Workplace Trends Overview

A Return To Office mandate is a funny thing. A trade-off of lower workforce productivity, morale, retention, engagement, and trust in exchange for...managers feeling more in control. It's more a sign of insecurity and incompetence than sound decision-making. The fact that 80% of executives who have pushed for RTO mandates have later regretted their decision only makes the point further, and yet every few months more leaders line up to pad this statistic. In case your leaders have forgotten, return to office mandates are associated with: 🔻 16% lower intent to stay among the highest-performing employees (Gartner) 🔻 10% less trust, psychological safety, and relationship quality between workers and their managers (Great Place to Work) 🔻 22% of employees from marginalized groups becoming more likely to search for new jobs (Greenhouse) 🔻 No significant change in financial performance while guaranteeing damage to employee satisfaction (Ding and Ma, 2024) The thing is, we KNOW how to do hybrid work well at this point. 🎯 Allow teams to decide on in-person expectations, and hold people accountable to it—high flexibility; high accountability. 🎯 Make in-person time unique and valuable, with brainstorming, events, and culture-building activities—not video calls all day in the office. 🎯 Value outcomes, not appearances, of productivity—reward those who get their work done regardless of where they do it. 🎯 Train inclusive managers, not micromanagers—build in them the skills and confidence to lead with trust rather than fear and insecurity. Leaders that fly in the face of all this data to insist that workers return to office "OR ELSE" communicate one thing: they are the kinds of leaders that place their own egos and comfort above their shareholders and employees alike. Faced with the very real test of how to design the hybrid workforce of the future, these leaders chose to throw a tantrum in their bid to return to the past, and their organizations will suffer for it. The leaders that will thrive in this time? Those that are willing to do the work. Those that are willing to listen to their workforce, skill up to meet new needs, and claim their rewards in the form of the best talent, higher productivity, and the highest level of worker loyalty and trust. Will that be you?

Are you ready for the seismic shifts in the world of work in 2025? At Top Employers Institute, we surveyed the HR and talent teams of 2,300+ global organizations on their people practices and forward-looking next-practices. Here are 5 key trends that will shape the future of work: 1) *Building Sustainable Workplaces Together* Orgs are increasingly integrating social responsibility into their strategies, addressing global challenges like ethical AI use and employee demographic shifts. 40% of Top Employers now offer special leave for elder care, reflecting a 5 percentage point increase from last year. Plus, reporting social and environmental performance indicators has increased by 7 percentage points, showing a strong commitment to sustainability. 2) *The New Belonging* Workplace belonging is transforming. Employees are seeking connections that extend beyond traditional org boundaries, fostering a sense of community through external networks and shared spaces. Notably, 87% of Top Employers involve existing employees in facilitating onboarding, which is linked to higher engagement and profitability. 85% have an employee referral program, and 75% organize social events for new employees, enhancing community building. 3) *Transforming Employee Experience for All* The lines between blue-collar and white-collar jobs are blurring. Companies are focusing on inclusive practices that ensure all employees, regardless of their role, feel valued and empowered. This year, 30% of Top Employers believe that the employee experience will become even more important, with significant increases in employee listening strategies (up 8 percentage points) and offboarding practices (up 12 percentage points). 4) *Neuroinclusive by Design* Inclusivity is becoming a foundational principle in workplace design. By embracing neurodiversity, organizations are creating environments where diverse neurological perspectives are not just accommodated but celebrated. This year, 92% of organizations reported using a standardized framework for employee selection that emphasizes skills and capabilities, benefiting both market share and profitability. Plus, HR practices ensuring equity for neurodivergent employees have increased by 8 percentage points. 5) *AI-Powered Leadership Takes Hold* AI is reshaping leadership roles, balancing human intuition with technological insights. This new era of leadership leverages AI to enhance strategic decision-making and foster connected, adaptive teams. Top Employers using AI to support employee experience have seen internal promotion rates 13 percentage points higher and engagement levels 13 percentage points higher. We’re seeing that 27% of Top Employers identified utilizing AI as their key HR priority for 2025. These trends highlight collective ambitions to build resilient and innovative workplaces. Interested in the full report? Comment ‘Yes’ on this post and I’ll DM you the full insights report.

