COVID-19 and Career Transition: What’s the Effect?
COVID-19 has had a huge impact on society, lifestyle, health and mental health and the economy. Governments have supported many individuals across the globe financially as employers were forced to close. This support ranges between 60 and 100% of employees pay-checks.
Many governments across the globe have made it more difficult, and in some cases illegal, to layoff workers during the pandemic, however the rates of unemployment are still soaring and the redundancy rates are also climbing high. For example, in the UK, the Office for National Statistics found that for the 3 months leading up to September 2020 redundancies reached a record high of 314,000; an increase of a record 181,000 on the quarter.
As some sectors have been harder hit than others, there has however been an increase in labour mobility between sectors. This is particularly interesting as more recruiters and employers are starting to look at different candidates than in previous times. Soft skills are becoming more important and career fluidity is increasing.
This shift in ‘desirable skills’ for job roles, will also help to feed the increasing trend for younger people to move jobs more frequently than in the past and may lead to workers having more experience in multiple roles.
How to Help Your Employees
HR teams have had to very quickly adapt their workforces in 2020 – some into unknown territory of a remote workforce, remote management, training, changes to IT infrastructure and supporting employees in an entirely different way. Employees expect a high level of support and understanding from their employers and HR teams must work out how this is delivered. And then comes structural changes to organisations. Restructuring within firms is inevitable, and now many companies face restructuring their workforce, some perhaps on a large scale.
It is important that a strong strategic plan has been put in place looking at the talent within the company, gap analysis and the possibility of internal mobility before redundancies are made. Many organisations will partner with a specialist career transition provider to help them navigate through this mammoth task. Professional career transition specialists will help to bridge the gap between strategy and implementation providing guidance and programmes for each step.
Communication with employees is highly important and must be managed correctly. Every step of the process could have a huge effect on an individual and on the reputation of the organisation.
COVID-19 and career transition is intrinsically linked. The world of work will change in the aftermath of the virus, that much is inevitable. However, with an increase in labour mobility between sectors and industries, and the realisation of the importance of soft skills, employees can thrive if given the right support when exiting an organisation. Specific and successful programmes for employees have been designed to do just this.
If you require any further information on how we can support your organisation and employees, please contact us here.