The HR Dive Outlook on 2022

From the Great Resignation to vaccine mandate confusion, last year was a wild ride for HR. Some things may not have cleared up much — like when the pandemic will end or when the labor market will stabilize — but HR Dive's predictions build on the learnings from the last 12 months. Nearly two years into the pandemic, here's how the continued relevance of COVID-19 is reshaping the workplace for the long term. 

The key word? Flexibility

Between the remote-work revolution wrought by the pandemic and the challenges brought on by the talent shortage, even the most conventional workplaces are pivoting like never before. Employers are more confident work can get done despite drastic changes to the standard work style. That gives HR more freedom to experiment, whether that means letting employees pick their own hours, introducing a four-day workweek or following another path.

Even companies that are unable to adopt certain types of hourly changes can pursue flexibility in their own ways. "You can be really creative with scheduling shift workers and thinking innovatively about making sure someone has plenty of notice if you are going to change their shift, or creating a schedule such that if someone takes two days of vacation, then they can piece together a 10-day break or something like that," Anthony Klotz, the professor who predicted the Great Resignation, previously told HR Dive.

Employers will forge their own way on vaccine policy

Since the development of a COVID-19 vaccine, employers have been trying to decide how to approach its use in the workplace. The Biden administration seemed to clarify this with the announcement of a federal temporary emergency standard in September, which would require large employers to ensure their workforces are fully vaccinated. The ETS has been tied up in the courts, however, and the U.S. Supreme Court issued a stay Jan. 13, preventing its enforcement. 

The stay is "certainly not the end of the road" for the federal mandate, "but it is a significant impairment for the administration to impose a broad mandate under its current structure," Shaun Kennedy, partner at law firm Holland & Hart, told HR Dive. The Supreme Court stay means the government cannot implement the ETS in its current state, and employers will be in a holding pattern until the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issues a decision. That could take 6 to 8 months, Kennedy said — and even after that, the policy may be reviewed again by the U.S. Supreme Court, prolonging the process further. 

The bottom line for employers? At this point, consider vaccine policy to be an individual company choice. "I certainly expect there will be some that just go full speed ahead on either vaccine or test requirements," Kennedy said. "And then I expect there will be some that will take shelter in the fact that these [various mandates] are stayed and relax some of those requirements. It just really comes down to a company-by-company basis, to what their culture and ethos is."

Industry responses are already taking shape — and not without pains. Citi has taken a hardline approach, for example, putting office workers who did not comply with a Jan. 14 deadline to upload their vaccination cards on unpaid leave. (The company plans to terminate them by the end of January, it said.) United Airlines, an early adopter of the vaccine mandate, faced a suit from employees who alleged the airline did not provide reasonable accommodations to its policy and retaliated against them. On the other hand, employers in the construction industry have been far less eager to adopt a mandate, with construction workers more resistant to the policy.

Pandemic stresses importance of timely care, well-being support

While questions about the COVID-19 vaccine may still be relevant in 2022, the employee benefits side of the house will need to deal with other healthcare issues. For example, observers have speculated about the role of virtual care in improving care delivery, now that patient populations have had more exposure to the concept during the pandemic. According to Adam Stavisky, senior VP of U.S. benefits at Walmart, the importance of timely care access has heightened going into next year.

"Increased interest in virtual care have spurred us to expand telehealth options to include primary care, physical therapy, and digestive health," Stavisky said in an email. "We're also making it easy for more associates to find great doctors by leveraging data to identify doctors who more consistently practice medicine according to current science."

The retailer was one of many employers to expand virtual care options in 2021, particularly for mental and emotional health. Beyond those dimensions, the company also is planning to address financial well-being next year. "So, whether someone is a technologist working on our eCommerce experience, an hourly associate stocking shelves or in any role across the enterprise, our associates have access to a host of great physical, emotional and financial well-being benefits year-round," Stavisky said.

