at Globalization Partners
Answered 4 years ago
“Equality and diversity have become key objectives for every forward-thinking company, and in 2022, companies must continue to ensure they eliminate bias and deliver on opportunity for all. In focusing on these goals, it’s absolutely vital to understand that ensuring the reflection of a fair and equitable society also makes very good business sense. For example, companies that build diverse management teams can boost revenue by as much as 19%. When focusing on commercial imperatives, therefore, expansion and growth might be about delivering increased market share, but to get there, leaders should build more diverse talent pools positioned for growth. Since talent has gone global, ambitious companies will take advantage of developing new markets and investing internationally in 2022. In doing so, many will fare significantly better than those who have acted defensively in recent economic downturns."
We’re beginning to see positions like Head of Remote and other director-level positions that are dedicated to supporting a remote workforce around the world. Tech companies are early adopters of this phase of remote work that accelerated during a global pandemic, and companies in other industries are taking note. Having a dedicated leadership role for remote means that metrics are different, operations are different, engagement is different, and it all requires a different approach to leadership.
Gone are the days when ping pong tables and free food served as proof of a healthy tech company culture. Today, tech talent around the world—many of whom have transitioned to fully remote and hybrid work environments—demand flexibility, work-life balance, better pay, equity, and diversity from their employer. And they’re looking for proof of these offerings on social media and employer review sites to hear directly from the employees who work there. To compete for talent, companies must consider what their key employee benefits are, as well as rethink how they market those benefits to a global talent pool more effectively. Investing in social media recruiting and employee advocacy solutions can help scale your employer brand message and influence, and also localize that message so it reaches the right candidates in the right region, language, and timezone.
Now that the size of the global technology industry continues to grow, more and more employers are finding potential hires with non-traditional backgrounds– to create a more diverse and inclusive organization. In other words, the rise of nontraditional career paths will remain a trend in the global tech workforce. The entire industry is ripe for innovative thought processes, which is the reason why non-traditional paths can still be so successful. While highly-trained engineers with advanced degrees will always be needed, the truth is that technology careers have broken wide open for basically anyone to take advantage of. At the end of the day, the road to technology career success is littered with great ideas, hard work, and pretty much anyone who persevered and used technology to their advantage.
The world of work is changing. In today's gig economy, it's no longer necessary to hire employees—and in the tech industry, that's creating new opportunities for businesses and workers alike. By hiring freelancers, tech companies can get the work done more quickly and easily than if they had to hire full-time employees. The result? Increased productivity and profitability for the company, and more job opportunities for freelancers. Regards, Ishu Singh Founder of startingtoknow.com
The exponential demand for global freelance and gig work (e.g., contract workers) will create opportunities for countries to revise their tax laws and employment regulations to accommodate these workers. Tech companies will increasingly limit their contract opportunities for freelance and gig work to those countries that are most accommodating, perhaps even basing decisions on where to build large operations on the the tax and employment regulations for contract employees.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), positions like “information security analyst” are expected to be within the top 10 fastest growing occupations over the next decade. New threats emerge daily. This means companies need to continuously learn about them. They ought to have a team ready to tackle such security challenges. Additionally, amid developing geopolitical tensions and risks, cybersecurity experts will become central players in the world of global employment. A growing amount of surveys state that, even with current training programs, the global cybersecurity labor gap will expand by around 25% over the next few years. This calls for increased investment both in the public and private sectors.
The biggest myth I've found from tech companies is that all you need is a great product. The truth is, yes you need a great product but you also need appropriate staffing. Over the next few years, the barrier to success for tech companies won't be product, it will be people. We are in a really tough labor market and time to fill in tech firms has risen from 73 days to 90+ days. This means that tech companies will need to create staffing plans to hire talent AND contingency plans on how to grow in spite of not having appropriate staffing levels. This may include temporary staff augmentation while running searches in parallel or it may mean decreasing your interview process and allowing for paid auditions in order to hire the right fit.
Although millions of graduates enter the global labor market every year, the population of talented tech specialists is lower than demand. Until now, we could observe a race between tech companies using wages and extra benefits to overtake competitors. This high competition causes a significant rotation of employees; therefore, many companies will focus on their staff retention and end the 'salary race.' So that I believe that the continuous growth of wages in the tech industry will slow down in the coming years. Instead of money, the vast role will play currently uncommon fringe benefits like a four-day workweek or extended paid leave.
