How Can HR Help Organisations Prepare for Hybrid Working?
Digital HR Leaders Podcast hosted by David Green EP 54: Ethan Bernstein, Harvard Business School

How Can HR Help Organisations Prepare for Hybrid Working?

David Green 🇺🇦 David Green 🇺🇦

David Green 🇺🇦

Co-Author of Excellence in People Analytics | People Analytics leader | Director, Insight222 & myHRfuture.com | Conference speaker | Host, Digital HR Leaders Podcast

Published Feb 2, 2021
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We don't want to go back to normal, we want to go forward to something that looks different

The nature of ‘work’ and ‘workplaces’ was already changing, but the pandemic has fast-forwarded many aspects of the ‘future of work’.

Today’s guest is Ethan Bernstein, who is an associate professor in the Organizational Behavior unit at the Harvard Business School. He teaches the second-year MBA course in Managing Human Capital, the Harvard Business School online course on Developing Yourself as a Leader, and various executive education programs.

Ethan studies the impact of workplace transparency—the observability of employee activities, routines, behaviours, output, and/or performance—on productivity, with implications for leadership, collaboration, organisation design, and new forms of organising.

Together with Hayley Blunden, Andrew Brodsky, Wonbin Sohn, and Ben Waber, Ethan has been conducting research during the pandemic to understand the implications of working without an office. The study, which combines active longitudinal data from a bi-weekly survey coupled with passive sociometric data, seeks to answer a number of questions. Paramount amongst them: What impact has working from home had on productivity and creativity?

The discussion that follows is rich, wide-ranging and constantly fascinating. Ethan is one of the most interesting, knowledgeable and witty guests we’ve had on the show yet. Sit back and enjoy.

There are people who think technology is going to solve this before we make it back into the office and they might be right.

You can listen by clicking on the image below or by visiting the podcast website here.

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 In our conversation Ethan and I discuss:

  • The key findings of his research on the impact remote working is having on productivity and innovation ("Weak ties are down, communications are down at least 10%...much of the work that has been done using people analytics shows that organisational health in the long term drives from the weak tie networks that provide unique and novel information to us in the short term. So it very well may be that we have a challenge for creativity, a challenge for innovation, a challenge for information and knowledge generation and learning in the next 18 months.")
  • The implications post-pandemic for work, collaboration and workplace design ("[We need to] put the same spirit into the hybrid world that we have put into the pandemic world.")
  • The unintended consequences of transparent workplaces and open offices. In one example where the simple introduction of a curtain on a production line improved productivity by over 10% ("You do it one way when they are watching and you do it another way when they are not.")
  • How well-equipped HR functions have thrived during the crises of 2020 ("I think HR professionals are some of the busiest people out there these days. They have become communication specialists, they have become pulse survey experts. The way that the field has moved to respond to the pandemic by and large, I am just so heartened and impressed by.")
  • The role of HR in workplace design and in helping prepare their organisations for hybrid ways of working ("We should re-envision the office for the things like on-boarding new people, for the things like building weak ties by fostering relationships that otherwise wouldn't get fostered.")
  • How People Analytics has helped bring HR and Real Estate together ("People analytics has done a lot to help us think about real estate and HR being two people oriented functions.")

This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested or involved in workplace transparency, technology and future ways of working so that’s business leaders, CHROs and anyone in a People Analytics, HR Tech or HR Business Partner role.

Having data is not useful if we are not using it


LISTEN TO THE PODCAST

To listen to the Podcast and read the transcript of my discussion with Ethan, head over to myHRfuture by clicking on this link: How Can HR Help Organisations Prepare for Hybrid Working?


WATCH THE VIDEOS

As well as the podcast, there will be a couple of videos available on the myHRfuture YouTube channel highlighting two of the topics Ethan and I covered in our conversation. In the clip below, Ethan highlights some of the findings from his research on the impact of virtual working on productivity.


GET INVOLVED

If you enjoyed listening to this week's podcast episode, I'd be grateful if you could take the following steps:

  1. Please subscribe to the Digital HR Leaders podcast and weekly newsletter to make sure you don’t miss an episode.
  2. Please take the time to rate the show on iTunes. We rely on your feedback and support to make the podcast, so this is very helpful!
  3. Who would you like to see me interview in future episodes? Let me know in the comments below.
  4. Lastly, don’t forget to share on social media with your friends and colleagues, your support is always greatly appreciated!


THANK YOU

A huge thank you to Ethan for such a fascinating conversation and for sharing his time and expertise with our listeners. You can follow Ethan on LinkedIn, connect with Ethan on Twitter @ethanbernstein and find out more about his work on Ethan's Harvard Business School Faculty page.

I also recommend checking out the following articles Ethan has authored or co-authored, which develop many of the themes we covered in our discussion:

I also recommend checking out the video below, which was shot in the HBS Organization Lab, and features Ethan speaking with the late, great Clay Christensen to explore the design of organisational field experiments.

Thanks to OrgVue for sponsoring Series 11 of the podcast, and also Ian Bailie, Manpreet Randhawa, Caroline Styr and the myHRfuture team for creating the Digital HR Leaders podcast and video series.

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CATCH UP ON THE DIGITAL HR LEADERS PODCAST

If you haven't listened to all of the episodes of the Digital HR Leaders Podcast, you can catch up now by clicking on the links below.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

David is a globally respected writer, speaker, conference chair, and executive consultant on people analytics, data-driven HR and the future of work. As an Executive Director at Insight222, he helps global organisations create more cultural and economic value through the wise and ethical use of people data and analytics. Prior to joining Insight222 and taking up a board advisor role at TrustSphere, David was the Global Director of People Analytics Solutions at IBM Watson Talent. As such, David has extensive experience in helping organisations embark upon and accelerate their people analytics journeys. David also hosts the Digital HR Leaders Podcast on myHRfuture.

SEE ME SPEAK AT THESE EVENTS

I’ll be chairing and/or speaking about how to drive business value and employee experience through people analytics as well as the Nine Dimensions for Excellence in People Analytics model at the following upcoming events between now and the end of March.

Teemyco

7mo

Thanks for sharing David Green 🇺🇦

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Kunal Kar

Digital Technology strategy - Financial Services

3y

Words from Professor Ethan are always precious. I am still savouring my moment from interviewing him back in 2016. Quite an inspiring conversation on organization culture.

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1 Reaction
Juan Pablo Gevert

Global Head of Talent

3y

Ethan Bernstein is probably one of the most inspiring teachers I've ever had.

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Marcela Provazníková, MSc

Product Owner | Experienced Project Manager with expertise in Change Management | Organizational Psychologist & Talent assessment consultant | SHL & Hogan Certified

3y

It’s fantastic to see if that actual researchers are so invested in development of HR processes. Just today, we discussed with my colleague Ondrej Prerovsky how to make the company ready for the unpredictable, uncertain, (even scary) future. The conclusion: take care for people. Prepare the people and you’ll be ready for anything. Noone says it’s gonna be easy. But, it will work!

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2 Reactions
Susan Honjo (Knodel)

Learning & Development | Talent Acquisition

3y

thanks for sharing

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