Performance reviews increasingly continuous, informal

Managers have been exposed to a more human and casual side of their employees the past two years, from hearing dogs bark in the background of a videoconference to embracing patience as workers manage child or elder care. This evolution has helped break down hierarchical barriers and facilitated flexibility and informality in other aspects of the job, including performance management.

The conventional process for the annual performance review is, in a word, "painful," Rosette Cataldo of Workhuman told HR Dive. As vice president of performance and talent strategy for the firm, Cataldo is seeing more and more companies move away from the standard process in which managers reflect on a year's worth of performance, write up a summary, use a self-assessment and sometimes deliver a rating, a procedure Cataldo said "doesn't feel very human."

The forward-thinking approach that more and more companies are adopting involves a continuous process of providing "quick, two-minute insights," Cataldo said.  

In addition, the mindset toward assessment is shifting to a more empowering strategy of coaching, which has been shown to increase engagement and productivity. "Imagine if I said to you, 'Instead of you having an assessment, I'm going to give you an opportunity to reflect, so I can coach you.' Just think about the words of that. 'And then we can collectively plan what you're going to do in 2022,'" Cataldo described of the process. 

When it comes to learning, think small

These days, autonomy is everything to the workforce. Employers can lean in by embracing the "two biggest trends" Kay Green, founder of learning software company EDesign Consulting, sees in the marketplace: "micro and on-demand learning." 

"The ability to engage at the employee's preferred time and location and the ability to learn in [small] 'chunks' has changed the face of training," Green told HR Dive via email. "It also changes how businesses approach training, because it opens the door to creating micro lessons on any cultural, procedural, or industrial information an organization wants employees to be aligned on." 

When it comes to DEI, parental leave and pay transparency will take center stage

Mandy Price, CEO and co-founder of Kanarys, said she believes parental leave will take center stage as companies mount DEI goals for the new year. "Since January 2021, the pandemic has forced a 'shecession.' Nearly three million women have dropped out of the workforce," she wrote in an email to HR Dive. 

Because the pandemic has turned a bright light on challenges faced by working parents and caregivers, Price said HR should expect ongoing conversation around parental and paid family leave, particularly following related budgetary cuts from the Build Back Better spending plan. "Workers demand better policies that put families first," Price said.

Some companies have taken the lead on parental leave; Pinterest, for example, recently rolled out a NICU benefit in addition to extending its parental leave to nearly six months for the birthing parent. 

Price also believes pay transparency is on the rise. For positive change in a new year, she said, "companies need to publish pay ranges for each position; clearly define roles and responsibilities and use market data to set salary ranges to eliminate bias and create a less subjective pay structure; conduct pay equity audits to identify and resolve existing pay disparities and opportunities to improve equity; [and] train managers to have proactive salary conversations with employees." Company leaders also need to work with HR experts to understand the root cause behind the disparities, she added.

Organized labor is on the upswing

The PRO Act may have stalled out in Congress, but in the wake of #Striketober and with employers facing a tight labor market, employees are still organizing. 

Several Starbucks locations recently unionized, and more are in line to take a vote. The National Labor Relations Board recently ordered a new election for Amazon's closely watched Bessemer, Alabama, distribution center, which is set to start next month. And Google was recently ordered by a federal judge to release documents related to an internal anti-union initiative.  

In other words, workers are feeling empowered and the NLRB is paying attention. Employers may want to get a sense of worker morale and brush up on the National Labor Relations Act.

 

With Great Resignation comes great responsibility. As HR departments seek to backfill vacated roles or hire for new ones, recruiters are tasked with navigating a whole new landscape forged by the events of 2021. 

"The decrease in labor force participation — combined with the significant changes organizations, industries and employees are making as the pandemic lingers — creates significant ongoing attraction and retention challenges," Willis Towers Watson Senior Director of Talent Management Consulting Lesli M. Jennings told HR Dive via email.