Benefits have always been a key to attracting and retaining top talent, but given the global nature of employment, companies now need to offer benefits that transcend borders. Things like worldwide health plans, WHF stipends that can be applied to coworking spaces, international company retreats, and even phone roaming reimbursement are on the table. In short, if you're competing for global talent, you need to offer a compensation package that fits their needs.
As if the tech talent pool wasn't already sparse, The Big Resignation escalated the pressure on hiring managers to up their games in hiring the top talent. Over the top, quirky, and competitive compensations package offerings are one consistent trend. The salaries for developers and engineers have always been attractive; however, the last couple of years have shot the benchmarks higher up. To up their games, some companies have adopted 4-day workweeks to promote flexibility in their workplace, some companies get creative and offer benefits packages that cover a large surface area of their employee's interests, and more.
The pandemic has normalized remote work and as a result, previously overlooked countries, in terms of tech hiring, are now likely to see a huge boom in productivity. This can already be seen in some African nations and will only increase.
To reduce the cost of recruiting we have begun to invest in reskilling our current workforce in learning complex digital skills such as data analysis, computer science, and information technology. The term ‘internal mobility’ is a new trend to upskill employees for job roles of the future. So instead of searching for new employees, we utilize our energy on how we can develop the skills that we have within the company today and apply both formal and informal methods of skills acquisition.
New platforms will continue to arise making global employment opportunities more accessible for job seekers and more efficient for human resource teams. For example, Globalization Partners is available in 187 countries and offers everything from HR to in-house legal and automated employment contracts. Boundless, another platform is bridging the gap across borders and securing employment rights globally. Platforms such as these automate recruitment, payroll, expense management, legal and more. Efficiency and opportunity are imperative moving forward and with the help of global employment platforms, the future of tech employment worldwide shines bright!
The widespread adoption of remote work transforms software development and tech recruitment into a single global market operation. Increasing broadband penetration, availability of educational resources, and disappearing barriers to flexible work accelerate this process. Although the talent distribution is still uneven across the globe, the top-performing individuals are still dispersed worldwide. Recruiting and using subcontractors from different countries shifts the market towards the equilibrium that doesn't financially discriminate based on geographical location.
Endless possibilities. Tech has always been the leader in having a global, remote workforce, but that will only expand. Tech companies will hone their ability to find the best candidates for a job on a global scale, not tied to any location limitations. Remote training will only improve, and companies may be able to find less expensive workers for high-skilled jobs in other parts of the world, which could increase the job competition for people in the USA and other locations.
The next step for tech companies in the global employment landscape is to focus on strategies to fill the skills gap. By filling the skills gap, companies can create a more efficient and productive workforce. Additionally, they can also improve their ability to compete in the global economy. One way to address the skills gap is by collaborating with educational institutions to create programs that will better prepare students for jobs in the tech industry. One way to fill the skills gap for global employment for tech companies is to provide more complex and academic-oriented training and development programs. By focusing on higher-level skills, companies can give employees the ability to work on more sophisticated projects and problems. Additionally, this type of training can also help employees be better prepared for future challenges and changes in the tech industry.
For years, tech enterprises provided an ungodly amount of workplace amenities to keep staff tethered to the office. Working remotely was not an option for most until COVID left them no choice. Initially, productivity and satisfaction increased. Yay! Until the Great Resignation happened and shook the industry once again. Boo! Employees (especially highly skilled ones) now have some serious leverage in this market. The number one thing they want is flexibility– not just the flexibility to work remotely, but whenever and for whoever the heck they want. They don\'t want to feel like one employer owns their life and who can blame them. The silver lining for employers is that remote work has also expanded their access to global talent, and there are so many benefits to hiring international contractors over local FTEs. The best thing an employer can do is embrace it and get creative to turn it into an advantage.
By expanding your candidate options, recruiting globally can lessen the amount of time it takes to find talent. This is especially important for tech companies as they typically involve many different kinds of roles that need to be filled, from product managers to software engineers. This is why tech companies are likely to keep leaning more towards recruiting and hiring from around the globe in the future.
As the world becomes increasingly digitized, the need for tech professionals will continue to grow. Companies will continue to expand their search for talent to new and emerging markets, and they will also place a greater emphasis on employee retention and satisfaction. In order to stay competitive, tech companies will need to focus on creating a positive work culture and offering employees the opportunity to learn and grow.