The Future of Work Starts Now

I have spent 20 years in human resources leading talent acquisition and talent management teams. Throughout that time, I have been surrounded by and often limited by the paradigms in HR – the things we accept as truth or fact, that become our norms.

But through the COVID-19 pandemic, many of these norms have been turned on their head. The collective experience of this crisis has forced us to uncover and break through those accepted norms to innovate and reinvent how we acquire, develop and retain talent.

Months into the crisis, we don’t know exactly what the future holds, but we do know that simply going back to our pre-COVID practices would be a huge missed opportunity for the credit union industry. Rather than “return to normal,” we should be using every moment of this unprecedented time to learn how we build a better normal – one that improves how we hire and retain talent and better serve members.

Here’s what we’re learning and the critical questions we’re asking in key areas surrounding talent.

Expanding the Talent Pool

I have long said we can have access to talent anywhere, if we want it. But one of the accepted norms in human resources is that an in-person interaction is required to confirm we’re making the right hiring decision and that to be most effective, some roles must be based at our corporate headquarters. But what happens when that’s no longer an option?

What we’re learning:

• Like credit unions, we had to evaluate, in only a couple of days, how to continue our operations with as many employees remote as possible. We’ve been faced with unexpected barriers to our plans and processes for candidate and employee experiences, and it’s taught us we can effectively conduct business and continue our operations in a remote work environment.
• We can also leverage our technology tools to engage with our candidates, our teammates and our leaders. For us, going to all video interviewing created a learning curve that didn’t come without discomfort. But we are finding it to be a successful approach that we plan to continue utilizing for the long term.

Critical questions to ask:

• Are we building a comfort level and proficiency with virtual hiring and remote work setups that will continue? How can we keep this as a new norm?
• How can we assess and address any biases or hesitation among managers?
• How can we think about creating a positive candidate experience in a fully remote setting?

Hiring a More Diverse Workforce

Hiring diverse talent is a priority for credit unions. To meet evolving member needs, we need high quality and diverse teams.

What we’re learning:

• Seeing our company culture come to life in this fully remote environment inspires us to expand our view of the workplace. Appreciating the connection our candidates and employees have with their families, friends and communities can enable us to attract and retain top talent into our organization, without asking them to choose between their personal and professional lives.
• When faced with the dilemma of our summer intern program, which brings a diverse group of young professionals to our campus, we gave our business leaders and interns options so they could determine what worked best for them. This summer, 88% of our planned intern class will be joining us virtually.

Critical questions to ask:

• Would removing a need to relocate significantly expand our access to talent?
• What will the impact of remote work be on different groups of employees and how can we be attentive to that?
• How are we deepening our understanding of the vastly disparate impact of COVID-19 and the underlying disparities that impact our workforce?

Improving Belonging and Connection

We know we can’t simply hire diverse talent; we also need to create and nurture a sense of community and belonging.

What we’re learning:

• With about 95% of our employees remote during this crisis, we can still build a strong connection and a sense of belonging on our teams. In fact, we have seen leaders at all levels communicating more frequently and more authentically than ever.
• We have very active and strong business resource groups that we know are important to our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. But their potential impact is clear even more now. We have seen our employees across these groups come together and support each other, and I believe this is proof of their impact regardless of physical location.

Critical questions to ask:

• How can we maintain this level of authenticity and communication among our leaders in the long term?
• How do we amplify the role of employee resource groups and ensure employees have these connections?
• How can we design an immersive and inclusive virtual onboarding experience?

Fully Supporting Employees

What we’re learning:

• Putting employees’ well-being first has always been part of our company culture, but it’s been crystal clear through frequent messages to employees during this time. Employee surveys confirm how important it is that this remains part of our company’s values.
• Company leaders are not exempt from the difficulties of this situation and feel a strong sense of responsibility for the well-being of their teams. By reaching out to leaders across the company, from frontline managers to executives, we have a deeper understanding of their experience and challenges so we can provide “just in time” support and resources.

Critical questions to ask:

• How can we continue to foster a high level of communication and shared experience?
• How can we equip leaders with the tools needed to lead through ambiguity?

Entering a New Phase of Work

Our people are truly our greatest asset. During this pandemic we have seen yet again the power of people working together to support each other, and the powerful role credit unions play in their communities. Maybe this will be our new paradigm, using the critical value of talent and removing contrived barriers like physical location, in order to empower our workforce.

We certainly don’t have it all figured out, but we’re learning to embrace the challenges this pandemic has created as a wonderful opportunity to break through paradigms in our people programs, processes and policies to drive our purpose forward.

Don’t shy away from the chance to learn, to question the norms we’ve accepted and to build a better normal. Now is the time to change what may have previously limited us.

Let’s take this opportunity and build the new future of work together.

Andrea Cooper is Director of Talent Management for CUNA Mutual Group in Madison, Wis.