This authored article by Karunjit Kumar Dhir - Co-Founder, SCIKEY originally published in Business World

Coronavirus or COVID19 has already impacted the whole world more than any one of us were prepared for. It started with news coming from China, where the rest of the world remained oblivious to the dangers that lurked so close to them. Then it happened so suddenly that the whole world is almost coming down on its knees in a matter of a few weeks. We keep hearing lockdowns and measures to beat the impact of the virus, but in parallel, the collateral damage that has happened to businesses has been unprecedented. The expert analysis clearly shows that no one was prepared for this impact, as it was so quick and had a ripple effect that became completely out of control.

While governments and citizens are finding ways to come out of this unprecedented catastrophe, experts in SCIKEY are analyzing the impact of COVID19 on the future of jobs.

Full-time Jobs will reduce and Gig economy will see mainstream adoption

It is very clear that jobs that will not add value to any business will quickly perish. Paper pushers and coordinators will reduce dramatically and so will be the high salaried jobs that do not justify their cost. In turn, companies will move more to hire freelancers and contractual workforce to carry out more and more jobs they need. Companies will look for reducing their fixed overheads and find ways to outsource everything except the absolute core jobs with a direct impact on the organization’s IP.

Remote and digital working will become the new norm

Mass remote working for prolonged times will make people more mature in remote working. It will also change the behavior of people and expectations from companies. Technology will improve significantly to provide not only remote working with great experience but also remote schooling. Homes will start having a home office to qualify for jobs in the future. Everything digital will replace almost everything that needs physical to connect to remote connections. Social distancing being enforced will make an impact on social behavior and more people will work remotely encouraging social distancing as an accepted norm for a longer period.

Salaries will become unfixed

The obvious reaction to a financial crisis is cutting costs. Companies will not be able to shoulder the burden of taking care of employees beyond their means. With the rapid growth and rising costs, more and more companies have been living on very low margins or perpetual losses and in changing times, funding will be hugely challenged. In such a scenario, companies will look at adding variable salaries to a clause that will take care of sudden cuts that may be needed for the companies to survive or sail through any such tough times.

Value perception will increase

Job titles will quickly meltdown and real value will be demanded at every level. There will be clearly three values that companies will determine before creating a job; Accountability to increase revenue; Accountability to optimize costs; Accountability to provide value-added regulation and governance. The salary correction will happen across the spectrum. It is not what one expects, but what the market can afford for months or maybe a few years to come.

New jobs of different kinds will be created

Crisis situations take away millions of jobs, but new ones get created soon. With COVID19, Healthcare and wellness sector will get a tremendous boost and create more jobs. Digital economy will get a major boost and create more jobs for technology professionals. A major change that will start happening is ‘localization’. With reduced travel and possibilities of reduced global trade, local economies will re-emerge and start creating small job opportunities that were destroyed by rapid and massive globalization.

Asian economies outside China will see an increase in manufacturing jobs

It is likely that countries will start looking at each other more suspiciously after the COVID19 breakout and start investing and building local manufacturing capabilities with lower cost and better efficiency. Manufacturing will start moving to South Asian countries out of China and will create more related jobs in those geographies.

Fitment will overrule qualifications

With the changing needs of businesses on who they need to hire, increased focus will be to hire people with the right attitude who can learn any new skills faster than others. Degrees and qualifications will not matter as much as they did earlier. People will learn quickly to fit into new jobs and start in new jobs afresh instead of banking on their degrees prior experience for too long.

Reskilling e-learning adoption shall emerge even faster

The ability to learn any new skills quickly will be an added advantage for any job seekers as almost every business will need to pivot in some way or the other to adjust to the new emerging trends global forces. Even the employers will be more willing to invest in helping their current workforce learn new skills rather than investing more in creating hiring for full-time jobs that carry the risk of getting redundant again with the emergence of new needs technologies. Hence, quick reskilling up-skilling will be another new norm, that will in-turn enhance the rapid adoption of e-learning tools platforms.

Fresh graduates will be expected to learn by themselves come prepared

Fresh graduates expecting lengthy training and getting paid during the period will fade away faster than expected. Fresh graduates will now make themselves ready for the job outside the system if they have to contest for a new job. The fresh graduates can also expect additional competition from the lateral and experienced people who will now be looking for new jobs and even ready to accept lower salaries.

People will not leave hope and continue trying new ventures

Small ventures will continue to be attempted under a changed scenario and create new jobs. Finally, the will power of people will win over all the negativity and help the economy come on tracks faster than before. A lot of new entrepreneurs micro-entrepreneurs will rise, given this COVID19 crisis shall level the playing field in many ways, with every business industry having to practically reboot fully or for a large part of their business from the ground up.

About SCIKEY:

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