Jennings said that she and her WTW colleagues have observed employers take a variety of actions to combat these talent challenges. But overall, she said, employers' tactics typically fall under the "employee experience" umbrella. For example, employers have been focusing on flexibility as an advantage, including hybrid work models, more workplace options and differentiated pay strategies, Jennings said. 

Employers have also revamped their approach to compensation and benefits, she added, with pivots to equitable total rewards, skill-based pay, sign-on bonuses and creative recognition. Similarly, companies have boosted mental health assistance, financial education training and time off for employees. 

In order to get talent from application to onboarding, HR teams will need to bring their A-game. Here are some specific issue areas that should be top of mind for recruiters, talent acquisition professionals, managers and HR departments in 2022.

Neurodiversity is key

Beyond gender and race, HR professionals are now centering neurodiversity in their inclusion efforts. Mandy Price, CEO of diversity, equity and inclusion technology company Kanarys, observed how major companies have set the tone with their neurodiverse recruitment programs and their "self-ID" campaigns. These help current employees: "Microsoft, for example, has made things easier for the employees with dyslexia by providing them with assistive technology," Price told HR Dive.

But they also help new hires and provide a welcoming environment for job candidates. "We've seen that Hewlett Packard has implemented a buddy system where employees that have autism are paired with another individual that has specific understanding around and has participated in autism awareness training, so that they can help with the onboarding process," Price continued. She also highlighted JPMorgan Chase's use of pymetrics to recruit talent. 

Pymetrics games help JPMorgan match candidates with the right job fit, as opposed to looking at "previous outdated metrics which weren't based on actual people's skills and talents," she explained.

Companies may nix location-based pay

Ian White, CEO of data analytics company ChartHop, observed that more employers are doing away with salaries based on location, due to the advent of WFH or working from anywhere. "We run compensation cycles for hundreds of companies. Often, location adjustment has traditionally been a big piece of compensation. You know, people typically look at the cost of talent and the location, and they adjust accordingly," White told HR Dive. Now, geography is hardly a factor in the workplace experiences of many knowledge workers.

"It's one thing if you're going to ask people to relocate to an area and commute to an office. You're asking them to be in a particular place. But if we're working remotely, and two people are doing the same work? [Still,] equal work means equal pay," White said.

DEI initiatives are a Gen Z dealmaker – or breaker

"For a long time, DEI was something that was viewed as a function of HR," Price said, adding that now, Gen Zers are putting diversity, equity and inclusion work front and center. "Younger job-seekers don't see DEI as an added bonus, or you know, something where we just celebrate during the [awareness] month. She pointed to a finding from a 2020 Monster survey, wherein 83% of Gen Z respondents said DEI commitments are important when choosing an employer. 

The younger generation is challenging employers to go beyond mere unconscious bias training, she observed. "This is something that is an absolute requirement to work at a company," Price said. 

Former employees can be a talent solution

Jennings noted that shifting tides across industries and with talent have "put pressure on organizations to identify new sources of talent, both internally and externally." 

Richard Wahlquist, CEO of the American Staffing Association, believes that a key source of talent in 2022 will be "word-of-mouth referral."  Essentially, an element of trust that exists between workers that does not exist between job-seekers to their potential employers.

"We'd like to see objective ratings, not the ones that were 'paid for by Amazon,'" Wahlquist continued. "Talent are looking to third parties to say, 'Hey, what do you guys think about working for ABC company?'" Former employees who "hopefully, left with a good taste in their mouth are your best source of recruiting," Wahlquist said. 

He went on to discuss the ever-controversial "boomerang employee" as a talent solution. "Why invest in rehiring them only to have your heart broken again? [But] boomerang employees can be one of your best sources of talent," he said, adding that they can be some of the most loyal employees after experiencing other workplaces. "The grass always looks greener until you're in that other neighborhood."

