Home office, transgenders, purposes: How HR can help your company in times of change

The world has changed in ways that are hard to keep up with. not only the transformations are faster and more intense, as well as more complex and frequent. We have to deal with new facts in practically all spheres, from the environment to popular manifestations, from technology to politics. Many of the movements we still cannot understand.

The global advance of the extreme right ideology, conservative in customs, is something that has intrigued researchers around the world. At the same time, the number of young people identifying as transgender has nearly doubled in the United States in recent years, according to a survey commissioned by CDCthe American health agency.

The study anticipates the trend of a society that embraces diverse gender identities – beyond the male-female binary. The routine of “polyamorous” families (in which individuals of the most varied profiles unite to share the house, raise children and married life) and the network of services that emerges to serve this public was highlighted in the New Yorker magazine, from March 2021.

In technology, we also have to deal with phenomena that did not exist in the past. For example, deep fake, the tool that creates very high quality fake videos, almost impossible to identify as a fraud.

We learned about deep fake after a video of an allegedly drunk Tom Cruise went viral on the internet – reaching over 11 million views. There has even been the case of a startup that appointed a “lie” CEO and a company that lost millions of dollars because it fell into the scam of a false CEO, created by a deep fake system.

At work, we experienced the most radical change at the beginning of the covid-19 pandemic, when hundreds of thousands of office workers were sent home to carry out their duties there, isolated from colleagues and away from the eyes of the boss. No one had ever imagined that such a feat would be possible. And, as much as CEOs criticize the remote, no company ceased to exist because its professionals work from home in flip-flops and sweatpants.

Changing world comes to the workplace

All these transformations make us reflect on the world around us and on our lives – in which the sphere of job has an important role.

No wonder, during the pandemic, the movement called Great Resignationwhen a record number of people (including those in Brazil) decided to ask resignation🇧🇷 The reason for leaving did not come from a specific source of dissatisfaction (the salary, the boss, the job itself), but from a complex set of factors, linked to the exhausting routine, the lack of purpose, the desire to change.

The changes, on the one hand, are frightening. Our first reaction is to want to go back to the comfort zone, to what we know. This, by the way, is a theory to justify the global advance of the extreme right: without understanding the transformations in society, some would seek comfort in traditional ideologies. And perhaps this is also why so many CEOs are pushing employees to get back to the office. Having no idea what the working relationship will be like from now on, the safest thing is to go back two steps.

But, once the ignition is given, there is no turning back.

Thus, the best way to deal with changes is to observe them, study them and, as far as possible, follow them. This requires flexibility🇧🇷 Just because the work has always been done under the same roof doesn’t mean it can only be done that way. Just because we are told that the family consists of a man, a woman and their children does not mean that this is the only permissible arrangement.

Another fundamental point is that companies stop seeing themselves as a nucleus apart from society. Even today, many executives are concerned with changing consumer behavior and, based on research, create products and services that meet new demands.

But how many are interested in knowing whether the benefits offered to employees Are they aligned with the profile of the people who work there? Does the corporate health plan Do you accept the inclusion of dependents of the same sex? And is the company prepared to include trans professionals?

Here, I have cited just a few examples of transformations. There are many others. The important thing is that business leaders and those responsible for managing people understand that all factors are connected.

If companies continue to see themselves as separate from society, it will only breed resistance and conflict. But if they also position themselves as an element open to news, they will be able to see the opportunities and continue to evolve – like society.

Tatiana Sendin is founder and CEO of Think Work. Journalist specializing in business and human resources, for the last 20 years she has been writing about careers, the job market, people management, entrepreneurship and technology.

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