3. Engage in the employee

Employee engagement has been a topic of much discussion following the onset of the pandemic. In line with what we’ve already said, independent analysts at Gartner have highlighted that engagement will be key in building effective talent strategies in the years to come.

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Gartner cites equity, connectedness to work, and frequent soft and hard measurement as essential to maintaining engagement.

Meeting these requirements and creating an experience of work that promotes engagement will require a much more proactive level of involvement and be much more innovative and flexible in their approach to building new workforce strategies.

In the past, HR teams have been the guardians of rules and processes. In the future, HR will have to be risk takers and be willing to experiment in order to become catalysts for change, rather than simply trying to maintain stability.

This will require not only a willingness to be flexible, but a willingness to establish much higher degrees of trust with your workforce. If the pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that leaders who build trust and maintain transparency are rewarded with engaged employees. Showing you can invest time in someone’s career and wellbeing gives the employee confidence they are not simply a cog in the machine.