Fluidity is key

Ernie Paskey, the North America assessment practice leader for Aon, told HR Dive that managers have to become capable of navigating the new waters of the pandemic. The key to doing so is fluidity, he said. Paskey explained how, from his perspective, HR professionals fall into three categories. 

"One camp has some hubris and says, 'I know HR. I know what's going on here. This is our response.' They just have a strong viewpoint, that may be correct or not," he said. The second camp is what Paskey calls the "ossified" or "calcified" HR professional.

"'We've done HR this way. We're gonna continue this way. We're gonna ride out this current storm.' They're going to lose on the talent front," he said. And lastly, Paskey categorizes the third bucket of HR professionals as those willing to unlearn everything they've known — ones that say to themselves, "I can't assume that past patterns or precedents are applicable going forward."

Paskey encouraged these HR professionals to ask themselves questions such as, "Can I be creative in shift assignments? Can I have two people do a job (job-sharing)? Can I have employees pick the shifts that they work? Can I have a different mix of benefits?" The managers that continue to think creatively and with agility will lead successfully in the workplace, he explained.

The second year of a pandemic may be challenging for everyone – but it's not all bad for those in the compensation and benefits field, sources who spoke to HR Dive insist.

With worker attrition at historic highs, pay has become the centerpiece of the recruiting conversation; 68% of HR leaders in a recent Grant Thorton report said they increased the number of employees eligible to receive a cash bonus in 2021. Large organizations — particularly those employing large numbers of frontline workers — have expanded non-salary employee benefits offerings in lockstep with their competitors.

"It's a great time to be a total rewards professional," said David Giesman, vice president of global total rewards at fashion retailer Designer Brands, Inc. "Your entire playbook is open to consider doing things differently. It's an opportunity to be creative."

Whether the currents of late 2021 continue for much longer, the focus in some ways remains the same for those in charge of benefits. HR teams still will need to provide offerings that meet workers' personalized needs and integrate those offerings directly into overall talent strategy.

The Great Resignation's reign

It has not been easy for employers to find skilled talent, and in some ways, it may be even harder to keep existing talent.

The U.S. workforce recorded a quit rate of 3% in November 2021, tying September's record for a series high dating back to December 2000, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The agency found attrition to be particularly high in the accommodation and food services; healthcare and social assistance; and transportation, warehousing and utilities sectors.

Labor market pressures should continue for these types of frontline workforces, said Lauren Mason, principal and senior consultant for the career business of HR consulting firm Mercer. The ongoing surge of the omicron variant indicates that the situation is likely to worsen, she continued.

That has caused employers to up their compensation budgets, but many increases have still been tight, Mason said, compared to the labor market. One priority for compensation professionals is to ensure investments are targeted to positions where the organization is seeing the greatest pressure and turnover, she added. That translates to higher hourly pay for frontline workers as well as larger bonuses for professional and salaried workers going into this year.

Increasing wages, moreover, will not satisfy everyone. "When you look at total rewards and you look at the elements that have the biggest impact on recruiting [...] it becomes a different list of things that are the most tangible and in-the-pocket for people," said Giesman, noting that time off and similar perks can be a particular draw for new talent. "For retention, those things may be at the bottom of the list."

Giesman said Designer Brands Inc. has instead sought to appeal to current employees by increasing eligibility for bonuses and experimenting with other perks, such as paying for one year of employees' health insurance premiums after they log one year of service. HR teams should hold managers accountable in this area by, for example, ensuring that people have opportunities for self-development on the job, including earning a promotion.

"We do talent reviews so that management and above is focused on assessing that potential," Giesman said. "It's so much easier to promote."

Keeping an eye on deferred care

Toward the end of 2020, observers identified deferred care as a potentially problematic trend. With care centers closed or otherwise hampered by COVID-19, workers went without some forms of preventive and elective healthcare, particularly during the pandemic's early months.

