employees. To drive transformation and business success, we need employees who are willing to up their competency level and be equipped with the ever-evolving technology skills and obtain growth opportunities.
How are you tackling this challenge, and how closely are you working with your leadership stakeholders on it?
Gwen Wong: While the Great Resignation certainly had its downsides, it has also sharpened our focus on talent retention. With support from the FUJIFILM Business Innovation (FB) leadership team, we adopted the build, borrow, and buy strategies to fill critical skill gaps and develop talents from within the organisation. Strategic workforce planning with the various head of departments and workforce analytics are also put in place to help determine the right mix of build, buy and borrow strategies to be implemented.
Employees who continuously upskill and enhance their capabilities while possessing a growth mindset are key considerations when identifying talents. Stretch assignments and problem-solving opportunities are also provided to reinforce learning.
Employee engagement surveys are introduced to help us to listen and understand how our employees are feeling and thinking. We are looking into forming focus groups to drive change based on employee feedback.
Workplace Resilience: Mindset, Skills, and Culture
What exactly does it mean to have resilience in our workplace for us in FUJIFILM Business Innovation?
Gwen Wong: One of the key characteristics of workplace resilience is having a growth mindset. This means that you’re able to see challenges and failures as opportunities for growth and learning. Our FY2023 Corporate Direction reinforces this message of employees consciously adopting a growth mindset and taking cross organisational challenges. Organisations with a growth mindset learn to innovate, stay competitive, and support a culture of continuous learning and improvement.
This message was reinforced by our CEO Naoki Hama, President and CEO, of FUJIFILM Business Innovation Corp, during his recent visit to Singapore. He reiterated that to realise our ideal FUJIFILM Business Innovation, we must foster a corporate culture in which every employee boldly tackles challenges without fearing failure.
What preparation is FUJIFILM Business Innovation HR planning for the workforce? How does HR gauge workforce resilience?
Gwen Wong: At FB Human Resources, we’ve providing learning and development opportunities so that employees enhance their skills and competencies. This includes soft skills such as emotional intelligence and problem-solving, which are crucial for overall productivity and better organisational innovation.
Our emotional intelligence programs aim to strengthen employees’ ability to recognise and manage their own emotions and those of others. Other programs that focus on problem-solving and decision-making can improve employees’ critical and creative thinking skills.
Second, we’re focused on developing a stronger culture of workplace communication and collaboration across different levels and departments, for instance, by encouraging one-on-one meetings and more collaborative communication between managers and employees.
Third, we promote employees’ psychological health through company initiatives like the Employee Assistance Program, which offers confidential counselling services for personal and work-related problems. We’ve also introduced various wellness and fitness workshops to help employees develop healthy habits for physical and mental wellbeing.
How can we tell if these efforts are working? At Human Resources we use clear parameters to help us gauge workforce resilience. We monitor key performance metrics such as absenteeism, employee engagement, and productivity. We also listen to managers’ feedback on employees’ performance, motivation, and engagement level.
How does FUJIFILM Business Innovation define its culture of work, and where can it be further improved?
Gwen Wong: It is important to define a positive culture of work to create a productive and engaged workforce. FB has always articulated our corporate identity, vision, and mission, through various communication platforms. These efforts help align our many policies and behaviours with our overarching company direction to unify our workplace culture.
One area of improvement for us is in developing employees’ capacity for innovation and creativity. We should encourage employees to take risks and provide a supportive environment for them to try new ideas without fear of failure.
HR and the Future of Work
What are some upcoming human resource trends? Are there AI-specific and other technologies that will positively shape the workforce of the future in FB?
Gwen Wong: Yes, AI can be used to enhance workflow processes to improve productivity and satisfaction. For example, when we adopt AI to automate repetitive administrative tasks like data entry, employees are freed up to focus on more challenging and rewarding work. We can also use AI for better decision-making when it comes to analysing employee performance and performing predictive analytics for future staffing needs.
Another popular trend is the flexible work arrangement for better work-life integration. We are starting to move away from this traditional work culture by allowing employees to work from home one or two days per week. Such hybrid work arrangements are important is important to improve employee satisfaction, and talent retention and attraction to stay competitive.
Aside from gaining insights directly from employees, how does an HR leader such as yourself take a bird’s eye view to see global shifts in workforce patterns?
Gwen Wong: HR leaders have always gotten a sense of the wider world by connecting to the global HR community, for instance by looking at industry survey reports, and attending HR conferences and networking events. Besides this, HR leaders need to work closely with business leaders to identify skills gaps, develop talent strategies and plan for future workforce needs.
In this new era of work, business leaders need to create value for the workforce. How can HR facilitate this creation of value among the distributed workforce?
Gwen Wong: A distributed workforce is a group of employees who work remotely from different locations, rather than working together in a centralised location. It can be very challenging to maintain a sense of team cohesion.
HR can help to effectively manage a distributed workforce in several ways. First, lead the development of a flexible workforce policy that outlines expectations, guidelines and best practices for remote or flexible work. Second, set up regular communication channels like check-ins and team meetings to make sure that remote workers feel connected to their team and the wider organisation. And finally, plays a major role in implementing a continuous feedback process for remote employees, which will help identify areas of improvement.
In this post-pandemic era, creating value for employees and building workplace resilience both lead to the same thing. We’re aiming for a culture where employees can cope with stress and ambiguity and perform well under pressure. Resilient employees are those who can adapt, recover, and bounce back from challenges. Uncertainty will always be present. Programming our mindset, skills, and culture for resilience can make all the difference.
"One of the key characteristics of workplace resilience is to have a growth mindset. People with a growth mindset see challenges and failures as opportunities for growth and learning. We should provide an environment for employees to try new ideas without fear of failures. We celebrate successes and learn from failures to promote a culture of continuous improvement."
