New Work Forum: Only 50 percent of employees look forward to digitization
The HR Panel New Work study presented at the 2nd St.Gallen New Work Forum showed that there is considerable skepticism about digitization, even if the majority of respondents believe it offers opportunities. That is why the authors asked those present to explain the benefits, approach, scope and expected changes of a digitization strategy to employees. Opportunities, solutions, but also challenges were discussed at more than 20 workshops in the Olmahallen in St.Gallen.
On January 9, 2019, the St.Gallen New Work Forum took place for the second time. This event is organized annually by HR-Panel New Work of the University of Applied Sciences St.Gallen. The HR-Panel New Work accompanies companies and employees on their way to New Work. The content of the forum consists of the presentation of the annual HR-Panel New Work study, keynote speeches and workshops, whereby the latter are submitted by call and selected by the HR-Panel New Work.
The participants of this year's New Work Forum were welcomed by RAIffi, a humanoid robot from Raiffeisen Bank St. Gallen, with the words: "I think it's great that you're daring to take a look at the future of the working world. At the forum, 200 professionals and experts from business, government or educational institutions discussed whether satisfactory collaboration between humans and machines was a utopia or achievable. This question was derived from the first HR Panel New Work study, in which respondents attributed the greatest and, in some cases, undesirable potential for change to digitization. In the second study, presented on January 9, 2019, Prof. Dr. Alexandra Cloots, co-leader of the HR-Panel New Work at the University of Applied Sciences St.Gallen (FHS) and responsible for the forum, and her co-leader and rector of the FHS Prof. Dr. Sebastian Wörwag, investigate what employees expect from digitalization. As it turned out, these are both fears and opportunities.
Digitization triggers concerns in the work environment
The fears are expressed by the fact that only half of the respondents, and thus half of the employees, are looking forward to digitization. At the same time, the majority of respondents consider digitization to be an opportunity. Location-independent working is mentioned as a positive development, while the increase in performance pressure or the routinization of work, for example through more documentation, is mentioned as a negative aspect. Changes, according to the respondents, will mainly be reflected in terms of efficiency thinking, rules and technologization. Only 12% expect more humanity as a result of digitization, i.e., that routine activities can be handed over to the machine and employees can focus instead on people, customers, guests, work colleagues or partners. While the skeptics are mainly to be found among employees over 46 years of age, those just starting out in their careers are also skeptical about individual aspects: the young see a danger in the substitution of people, i.e., that jobs will be eliminated.
Technology, Michael Baeriswyl, Head of Data, Analytics and AI, Swisscom is certain in his keynote speech, will have a very big impact on the world of work. "Everything you can imagine is technically possible and everything that is technically possible will eventually be made possible." The truism that nothing is as constant as change proves true here as well, and as Luzia Schuler of workingwell emphasized in her workshop, a learning culture, flexibilization and networking are central to successfully dealing with digitization as an aspect of New Work. This in turn requires new, adapted leadership. However, as the HR Panel New Work study found, there are many skeptics among management. Accordingly, it is not surprising that only 18% of the respondents recognize a change in leadership behavior. In view of all these aspects, the HR Panel New Work study authors formulate a central request: "We need to communicate well about the benefits, the approach and the scope of a digitization strategy honestly and transparently," said Cloots during the presentation.
Artificial intelligence and automated processes also do work
Sandra Hutterli, Head of corporate training at SBB, showed in her workshop what such communication can look like: A video made for the employees shows the positive aspects of digitalization. Although Hutterli did not introduce this by saying that the video is intended to take away fear, this nevertheless resonates in statements in the video such as "we all want to be digital for a strong SBB". Likewise, SBB's head of education emphasized that artificial intelligence and automated processes also get work done. Therefore, she said, they are not evil, but can make a significant contribution so that SBB can fulfill its mission. These statements explain the benefits of digitization and arose in the context of SBB's claim to prepare and qualify all employees and managers for digitization in order to ensure the organization's future viability.
If digitization brings freedom, as Roman Büchler from BSG Unternehmensberatung AG emphasized in his workshop, the question arises as to which prison employees are currently in, what they are currently missing out on because this cannot be experienced in a prison, and ultimately also how people will relearn how to deal with freedom. These aspects are also reflected in the HR Panel New Work study: While, as mentioned, location-independent working, or a general flexibilization of work in terms of location, time and portfolio, is seen as an opportunity, at the same time there are fears of rules that restrict or complicate the freedom that comes with flexibilization. This brings us full circle to the fact that digitization as an aspect of New Work requires new management behavior that is characterized by trust - which, however, is in contradiction to the skeptics in management already mentioned.
Employees are also digitization drivers
The study also shows that the employer is not necessarily the digitization driver, but that private individuals in particular are also drivers. They already use many opportunities for digitization more frequently in their private lives than in the work environment, mentioning information gathering via blogs, forums or websites, the use of cloud services such as Dropbox or the use of instant messaging services such as Whatsapp. But even if the private individual is the driver and the majority of respondents see digitization as an opportunity, the skeptics should still be taken seriously, according to Alexandra Cloots and Sebastian Wörwag, so that they can be identified so that they can be addressed in the implementation. If digitization primarily triggers concerns in the work environment, they say, this can be countered with (quick) wins whose benefits and progress are emphasized. There are always opportunities for such development steps, because, as Wörwag emphasizes, digitization is an eternal process in which a higher level of maturity can be achieved, but which will never be finished.
