Whether it’s automation, multiple generations, globalization or the “Trump effect,” today’s workplaces are facing plenty of challenges. We talked to five HR leaders from across the country to find out how they’re dealing with the change.
Ken Johnston | senior vice-president, CHRO at Purolator
The Mississauga, Ont.-based company has 11,000 employees in Canada
When it comes to major changes facing Purolator, Ken Johnston, senior vice-president and CHRO, easily lists three: globalization, automation and the gig economy.
“Talent has been becoming borderless for a number of years now but what we’re seeing — particularly in Canada with the downward move of our currency, as well as changing tax regimes — is that being able to attract global talent to Canada has become very, very difficult, in the last year or so,” he says. “I would say it’s the most difficult I’ve ever seen it.”
Purolator regularly tries to recruit top international candidates, says Johnston, but many are finding it a significant challenge to move to Canada due to the cost of living and the value they’ll get for their dollar.
“That’s a real issue for us,” he says. “You really have to add 30 cents to the dollar on compensation in order to keep somebody whole, so providing somebody with 30 per cent more compensation is not affordable for a lot of organizations to do.”
As for automation, that’s probably the biggest, most urgent challenge in the supply chain industry, says Johnston. Just a few years ago, the trend was so expensive and immature that it was hard to make a business case for significant changes to location facilities or vehicles.
“But in the last 18 months, the number of players and the advancement of technology in our industry has moved so fast that the cost of automation has gone down, making it a lot more attractive; and, at the same time, e-commerce has been growing at 25 to 30 per cent per year, which means there’s a huge push in capacity.”
While people often equate automation with downsizing or a reduction in people, Purolator is not anticipating that outcome, says Johnston, who has been at Purolator for three-and-a-half years. For one, automation brings with it a higher need for skilled labour, which is positive both for the Canadian economy and for the types of jobs people can aspire to at Purolator.
Secondly, “we need to be able to create a lot more capacity in our industry, and the only way to do that efficiently is through automation,” he says.
But it takes time. “Anytime you’re automating, there’s just significant change management challenges associated with that because jobs change, skill requirements change, training, learning and development becomes a significantly higher priority for us as we go through that. So those challenges definitely exist for us and we’re working through them, but it’s not something that’s perceived within our organization or our employee base as a looming danger that they’re going to have to face, it’s just a change management activity.”
With that comes a strong need for effective, innovative communication, says Johnston, particularly at a company where 6,000 of the 11,000 Canadian employees are on the road all day.
“Finding ways to regularly communicate with our workforce is just a tremendously difficult challenge, so we have to be really innovative in how we communicate with them,” he says, citing as examples social media and twice-daily small group meetings.
As for the gig economy and changing types of employment structures, that’s huge in the industry as well, says Johnston, largely because customers want delivery 24-7.
“We will always in our business pride ourselves on having the majority of our workforce — I would say 70 per cent-plus — be full-time, permanent employees with retirement and health benefits, a more traditional employment model. But certainly, what was probably 10 per cent a year ago is now 20 to 25 per cent of our workforce that needs to be in a more non-traditional flex model. So, for us, that means everything from contractors to fully outsourced vendors, part-time work, casual work, a lot of seasonal work… so we’re trying to be as creative as we can to respond to that.”
As for suggestions employers are just looking to cut costs, and workers don’t really want contingent work, Johnston disagrees.
“We’re very much a service business, a people business, and our competitive advantage is people, so it would be very short-sighted for us if we looked at employment as an area we want to invest less in. So I don’t think you would find we spend less money on attracting non-traditional employees than we do on traditional employees, it’s just different — it provides us with flexibility to our customers. But you also have to pay for that — when you want to attract people that are working evenings and night shifts, there’s a premium for that. So, sure, you might save on the pension and benefits side sometimes, but we want the best people, so we have to invest in order to get the best people.”
When it comes to being prepared for the change and uncertainty, Johnston cites analytics.
“For me, the future of HR is going to be in analytics, predictive analytics. Everybody is going to have to adapt to changes that occur but the people that are going to win and get the most out of change are the people that can see it coming, predict it, adapt to it before others, and be ahead of those changes.”
