As we near 2022, it’s safe to say that things won’t be business as usual. With the ongoing pandemic, social unrest, cultural divisions, and remote work, the next calendar year is unlikely to return to “normal.” If you’re stugging having leadership development ideas, here are some leadership trends that will make an impact in 2022.
As employers and employees prepare for the challenges ahead in 2022, executives must be agile, empathetic, inclusive, strategic-focused, and ready to react. Employers can expect 2022 to be a year of leaders connecting with purpose, putting employee wellbeing front and center, and developing career paths and succession plans.
Here are the 4 leadership trends for 2022 we encourage you to consider you’re building your leadership development program framework.
1. Getting ahead of the resignation
Unless companies find innovative ways to engage, attract, and retain staff, the talent pool will continue to shrink in 2022. When the pandemic hit, HR took the lead, and they aren’t stopping now. It will become increasingly critical to invest in quality HR practices and services to keep employees engaged.
As The Great Resignation continues, a tight labor market is calling for companies to look at cracking the code. It may involve increasing starting salaries, offering more long-term incentives and benefits, or paying signing bonuses to remain competitive.
That being said, money isn’t always the answer. Modern HR puts more emphasis on humans, less on humans as resources. It is the autonomy that separates an engaged employee from an employee with one foot out the door.
Hold employees accountable for their asipirations and success. Involve them in setting their own goals to offer them independence. Help them understand how their goals align with those of the organization and define what success means for them within the company. When employees are empowered to set and achieve some of their objectives, whether it is testing an idea, developing new skills, or arranging team-building activities, they will be more engaged.
2. The people you have will become the people you need
In relation to the first trend, the skills shortage problem becomes acute. This is why retaining is the new recruiting. Companies are investing in cross-training, career development, training, and upskilling existing staff. Helping their employees become more flexible, agile, and resilient, they are ensuring their workforce can face the future.
Leadership and employee development should be continuous. Otherwise, the organization has no hope of achieving its mission and fulfilling its vision due to a lack of talent. Investing in training, development, neuroscience coaching, mentorship programs, and creating on-the-job learning experiences are ways to ensure that the people you have are the people you need. The impact of employee training and development on organisational performance are evident.
3. Employee wellbeing takes center stage
To no one’s surprise, burnout in the workplace is a growing issue and will continue to be one unless a plan. An array of reasons supports burnout, including being overworked, lack of separation between work and home, and a mixture of personal issues stemming from the pandemic. Leaders can effectively reduce burnout in the workplace.
We saw an increase in the awareness of employee wellbeing in 2021. We can’t predict the future, but it’s safe to say that putting the employee wellbeing center stage will roll into 2022 and hopefully be here to stay. In 2022, we’re looking at the big picture, culture change.
It boils down to the ability to create a cultural environment of high performance through training and development. Leadership at the top needs to be personally involved in and in charge of culture change from the very beginning. In other words, they need to be role models. Additionally, leaders must have a knack for nurturing their employees’ potential beyond what they perceive to be theirs. This requires an ongoing commitment to leadership development.
4. Career paths and succession planning
During the beginning of this pandemic, we focused on short-term solutions to avert as many problems as possible. Continued focus on short-term solutions can lead to some serious problems. That’s why they’re called “short-term solutions.”.
Succession planning and career pathing are your long-term solutions, which offer numerous benefits. A crafted succession plan is essential to minimizing the risks associated with the loss of valuable personnel. In addition, succession planning and career pathing enable businesses to have a pool of qualified employees available to fill positions as they become open or vacant due to resignations.
Employees want to know that they hold a valuable position in the company. The company’s growth potential is made more evident, with a path indicating where the employee will go within it. The most prominent potential benefit of workforce planning is that it reduces the likelihood of losing good leaders. In situations of abrupt personnel changes, the benefits of succession planning become very apparent. Since qualified internal candidates have already been identified and trained, recruitment and leadership development will take less time and money, if any at all.
A leader is always the source of both the problem and the solution in an organization or team. Taking note of these leadership trends might prompt your organization to revise its priorities, strategies, such as employee wellbeing, resilience, and purpose.
In 2021, business experts said remote working would become a significant trend for organizations worldwide. But none of them could have predicted the impact of remote working on the future of work. The leadership trends we will see in 2022 are the results of remote work’s impact. They are here to provide insight into the current work culture around the world. Make an impact on your company by staying on top of this year’s leadership trends.
The team at Lingo Live can and help you inspire the results you want. In this leadership case study we show how our coaches helped managers at Auth0 get the best from their teams, and take ownership of their own career.
Recommended reading: Learning & Development trends for 2022