Why oversimplified images about leadership miss the mark in 2025 We’ve all seen leadership diagrams like this one from Pinterest, which lists integrity, empathy, drive, and respect as the keys to leadership. These are important, but let’s be honest → in 2025, this is just the starting line. According to LinkedIn’s Future of Skills and Skills on the Rise reports, the most in-demand leadership skills now include AI literacy, adaptability, digital agility, and a growth mindset. Korn Ferry’s 2025 leadership trends echo this: leaders today must drive innovation, create psychological safety, and build inclusive, purpose-driven cultures—none of which show up in oversimplified diagrams. How should this diagram be updated? Add... → AI & digital fluency → Adaptability → Curiosity → Inclusivity → Purpose-driven vision Show leadership as a dynamic, social process—LESS about static traits, MORE about creating direction, alignment, and commitment across teams. Leadership in 2025 is about guiding people through uncertainty, leveraging technology, and fostering cultures where innovation and diverse perspectives thrive. It’s not just about being respected—it’s about empowering others to act, adapt, and grow. Your title doesn’t make you a leader. Neither does checking off a list of virtues. Let’s move beyond feel-good graphics and demand more from ourselves and our leaders. Coaching can help; let's chat. | Joshua Miller Sources: LinkedIn Future of Skills Report LinkedIn Skills on the Rise 2025 Korn Ferry Top Leadership Trends 2025 #ExecutiveCoaching #Leadership #FutureOfWork #Skills2025 #AI

Microsoft's latest Work Trend Index (based on data from millions of Microsoft 365 users) proves the modern workday is a fragmented, chaotic mess. But here's the critical insight: dropping AI into these dysfunctional workflows will only accelerate the chaos. We need to use AI to fundamentally redesign how work gets done. The data reveals what many of us feel daily, right?? Work has become an infinite loop of reacting to others' priorities while struggling to find time for meaningful progress. ++++++++++ THE SCALE OF THE PROBLEM Every 2 minutes: That's how often employees are interrupted during core work hours by meetings, emails, or notifications. 60% of meetings are completely unscheduled or ad hoc calls, preventing any semblance of planned deep work. 122% spike in PowerPoint edits occurs in the final 10 minutes before meetings. 117 emails hit the average inbox daily - most skimmed in under 60 seconds. 50+ messages arrive outside business hours. Evening meetings are up 16%. 29% of workers are back in their email by 10 PM, and nearly 20% are checking messages before noon on weekends. ++++++++++ WHY THIS MATTERS NOW 1 in 3 employees report the pace of work has become impossible to sustain, what with flat budgets and rising performance pressure. Working harder and longer is at its breaking point. This is where AI becomes critical, but not in the way most organizations think - automating existing chaos won't solve anything. ++++++++++ THE FRONTIER FIRM APPROACH "Frontier Firms" are avoiding the trap of just rolling out tools to everyone. They’re looking to redesign work itself around three core principles: 1. Apply the 80/20 rule ruthlessly. Focus AI and human effort on the 20% of work that delivers 80% of outcomes. Everything else gets automated, eliminated, or dramatically simplified. 2. Build work charts, not org charts. Instead of rigid departmental structures, create agile, outcome-driven teams that form around specific goals and use AI to fill skill gaps. 3. Become agent bosses. When ready, deploy AI agents to handle prep work, research, routine analysis, and administrative tasks, freeing humans for judgment, creativity, and strategic decisions. Start small with agents - but get started. +++++++++ WHAT TO DO TODAY: > Audit your interruption patterns. Track how often your team gets pulled away from focused work. > Identify your 20%. What work moves your business forward? What could be automated or eliminated without impacting outcomes? > Pilot outcome-focused teams. Take one project and organize a cross-functional group around the end goal, not dept boundaries. Use AI to accelerate the work. +++++++++++++++++ UPSKILL YOUR ORGANIZATION: When your organization is ready to create an AI-powered culture—not just add tools—AI Mindset can help. We drive behavioral transformation at scale through a powerful new digital course and enterprise partnership. DM me, or check out our website.

The latest Flex Report highlights the two related trends: 1) Large firms are standardizing on 3 days in the office each week 2) Office days are Tuesday and Wednesday, with Thursday a close third. Implications include: 1) Real-estate - do companies need offices 24/7, or should they fractionally own? 2) IT - employees need flexibility and portability of equipment and software across the office and home 3) Performance reviews - with employees out of sight 2-days a week managers need more data and check-in systems (less management by walking around). 4) Hiring - some employees may travel in early Tue and back late Thurs, opening up recruitment in other cities. This also seems like an opportunity to use all that city office, retail and transit space underused on the 4 quiet days of the week (Mon, Fri, Sat and Sun). Report: https://lnkd.in/gY4CWpXq