This is still true in 2022. Mercer's recent national survey of employer-sponsored health plans noted a larger-than-normal increase in health costs of 6.3% during 2021, and deferred care is likely to be the largest driver of increasing costs, said Kate Brown, leader of the firm's Center for Health Innovation.

Delaying preventative care can lead to higher treatment costs down the road in the event that diseases are not detected early on, Brown said, although other factors may also contribute to rising costs overall. She added employers are "cautiously optimistic," projecting healthcare cost increases that are more in line with average years.

As with talent availability, however, the omicron variant — and other potential variants — present their own level of uncertainty, Brown said.

Hearts at home

Video chats interrupted by children home from school. Caregiving duties increasingly intertwined in employees' daily workflows. Scenarios such as these have spurred employee benefits professionals to seek ways to support employees as they, in turn, support their loved ones.

Giesman highlighted a few of Designer Brands' efforts in this area. The company introduced a free employee subscription to Sitter City, a service that allows workers to find coverage for child care as well as elder care and pet care. "We quickly put that into place in 2020, paid for it and made it free to employees," Giesman said.

At the same time the company engaged its affinity groups to focus on important topics such as diversity, equity, inclusion and sustainability while also seeking to make certain benefits options more inclusive. For example, Designer Brands' changed its bereavement policy, which had once limited employees to taking off time for "immediate family members," to encompass a broader group of relationships.

Mason said employers may need to determine whether they should make other structural changes to existing benefits programs in order to stay ahead of pandemic-driven disruption. Changing guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention might be a reason to reassess how the organization structures its paid leave program, for example. And if employees have dependents such as children who get sick and need to quarantine, that may call for additional scheduling flexibility.

Different occupation groups may have separate benefits preferences, Giesman noted. Corporate workers at Designer Brands, he said, tend to value remote work highly, whereas those working in stores and distribution centers placed a premium on time off, scheduling consistency and getting desired hours.

Mental health's continued evolution

What had long been a popular topic for HR professionals became an urgent discussion amid the pandemic. Research continues to find evidence that employee benefits programs prioritized mental health in the past year. One recent poll of 151 business leaders by consulting firm West Monroe Partners found 44% of respondents said their companies were addressing mental health, but could be doing more.

The report's findings are indicative of the fast evolution mental health has experienced in the workplace context over the last couple of years, according to Eric Freshour, director at West Monroe Partners. But among the report's findings, "the biggest thing I saw was really the variety in what people are offering," he said in an interview.

Popular strategies cited by respondents included additional time off and personal days; flexible schedules; engagement and well-being surveys; and employee assistance programs and employee resource groups. But leaders in the survey also pointed to solutions that could help moving forward, such as technology that could help reduce workloads and fill staffing gaps, or scheduling "no meeting" days and company-wide mental health days, among others.

Smaller gestures, such as discouraging staff from sending emails after hours and instead encouraging them to prioritize scheduling work time and personal time in such a way that they can accomplish day-to-day tasks, whether work-related or not, can also have an impact, Mason said.

Freshour said he is skeptical about the ability of organizations to maintain their mental health programs and initiatives moving forward, as some of these efforts were created in response to the stressors caused by the pandemic. "My hope, though, is that what was borne out of necessity is now generally becoming part of the fabric of the organization," he continued.

Questions about momentum remain

Similarly, Freshour added that though it may seem challenging to continue making investments in well-being over the long term, such strategies are not necessarily high cost drivers. Even for something as simple as giving an employee an extra day off or providing access to a wellness session, "there a lot there in terms of the ROI of investing in that," he said. "There are other factors or benefits that can be considered that aren't quite additional in terms of cost."

Organizations are also getting smarter about how they elicit employee feedback on benefits, Freshour continued, and he recommended that employers use focus groups and surveys. "What I've always explained is that people really, truly do want to have their voice and opinions heard. You just have to demonstrate that you're taking those mechanisms and putting them into action."

