The future of work will be defined by flexibility, courage and a great company culture, say HR veterans

What’s the future of work in an uncertain, fast-changing world, one may wonder? For business leaders in India today, it is defined by a flexible work environment, courage to face the uncertain world and a great company culture. At the Business Today Best B-Schools and HR Summit in New Delhi, Ericsson’s Priyanka Anand stressed on the importance of flexibility and hybrid working.

"We’ve always been embracing hybrid working. We’ve always had a model of remote service centres, etc. Remote, hybrid and flexible has been the mantra that we’ve embraced for over a century. There’s a need to accelerate that a lot more. Physical presence doesn’t signify performance,” Priyanka Anand, Vice President & Head of HR, Market Area South East Asia, Oceana & India, Ericsson said.   

She said that she clearly differentiated performance v/s presence and what’s important. “As an organisation our talent strategy has been very clear. It’s about who with hire with attitudes values and behaviours and what do they deliver to the organisation with customer success, where they work from or when they work is not a point of discussion at all. The best financially performing year for us was 2020-2021 right at the peak of COVID,” she added. 

Talking of the future of work, there’s a concept called punctuated equilibrium, Dr NS Rajan, Former CEO, IDFC Foundation, ex Group CHRO, Tata Sons & Global Partner, EY explains. “Essentially it comes from evolutionary biology where seemingly small and insignificant things keep happening till they all come together and unleash as a transformation. That’s really where the future of work is going. There are three distinct dimensions: A permanent set of employees which is the core workforce, next is the contract employees and the third are external consultants,” he said.   

“Today, who you are has become less important than who will get it done. Second part is where work is done. Third aspect is the nature of work itself where you talk of technology, and AI perhaps replacing minds. That’s where the future of work is heading,” he added.  

Culture, too, is going to be very important when it comes to imagining future work. “I’ve always been a big fan of culture. It is a big multiplier of all that we want to do. In smaller new age companies, the importance of culture may not be fully realised but for organisations that have tenured, I’ve seen this multiply the efforts of what you want to achieve. With age, technology may chance but culture is one such element that stays and enables us to do what we want to do. It’s extremely powerful. And it’s always top down. It starts with the top team believing in it,” Shailesh Singh, Senior Director and Chief People Officer, Max Life Insurance said.   

According to Prabir Jha, Founder & CEO at Prabir Jha People Advisory, growth and managing risks will be the two broad job divisions and leadership will be defined by unique characteristics. “The first thing that I believe should be curiosity in a leader. I would look for courage because you’ll never have all answers to the questions. And finally, you’re in the business of influence. They must be masters of influence,” he said.  

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