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Averbook: Are you listening to the signals?

Jason Averbook, Mercer
Jason Averbook
With a career that spans over two decades in HR and technology, Jason Averbook is senior partner and the Global Leader of HR Transformation at Mercer, where he also is a leading figure in the firm's global generative AI strategy and services. He is the author of two books on the future of HR and HR technology. From 2018 to 2023, Averbook was co-founder/CEO of Leapgen, a company committed to shaping the future workplace. He also serves as an adjunct professor at universities worldwide, has held senior roles at industry giants such as PeopleSoft and Ceridian and is frequently quoted by top media outlets.

One of the most common questions organizations and people ask me, no matter where I am around the world–both pre-pandemic and now–is this: How do you keep up? How do you keep up with the ever-changing times? How do you keep up with ever-changing technology, and how do you know what to do?

Of late, with historic and groundbreaking events unfolding rapidly and daily, there are new, more pressing questions: How should HR leaders communicate with their workforces about the current social unrest? And how might these protests–peaceful and non-peaceful–shift HR approaches to diversity and inclusion? How do we keep up with change, let alone drive change?

The answer to all of these questions lies in listening to signals. They’re everywhere, almost deafening now. Find space and stillness to listen. Signals carry information, inform necessary change and provide direction as to where things are going–whether macro issues around the economy or micro issues within an organization. We’re getting lots of macro information about society, justice and how we live and work right now. These are all signals; it’s imperative to take the time and make the space to listen.

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Three Tips When Listening to Signals

  1. Assess: Listen, and take into account what we’re hearing.

Make sure what we’re hearing is factual. In validating it with people, we need to understand the prevalence of what we’re hearing and how widespread is the thought. We also need to make sure we understand, specifically, what that signal means to us.

  1. Align: Make sure what we’re hearing from a signal standpoint is aligned with our functional strategies, and that those are aligned to overall business strategy. 

If alignment is there, proceed to the third step. If that alignment is missing, you need to reprioritize and refocus. In today’s world and current climate, reprioritization and refocusing is more important than ever. And you’ll need to do them more frequently than ever. Get used to constant shifting of priorities and focus. Agility is key.

  1. Act: Jump to action on properly focused priorities.

The jumping part is easy. What’s hard about action is the risks and dependencies tied to doing it. If I act this way, what gets taken off the priority list? If I act this way, what breaks from a process standpoint? What happens to technology infrastructure if I act this way? What does this do to my budget? We need to build action plans that are sequenced intentionally, that are coordinated across all parts of the HR function and that are executed from a single group of ownership.

The Now of Work is the Now of Life

Our climate of social unrest and protests against injustice–both peaceful and non-peaceful–are connected to the Now of Work. Social causes like racial injustice impact fair and equitable business practices, organizational DNA and strategy, how the world works and the inclusive environments we create for people or that we need to. These signals have been muted for far too long, and they impact everyone in your workforce, whether they represent the voices trying to be heard or those of us who need to learn to listen.

Read more from columnist Jason Averbook here.

Leaders in any position–people and business leaders as well as community and political leaders–are facing the most significant challenge they will ever face. Achieving racial justice in the midst of a global pandemic is a challenge of great magnitude. It is understandably overwhelming for both leaders and employees to address, and it should be treated with care. Read through all of the above again; action must accompany words and well-meaning intention. Acting with outcomes in mind is the biggest impact we can have in the world right now.

Use signals to assess what you’re hearing, align what you’re hearing to what you’re doing, tie to a greater vision and create action. Digest quickly, and prepare to adjust. Let signals adjust and shape us.

We live in a fascinating time. A great friend of mine, Heather McGowan, wrote in her book The Adaptation Advantage, “This exact moment in time, right now, is the slowest rate of change you will experience ever again. This speed of change makes it more important to occasionally pause and reflect on being human. Advances in technology allow machines to do many things, but they cannot dream, contemplate or yet imagine our unseen future.”

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Start by answering a few questions in one minute flat in this week’s LeapPulse survey. We’re all incredibly aware of the social unrest and protesting happening across the country, likely in your own city. Its impact on work needs to be better understood. Thanks in advance for helping us glean insights to drive change. Our partners at HRE are committed to sharing these results with you, and I’ll be discussing them in our NOW of Work live broadcast at 10 a.m. PT June 5. Please join us: https://bit.ly/3gRcpDg.

Committed to action,

Jason