Seven Future Workplace Trends

Here is a list of seven future workplace trends from Yahoo and my take on each of them:

1. Four-Day Workweeks (and Three-Day Weekends!)

I'd LOVE it! And from the comments I've received, sounds like most of you would too!

2. Shape Up or Pay Up. Expect employers to take a more personal interest in your well-being through mandatory corporate wellness programs.

The issue of heathcare costs is not going away and employers will be trying in any way possible to lower their liability to costs. I'm sure we've yet to see even the beginning of the "creative" methods they will use.

3. Why Your Degree May Say "Yahoo! U." So that workers can hit the ground running, work more efficiently, and advance more quickly, Challenger, Gray & Christmas believe that large corporations will begin to create their own degree programs.

Interesting thought: will a "degree" from a top-flight business (think Google for the web, Procter and Gamble for marketing, Toyota for operations, etc.) eventually be worth more than a college degree? Could be (but you'd probably need a college degree to get into the company-specific program anyway.)

4. Recruitment Goes Global. If you ever dreamed of working in another country, the possibility is drawing ever closer.

And the pay will likely be better. I know several FMF readers are US citizens working overseas. Any suggestions, ideas, comments, etc. you can add to this thought would certainly be useful and appreciated.

5. Kiss Your Cube Goodbye. In order to maximize employee interaction and teamwork, many companies will eliminate the isolating cube and redesign their workspace to feature common areas, conference rooms, and tables, as opposed to individual desks.

I don't know. I'm enough "old school" to like my own space. You?

6. HQ's Get 86'd. The image of a hulking headquarters building will fade as fast as old newspapers in the years to come.

If this means working at home, I'm all for it!!!

7. Athletes Aren't the Only Free Agents. Baseball and basketball players, among others, aren't the only talented people who can be free agents. Expect more white-collar workers to follow their example. "The move to hiring temporary and contract employees, freelancers and consultants is beneficial for both companies and workers," Challenger says.

Wow, this would completely re-write the workplace rules if it's ever used broadly. Lots of implications for employers and employees alike.

Comments

[Trent D.]

"5. Kiss Your Cube Goodbye. In order to maximize employee interaction and teamwork, many companies will eliminate the isolating cube and redesign their workspace to feature common areas, conference rooms, and tables, as opposed to individual desks."

My wife works at a place like this, and she HATES it. Everyone in the company feels like it promotes idle chatter and makes it harder to focus on a task. Bad idea in most cases.

I work in a sales department, so it's important to be able to listen in and discuss things easily between open cubes, but for a more task-oriented job, it would be murder.

[Michael Blackburn]

7. Free Agents. Not until we get ourselves free from our employer-paid healthcare system. One big reason for the rise of active "semi-retired" Boomers is that they've got Medicare. They're not chained to their desk because they need to make sure their family is protected.

Sure, I can change jobs, but I can't go out on my own because my wife's plan is horrible and will eat up too much of her salary to provide insurance for all of us. And we're both healthy!

It's killing our companies competitiveness too. The only numbers I could find were from 2004, when GM spent $1500 per car on healthcare. At a healthcare inflation rate of 15% over three years, that's $2250 now.

So, what if the government paid for it? Let's say that $2250 were a VAT on the cost of a car, which in 2007 averaged $28,800. 2250/(28800-2250)= 8.5%

OK, so let's say that VAT is added to last year's entire GDP of $13.5 trillion, and you get $1.15T. Since the elderly and disabled will participate in this program as well, we can subtract the $440B we're already spending on Medicare and the $300B combined federal-state expenditure for Medicaid, and we get an incremental federal budget of $441B to provide GM union quality health care for every consumer in the US, without any economies of scale calculated. Granted, not caclulating waste to beuracracy, either, but there's PLENTY of b-waste in the current system, I assure you.

Now, that's all back-of-the-napkin, not-sure-I-believe-it-myself figgerin' but it sounds about right. Michael Moore's full of shit, this is NOT a no-brainer. $441B would be a HUGE program, just slightly smaller than DoD. In return, you gain enormous freedom for our economy, nearly eliminating the HR staff of every major corporation (they'll all go to work in the gummint or who knows? maybe do something productive instead) and creating a real booom in free-agency and entrepeneurship. Oh, and insure the 44M Americans currently without health care, but that's just a moral argument, so we'll let it slide.

Probably the best benefit of removing the profit motive from healthcare? NO MORE VIAGRA COMMERCIALS!

[dcs]

Got #1 - half of my "weekends" are four days (the other half are 3 days). We also have plenty of sometimes telecommuters, many via company-provided T1s.

Got #2 to a small extent - company will pay for a membership to the YMCA (might also chip in for other clubs, can't remember) but the catch is you must use it a certain number of times per month. You can't sign up then never go. There's no penalty for not using that benefit though.

Along the same lines, the CEO won't allow food vending machines on the premises because they're stocked with 99% junk food. There is a subsidized soda machine. It's still not cheaper than bringing from home though :).

Got #5 - I haven't had a cube for years. I work at a table with a small table-top privacy divider between me and the next table. It's also not exclusively mine. It is shared with someone who works on my off days because our HQ leans heavily towards item #6 - one of those old downtown loft-conversion kind of places (ours was a railroad depot). We all still have private, lockable drawers that nobody ever locks, but not at the desk.

This is not (and should not be) the setup for all positions at the company, but works very well for my department which has deadlines measured in minutes and requires extensive co-operation between team members.

By the way, a lot of problems accidentally get solved or prevented during some of those idle chats, believe it or not. I've seen all-staff emails from management chiding us for failing to wander around enough interacting with colleagues in other divisions or departments.

Huh, four out of seven. Pretty progressive for Nowhere, Michigan eh?

[miramaxa]

I love this list. In particular, I value that extra weekend day for four 10-hour weekdays.

[Amanda]

I worked in a School District in South Florida on an internship not long ago. The policy of the school district was that all employees worked ten hour days during the summer and spring break. Its a good system (and game us about 1.5 hours to shovel paperwork before customers came in) but it can certainly wear on you.