Total rewards professionals have the opportunity to help employers meet the challenges of the Great Resignation, but in order to do so, they will need to stay attuned to well-being metrics, Mason said; "Monitor those issues around what's happening and propose investments right now while the market is strong on those particular issues."

Even if the winds in the labor market do shift, employee benefits professionals can work to demonstrate how their efforts impact productivity, quality and other business metrics, Freshour said. "This might be one of the logical things on the chopping block for some, but I think it's kind of important to broaden the perspective on ROI around these types of things."

Another year of targets, initiatives and benchmarks is upon us, and it's all going to take people. Even as HR professionals struggle to see the path forward with COVID-19 variants and public health responses, competitive employers will do more than just backfill headcount lost over the past two years, industry sources say.

Those that thrive in 2022 will align policies and behaviors that curb inequitable outcomes. To that end, female leaders in DEI and workforce management shared several predictions by email with HR Dive.

Companies will prioritize equal footing for all employees

Remote workers have experienced less favorable treatment, missed out on mentorship opportunities and seen less engagement with their teams, according to Kanarys CEO Mandy Price – a rolling deficit that can lead to fewer advancement opportunities. Still, in spite of these significant penalties that can land on those holding remote positions, generally, microaggressions aimed at many Black workers chill prospects of workplace re-entry.

Data will reveal equity gaps between work arrangements and compensation

Companies must track promotions, pay and opportunities for all employees, whether remote, in-office or hybrid, said Price. This data will help to uncover disproportionate effects of work arrangements on employee compensation.

Workers will reject the grind of 'hustle culture'

"Business goals and employee goals are at odds," Leeatt Rothschild of Packed with Purpose recently wrote about the current time in an op-ed for HR Dive. A mass exodus from the job market has resulted in acute shortages among employers, and it's not letting up, Price said. For sure, it's job seekers in this labor-tight market who hold the leverage as they search for more money, more flexibility and more happiness. "Employees crave deeper meaning," wrote Rothschild, "not 'just a job.'"  

DEI efforts will expand to include those outside the walls of organizations

As DEI data compels new directions in corporate recruiting and retention, Aaisha Joseph, a DEI and anti-racism coach and consultant said she expects to see greater representation of veterans, first-gen students and individuals with disabilities across candidate pools.

To correct for the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on Black and brown workers and women, "companies will re-think, and really shift to redefine what it means to be a diverse organization, and will look to hire accordingly," said Joseph, an alumni of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation's Emerging Leaders program.

Increasingly, diversity will be reflected on boards of directors

Last year, California, New Jersey, and Illinois passed or considered legislation that required public companies to report on or commit to improving diverse leadership, particularly in the demographic composition of their boards of directors. In the new year, we'll see more regulation, reporting and diversification of boards, said Price, who is a former corporate lawyer.

Neurodiversity is diversity

"It's a watershed moment for workplace mental health," Lisa Moore, head of global business partnering, talent and people operations at Yahoo, previously wrote for HR Dive. Price agreed: "As employees start to head back into offices and return to a new normal of lingering health anxiety, it's simply not an option to ignore employees' mental and emotional wellness."

Neurodiversity refers to the "differences of brain functioning regarded as normal variations within the human population," according to Merriam Webster. Price cited a recent Bloomberg Law survey in which, of 72% of respondents that track diversity or well-being, only 17% reported that their organization tracks neurodiversity — making it the least-tracked diversity metric, according to Bloomberg Law.

Price said she believes that a holistic workplace approach to DEI means measuring and understanding both visible and invisible factors of the employee experience. She suggested that workplace environments boldly support mental health by offering mental health benefits on par with physical health benefits, and ensure easy access to those resources, without stigma.

By legislation or good will, we're closer to equal pay

"NYC recently passed a bill that will require employers to include a maximum and minimum salary in all job postings," Joseph wrote. Whether by corporate good will or legislation, this will take root in other regions. It's a step towards pay transparency and parity long-awaited by job seekers, candidates and employees alike.