Every workplace has them: the eye rolls when "the Boomer" suggests another meeting, the sighs when "the Gen Z kid" mentions work-life balance again, the assumptions flying faster than Slack messages. But here's what we're missing, generational diversity might be our most underutilized organizational superpower. The research tells a compelling story. According to Deloitte, age-diverse teams make better decisions 87% of the time. AARP found that companies with multigenerational workforces are 1.7x more likely to be innovation leaders in their industries. This isn't feel-good rhetoric, it's measurable impact. Consider the complementary strengths: Boomers bring institutional knowledge and relationship capital built over decades. Gen X offers skeptical pragmatism and independent problem-solving from their latchkey years. Millennials contribute digital fluency and collaborative approaches shaped by growing up online. Gen Z brings fresh perspectives on sustainability, inclusion, and mental health that organizations desperately need. Yes, the friction points are real. Older generations sometimes view remote work requests as laziness rather than efficiency. Younger workers might interpret process-heavy approaches as resistance to change rather than risk management. Communication preferences clash, formal emails versus instant messages, scheduled calls versus quick video chats. But here's the truth: every generation thinks the others "don't get it." Boomers were once the disruptors challenging traditional hierarchy. Gen X was labeled cynical and uncommitted. Millennials were "entitled" until they became middle managers. Today's Gen Z "snowflakes" are tomorrow's industry leaders. The organizations winning today understand that patience isn't weakness, it's strategy. When a 25-year-old's fresh perspective meets a 55-year-old's pattern recognition, innovation happens. When digital natives teach established professionals new tools while learning the politics of organizational change, everyone grows. Bridging these gaps requires intentional effort. Reverse mentoring programs where younger employees teach technology while learning leadership. Project teams deliberately mixed across generations. Recognition that "professionalism" looks different to different cohorts, and that's okay. The most successful cultures I've seen treat generational diversity like any other form of diversity: a competitive advantage that requires investment, understanding, and genuine curiosity about different perspectives. Because when five generations work together effectively, you get something powerful: the wisdom to know what shouldn't change, the courage to transform what must, and the perspective to tell the difference. That's not just good culture, that's unstoppable culture. 🌟 AA✨ —————————————————————————— 👋🏾 Hi, I’m Abi: Founder of The Culture Partnership. Follow + 🔔. I discuss organizational culture, inclusion, leadership, social equity & justice.

📊 Office visits are still 36% below 2019 levels. Even with mandates and headlines, the “great return” hasn’t materialized and likely never will. Brian Elliott’s latest post paints a clear picture: the workplace landscape has split in two. On one side, orgs are paralyzed—clinging to outdated assumptions, waiting for a 2019 that’s never coming back. On the other, teams are reshaping the office into a powerful tool for connection, trust, and performance. Here’s what leading companies are doing instead: 🔍 1. They’re facing the data, not the wishful thinking 🔹 Kastle shows occupancy hovering ~54%. Placer.ai reports February 2025 office visits are down 36% from 2019. 🔹 Even with mandates, firms are seeing similar attendance as flexible orgs. 🔹 Many offices were underutilized pre-pandemic—2019 isn’t a benchmark, it’s a mirage. 💡 Takeaway: Stop waiting for the office to “return.” Start building around how teams work now. 🏗️ 2. They’re shrinking space—and reinvesting in connection 🔹 Atlassian, Dropbox, Airbnb, and Allstate cut costs while boosting experience. 🔹 Savings are fueling travel budgets, team events, and redesigned spaces built for collaboration. 🔹 Dropbox’s OPT team alone saved 2,000+ hours while supporting 250+ offsites. 💡 Takeaway: Smart orgs know real estate savings are just the beginning—it's what you do with them that matters. 🧳 3. They’re thinking beyond the building 🔹 Allstate added 25 flex hubs across the U.S. 🔹 Genentech uses flexible vendors to support field teams. 🔹 Airbnb and Zillow are designing for cadence, not attendance. 💡 Takeaway: The modern workplace is a network—not a single HQ. Flexibility isn’t a perk, it’s infrastructure. 🧭 4. They’re investing in leadership, not just layout 🔹 Culture doesn’t come from snacks—it’s shaped by managers. 🔹 Great teams need rituals, not just space. 🔹 Companies are training leaders to create belonging, purpose, and performance—regardless of location. 💡 Takeaway: Empowering leaders to lead flexibly is the highest ROI investment you can make in this new era. 📌 The bottom line? The most forward thinking companies aren’t debating policy, they’re enabling performance. The future of work isn’t about where we sit. It’s about how we build trust, align teams, and drive impact. Make sure to check the comments for Brian Elliott’s full post. Is your workplace frozen in 2019 or evolving for 2025? #PeopleAnalytics #FutureOfWork #OrganizationalEffectiveness #HybridWork #WorkplaceStrategy

