Mercer recently released their Global Talent Trends 2019 report and there is a ton of great information on talent trends in it for talent management pros and leaders of any organization who want to know what’s coming.

Mercer’s research indicates that thriving organizations are “human-led and digitally enabled.” We couldn’t agree more. At Powers Resource Center, these two key factors are integral to our daily work with clients trying to create a culture of connection.   

The report outlines four key talent trends, but we are particularly interested in these two:

TREND: Curating the work experience. This is defined as making work simple, intuitive and digitally-enabled to help people grow and thrive.

Per the report, “With remote working and virtual teaming increasingly a reality, the quality of each employee’s experience depends, to a large extent, on frictionless digital collaboration….Enabling the workforce to thrive requires a redesign of the work experience to ensure the right information and opportunities are visible at the right time, and to foster employees’ sense of connection to each other and to their company.”

This talent trend is very consistent with our own research findings and experience with clients. You cannot simply create remote teams with the same structure, leadership, collaboration and communication skills of a traditional team located in the same building. It will fail. You need a new set of rules and skills to make remote teams work. Some of the skillsets the Mercer report identified as gaining strength in 2019 are digital leadership, agile project management, deep technical skills, inclusive leadership, critical thinking and problem-solving. All of these are critical skills for virtual teams.

TREND: Delivering Talent-led Change. This talent trend they defined as inspiring a growth mindset by redesigning structures, workflows and talent strategies around your people.

We are pleased the Mercer report found human capital to be an emerging trend — but we’re not surprised.  The conclusion that technological and societal change is linked to transformation in the workplace is something that’s been evident to us for a long time. We’ve been advocating for the human agenda in our deep work with our clients using programs that connect teams through trust, productive conflict and commitment.  We hope the mounting evidence will spur more companies and organizations to give HR a permanent seat at the table when major business decisions are made.

Plus, it’s good for business. Per the report, “when HR is bold, the business benefits: 53% of high-growth organizations say HR is involved in kick-starting major change, compared to 39% of modest-growth organizations.”

Adapting to these talent trends is not easy. If your organization is struggling to integrate virtual teams or you need some help supporting leaders or developing high-performing teams in this new digital age, we’d love to help. Contact us to get started today.