Paper Addresses Various Aspects Of Changing Workforce Composition

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Introduction

This paper addresses various aspects of changing workforce composition and its impact of employee engagement in a large organization. The world has witnessed a lot of changes socially and technologically and this has had impacts on the workforce composition as well as employee engagement. The companies, in response to these changes in the workforce composition has had to adapt accordingly in order to effectively achieves its organizational objectives

Younger generation workforce

Today many companies have youthful workforce of about 40 years and below. This means that the younger age groups such Millennials who are tech savvy and like more work flexibility command high percentage of workforce in many companies. The new generations are more conscious to work-life balance and like to work under contracts.  This new composition has lead many companies adopting various strategies in order to attract and retain best talents at work.  The management style has had to move from seniority based democratic and talented based. The leader nowadays is not about how many years you’ve spend at the company but how efficient and skilled you are at the company. If the company doesn’t adopt this and stills maintain management on seniority grounds then it is likely to loose the young talents.  The mode of communication has also changed from direct in person to email, text and social media.  The companies have had to equally change in order to suit to the new composition of the workforce. (Post and DiTomaso, 2009)

Work specialization

The young generation also sees career as a contract and process as opposed to older generation which viewed career as a responsibility. The workforce is becoming more specialized viewing a job as task based not just being at office the whole day. The niche developed in terms of work specialization has seen the some companies hire an expert for specialized function on temporary basis once done the expert moves to the next company. Usually this kind of an arrangement involves a lot of money to pay for the services than it would if the expert was an in-house employee. (Christensen and Schneider, 2010)

Technological advancement

With the technological advancement across the world, like robotic advancements, the nature of the work has had to change and hence the composition of the workforce. The call centers are perfect example of how the technology has lead to change in the composition of the workforce. The call centers nowadays employ people to work from their homes as long as they are online to answer to customer queries and other work related tasks. The company only needs to invest in the technological infrastructure like websites and other online platforms to enable employees work remotely from home or any other place suitable to them. The few employees who the company keeps at its physical call centers are mainly for administrative purposes but the main tasks are carried out remotely. The companies have also been forced to invest in robots in place of human beings in a bid to become more efficient and faster in work deliveries. (The Changing Composition of the Workforce, 2012)

Experts’ composition

Due to various technologies needing various experts’ technological advancement has contributed to having heterogynous composition of the workforce at various companies. The various cultural and social differences within the workforce has lead to different approaches to issues such as smart conference facilities that enable each employee to speak in his or her official language and have the rest of the workforce understand her communication without language barrier. These teleconferencing facilities enable employees of the multinational organizations to have work- related meetings with colleagues in different countries. (Post and DiTomaso, 2009)

Changes to workplace composition

In the next 5-10 years there would a lot more demographic changes than it is now. The gap between men and women will continue getting narrower as more women become enlightened through affirmative action and other agents of social justice. The workforce will continue having young people and this percentage will only grow going forward. This means that a lot of the workforce will be more tech savvy and perhaps texts messages would get more use in terms of official communications. The reason for this is that with time people tend to look for convenient ways of doing things. Perhaps there is going to be more women at work than men given the rate at which the gap is closing. It is therefore hard to imagine that once the gap closes the ‘increasing’ trend of women will stop. So the composition of workforce could be flipped on its head in the nest 5-10 years with more women in workforce than men. (Karoly and Panis, 2004)

Workforce and managerial implications

Workers will therefore need to be having basic learning in information technology in order to be marketable in the job market. Workers will not be having this certification in the next 5-10 years may experience challenges obtaining jobs because most jobs on offer will require basic IT knowledge. For example the secretary jobs is likely to move to remote working say at home where a secretary can respond to inquiries from clients through IT communication platforms. The need for physical secretary may no longer be necessary given the technological advancements. (Heler, 2014)

For managers, they will need to more tolerant and consensus building as opposed to only providing directions. The managers will need to be more skilled people with basic qualifications on IT on the minimum to be able to lead by example. They would need to adopt a flexible working schedule in order to align itself with the workforce who will ne more interested in work-life balance than before. Therefore a good company now should start preparations of flexing its time table in preparation of the incoming workforce. The managers will want to attract best talents for their respective organizations and to achieve this work environment should be conducive for the younger workforce generation. (Heler, 2014)

Conclusion

In conclusion the world will continue witnessing unprecedented changes in the composition of the workforce in various companies. The ever present technological advancement and the need for more work-life balance will continue being major agents of the changes in the workforce composition. The companies will therefore be required to continue aligning themselves to these changes in order to remain competitive in the market and attract and retain best talents available.

References

Belloc, H. (1923). On. New York: George H. Doran Co.

Christensen, K. and Schneider, B. (2010). Workplace flexibility. Ithaca: ILR Press.

Heler, D. (2014). New Workforce: Changing Demographics' Impact on Electric and Gas Utilities: A Practitioner's Solution. Natural Gas & Electricity, 30(11), pp.12-18.

Karoly, L. and Panis, C. (2004). The 21st century at work. Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND.

Ordun, G. and Akun, A. (2016). Personality Characteristics and Emotional Intelligence Levels of Millenials: A Study in Turkish Context. Journal of Economic and Social Studies, 6(1).

PALLIATIVE CARE WORKFORCE: TEAM COMPOSITION ACROSS SETTINGS. (2015). The Gerontologist, 55(Suppl_2), pp.777-777.

Post, C. and DiTomaso, N. (2009). Diversity in the work force. Bingley: Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

The Changing Composition of the Workforce. (2012). Springer Verlag