As companies reboot their businesses to adapt to new realities, they need to build on a number of lessons they’ve learned over the past year – from equipping their business models to be sustainable and resilient, ensuring their employees have the right skills to navigate a continuously disrupting future and identifying specific focus areas to drive growth, the return to the workplace means a new agenda for the HR function.

Through a series of expert conversations, the #HRReboot Work Week brought to experts to bring together a roadmap with ideas and solutions to navigate an uncertain future.

Mapping employee health and safety priorities for 2021

If there’s one organizational pillar that companies are going to strive towards, it is to maintain employee health and safety. 2020 was the most stressful year ever as many employees worked from home – coupled with the anxiety of the virus; they also worked longer hours at the risk of burnout. As the pandemic raged, 78 percent of the workforce said that it negatively affected their mental health, according to Oracle’s AI at Work Study.

While companies are already engaged in a number of steps improve health and safety, there’s a need to re-look at a number of monitoring and aligning processes – from leveraging wearables, tracking mental health and enabling tracebility without liability and data privacy issues, HR teams should hand hold employees.

In this deep-dive podcast, Shaakun Khanna, Head of Human Capital Management Applications, Asia Pacific, Oracle Corporation and Yasmin Taj, Managing Editor, People Matters discussed use cases of how technology is transforming the conversations on health and safety and how it is freeing up HR to focus on critical human connections.

Revamping learning: Integrating new innovations in the flow of work

One of the major shifts in the new workplace is a renewed focus and priority on learning. As companies went remote, there were new skills that became important – from digital dexterity, to soft skills and personal time management. Companies today need to align technologies that are grounded in principles that reinforce intentionality and a growth mindset, they also need to help employees put into practice their learning.

In this podcast, listen to Rowan Tonkin Senior Director, Human Resource Transformation, Oracle Corporation and Yasmin Taj, Managing Editor, People Matters as they talk about how to rethink learning journeys – from building learning based connections, integrating learning in the flow of work and creating an opportunity marketplace, there are new steps that need to be introduced.

Mapping new hiring journeys - Process, experience and priorities

As companies design a new workplace to cope with new workplace expectations with newer insights, and opportunities, there’s a need to rethinking recruiting. From the ability to access remote talent from anywhere to reinventing new onboarding process and rethinking candidate experience, there’s a need for a new hiring journey. Experts reflect on the changing journeys.

In a virtual panel, Deodutta Kurane, Group President - Human Capital Management, YES BANK, Soma Pandey, CHRO, Firstsource, Dr. Suryanarayan Iyer, Senior Director, Solution Engineering, Oracle India and Yasmin Taj, Managing Editor, People Matters discuss the changing hiring journeys

Career development in a new work environment – Going beyond career ladders

As careers took a back seat in view of business sustainability, there’s a need to refocus attention on supporting development needs and that means reviewing changing technology needs, rethinking experience and equipping managers with the right resources and tools to hone their skills and areas of growth. Although career ladders for long guided career development, companies are realizing the power of career lattices and dual career paths.

In this virtual panel, Hardeep Singh, Head of Human Capital Management Applications Strategy, Oracle India, Dr. S V Kiran, Senior Vice President & Head - Human Resources, Apollo Hospitals and Sirshendu Mookherjee, Group Head – Human Resources, Narayana Health take a deep dive into the changing learning mandate - on how they’re rethinking employee career journeys in the context of their industries. What’s changed? And what’s needed?

New workplace operating models in HR – Identifying, designing, and testing for the future

To navigate the uncertainty of the future, many companies implemented a number of steps – from hiring freeze measures, cut down on budgets, scaling up learning and enabling gig or contractual workers. As workplaces open up, companies need to rethink their employee journey throughout the employee lifecycle.  

From new work protocols, reviewing measures to enhance health and safety, rethinking flexibility with a blended workforce including onsite-remote, internal-external employees, predicting behaviour for change, refresh policies and the critical role of communication – there’s a number of new fronts to focus on. Shaakun Khanna, Head of Human Capital Management Applications, Asia Pacific, Oracle Corporation and Sukhjit S Pasricha, President & Group CHRO at Kotak Mahindra Bank shared their perspectives.

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