Five generations are now present in the workforce, but most leaders only know how to communicate with 1 or 2 of them. Most leaders don’t realize they're missing an essential piece to holistic leadership: Optimization of all age groups. Leading a team requires the skills to manage across multi-generational differences. Here are three critical skills essential for success in this area: 💬Effective Communication Leaders must adapt their communication styles to suit different generations, who may have distinct preferences and expectations for receiving information. For instance, younger employees might prefer quick digital communications, while older employees may value more formal, in-person discussions. Understanding and leveraging these differences promotes clarity, minimizes misunderstandings, and fosters a culture of inclusion. 🔄️Adaptability and Continuous Learning Given the rapid pace of technological and cultural change, leaders must embrace continuous learning to stay relevant and effectively lead a diverse team. This includes being open to new tools and trends while valuing traditional methods where they are effective. Flexibility in processes and policies that cater to varying career stages and work-life needs will also help retain and engage a diverse workforce. 👂Empathy and Emotional Intelligence Leaders must show understanding and respect for the unique perspectives, values, and motivations that each generation brings to the workplace. Empathy helps build trust and enables leaders to manage potential generational conflicts or biases, creating a more collaborative environment. Emotional intelligence also helps understand generational stressors, allowing leaders to tailor support to help employees feel valued and supported at all stages of their careers. By mastering these skills, leaders can create a more cohesive, productive, and engaged multi-generational workforce. For three decades, my work has focused on diversifying workplaces and helping leaders develop the skills they need to create inclusive and equitable spaces. While you don't need to become an expert, it's essential to know how to nurture a culture of transparency and trust in rapidly evolving workplaces. Head to my profile for more information on how to work with me.

Blue-collar labor is becoming the scarce resource of the 2020s America’s working-age population is barely growing—but the split is what matters: Non-college adults (20-64) are shrinking fast. Bachelor’s-degree holders are still rising 1–1½ % a year through at least 2035. Because college grads seldom choose transportation, production, construction, repair, food service, cleaning, or hands-on care, the talent pool for those roles keeps thinning. Yet demand hasn’t faded. The chart below shows blue-collar & manual-service employment climbing to record highs despite a pandemic dip. Result: the worst hiring gaps and the fastest wage gains are now in jobs that once struggled for respect, not in white-collar cubicles. Demographics say the squeeze will intensify all decade. What’s your plan? Source: BLS #labormarkets #recruitment #bluecollar #jobs

Performance Reviews and Pay in a Changed World Tying compensation to performance reviews: a common employer practice. But does it still make sense in today’s world of work? Traditionally, compensation decisions have followed annual performance ratings: reward top performers, motivate the middle, and manage the rest. But in the last five years, the workplace has changed dramatically. We now have: 1.        Hybrid and remote work 2.       A stronger focus on belonging, equity, and transparency 3.       Rapid automation and digitization 4.       A shift from static roles to dynamic, skill-based work and constant adaptation These changes challenge the very foundation of how we define “performance.” Work is more collaborative, technology enabled, and often asynchronous. Teams span time zones, and job responsibilities evolve faster than org charts and job descriptions can keep up. Forward-thinking companies are reimagining the link between performance and pay. They're using continuous feedback, skills assessments, and team-based results (not just manager performance ratings) to inform compensation decisions. Some employers are separating employee developmental conversations from pay decisions to reduce bias and improve trust. So, is it working? ·       Benefits: better employee engagement, more equitable outcomes, and stronger alignment with business goals. ·       Challenges: manager capability, system complexity, and skepticism about fairness. Enter AI. Used responsibly, AI can surface patterns of employee contribution, flag inconsistencies in performance ratings, and model equitable pay decisions based on performance, skills, and outcomes instead of an employee’s visibility or tenure. But AI isn’t magic. It requires governance, transparency, and a human-centered design to support fairness and accountability. The real question isn’t whether to connect performance and pay, but how to do it in a way that reflects how work truly gets done today. #Compensation #PerformanceManagement #FutureOfWork #TotalRewards #PayForPerformance #AIinHR #WorkplaceChange #Leadership #PayEquity #PayTransparency #FairPay #CompensationConsultant #Worldatwork #SHRM