Global corporates face five key challenges for sustainability

New research identifies five key challenges global companies face to sustain performance now and in the future.
Global companies are failing to put the right “people strategies” in place to meet critical business challenges, according to new research from global management consultancy Hay Group. Based on data from more than 5 million employees globally, the research identifies collaboration, agility, transparency, innovation and productivity as the five key challenges facing global businesses over the next 15 years.
Overcoming these challenges will depend on an engaged and enabled workforce.
“People are crucial to sustaining performance in this rapidly changing world, and organisations need to wake up to this. Our research shows that firms rated highest for engaging and enabling their staff achieve four and a half times the revenue growth of their lowest-scoring counterparts and see up to 54-per-cent improvement on staff retention,” said Nongnuch Obsuwan, a senior consultant at Hay Group.
“Successful organisations will be those that realise their employees are a unique asset and can help them meet challenges both now and in the future,” she said.

Collaboration
Keeping up with change and making the right decisions will require new levels of collaboration. This means bringing together teams, functions, organisations and even competitors to reach solutions.
But despite 80 per cent of global organisations placing teamwork among their strengths, Hay Group’s research reveals that close to half of employees (44 per cent) say that their teams are not adequately supported by counterparts elsewhere in the business. Furthermore, 35 per cent feel that cooperation and sharing of ideas and resources are not readily encouraged. In Thailand, it is likely to go in the same direction.
Collaboration is only set to get tougher with an emerging multi-generational workforce that is increasingly used to working remotely. Organisations need to make sure they have the right platforms, processes, practices and development tools in place to ensure that employees aren’t left frustrated and disengaged.

Agility
In a fluid and complex business environment, different ways of thinking and behaving are required. Only the most agile organisations will survive. Continuous training and clear communication are critical to help employees cope with changing demands.
Hay Group’s data indicate that working with agility is something many organisations struggle with, as more than a third of employees (36 per cent) feel that decisions are not generally made at the right level and close to half (46 per cent) are concerned about the speed of decision-making at their firm.
To promote agility, leaders will need to ensure that decision-making is seen as an opportunity for development rather than a burden. To push decision-making downwards, organisations also need to make people feel comfortable with delegation. Moreover, training is essential to prepare the skills, knowledge and abilities that employees need both now and in the future.
In Thailand, it was found that a little more than half (55 per cent) of employees were not trained adequately. This suggests that organisations in Thailand do not efficiently support the development skills and abilities that can help with competition and new challenges that may occur.

Transparency
Digital technology has fostered a climate of transparency. Transparency is at the heart of business in this era where the management must have integrity and accountability. Just the slightest showing of dissatisfaction towards a customer can cause the customer to discredit the organisation with a click of the mouse.
Social media can also feed information to your key employees and making it easier for them to search for new opportunities easier if they feel de-motivated in the organisation.
Research shows that, globally, there is a dangerous lack of clarity around how performance is linked to pay and career development. Fewer than half of employees (45 per cent) feel that there is a clear and transparent connection between their performance and their pay, and 43 per cent feel that better performance won’t lead to opportunities to progress.
Meanwhile, more than half (52 per cent) believe they are not paid fairly for the work they do and 41 per cent lack clarity on the possible career paths available to them.
In Thailand, 42 per cent of employees feel that their organisation is not being open and honest in communications to them, so the management team should focus more on this.

Innovation
Innovation is key to responding to new business challenges. Many companies are keen for employees to innovate.
More than a third (37 per cent) of employees don’t believe they’re encouraged to take reasonable risks to try out new ideas and ways of working, and more employees (47 per cent) feel their ideas aren’t put into practice.
About 40 per cent of employees in Thailand stated that the organisation was not being innovative in how work is done (using new technologies or creative approaches to improve internal effectiveness).

Productivity
While improvement depends on innovation, there is a fine balance for companies to strike between this and keeping people focused on their day-to-day business operations. Creating environments that help employees get their tasks done as efficiently as possible will be crucial, yet many organisations don’t have the right enabling policies in place.
Hay Group research indicates that almost half (44 per cent) of employees believe their organisation does not operate efficiently and is not effectively organised and structured (45 per cent). In addition, More than half (52 per cent) of employees report that staffing levels are inadequate in their particular area of the business.
In Thailand, 44 per cent of employees indicated that their organisation did not support them in achieving a reasonable balance between work life and personal life.
Improvements to productivity can come in many forms – from making sure staff are adequately trained and ensuring well-being is prioritised, to introducing digital technology to make employees’ lives easier.
The above may paint a bleak picture for businesses going into 2015 and beyond, but as Nongnuch points out, chief executives and business leaders are already viewing employee engagement as critical to future company success.
While human resources can lead the way in developing these, it’s not just an HR issue. All areas of the business will need to be involved to develop and maintain these strategies and ingrain them in company culture.