HR needs to take a macro view, he says, and that means being able to predict what’s happening with the economy, customer behaviours and technological advances, and what types of behaviours are most easily found in different demographics of candidates.
“The advancements in analytics for talent management are extraordinary, so we’re really trying to get ahead of that curve so that we can be prepared to have the right talent to fit our customer demands more quickly as we move forward.”
Lance Livingston | vice-president of HR at Aecon
The Calgary-based company has more than 10,000 employees in Canada
While there has been much talk of change in the workplace, Lance Livingston, vice-president of HR at Aecon in Calgary, is not convinced things are much different now than they were 20 years ago.
“If you look back at the HR topics 15, 20 years ago, they were about change — it was about the speed of change, it was about how to influence it... so the topics haven’t changed much.”
What is changing, however, is the speed of information, he says, and the difficulty in managing communication.
“There can be a jobsite incident now of various severities where people’s families find out before the front-line leadership do, just because of social media. So we’re seeing examples of that, both positive and sometimes challenging,” says Livingston. “We have to get more engaged on the social media side because that’s the medium and the forum that a lot of our employees like to use. And a lot of… potential, prospective employees use social media to find jobs and to communicate, so we’re spending more time now tweeting and more time responding to various formats of social media, and questions. So that’s increased.”
As for any possible “Trump effect” from the United States president when it comes to issues such as trade or immigration policies, Livingston says it’s hard to decipher what’s real, and part of that comes down to media and the speed of information.
“Right now, we’ve seen some positive effects, so he’s taken action on the Keystone pipeline to approve that in the U.S., which has down-line, positive implications for us because we’re a construction company that builds pipelines,” he says. “The immigration issue and his restrictions, I think it causes more worry than actual harm… We haven’t seen any cases in our organization, and we’re still able to move people from the U.S. into Canada — we just haven’t had an impact.”
When it comes to being prepared for change, that’s not necessarily something that can be engineered into a company, other than through culture, says Livingston.
“(It’s about) making sure that you’re hiring adaptive people that are agile, easy to adapt to change and think about change. For me, it’s more about developing the right culture within an organization than trying to think of everything that’s going to come down the pipe — you just need to be able to be adaptive and agile and be able to adopt new technology where it makes sense to help the business.”
Aecon, for example, has been using tools such as GPS to run pieces of equipment, alongside surveying via satellite and self-driving or self-levelling equipment.
“We’re getting into robotics in some ways too. Like, right now, we’re pilot-testing exoskeleton suits that are lift-assistant suits — you wear them like a vest but what it enables you to do, as an example, would be to use a drill or jackhammer above your head for many hours without fatigue.”
The company, which has more than 10,000 workers in Canada, is also using drone technology to take inventoryies of large resources such as gravel or cement, and to take photos of jobs in progress.
“We’re constantly looking at ways to innovate and both be competitive and reduce costs, and improve safety, so wherever we can help our workforce, then we should look at those things.”
As for the potential of job loss, Livingston says it’s about different skills sets, which can mean new hires or developing the existing workforce.
“I don’t really see it as straight one-for-one replacement of current jobs, nothing like that. If anything, it provides an opportunity for new roles in an organization, and for an organization, essentially it’s constantly flexing. So just because you hire a few new people that are technically adept at some new technology, we also have people that are retiring on a regular basis and, frankly, there’s a big bubble of retirees coming in the construction industry, so I think we need more people that are tech-savvy and able to bring different ideas to our industry.”
When it comes to the rise of the gig economy, that can be a challenge in the construction industry because of remote work, he says. But what is common is people signing up for a project or assignment, so not part-time but short-term, and leaving after two or three years to find alternative work. And they may come back, says Livingston, who has been at Aecon for five years.
“Due to the loyalty factor, a lot of companies probably had a policy against rehiring anybody that left, whereas I think that’s a practice of the past if you’re going to be successful. We have lots of people come to us and work for us for a couple years, then they go to a competitor. They go to maybe a different part of the industry like consulting or engineering, and then they end up coming back to us with a different skill set, and we redeploy them, and they’re more valuable than when they left.”
Lyne Leclair | vice-president of HR and infrastructure engineering at SNC Lavalin
The Montreal-based organization has about 9,000 employees in Canada
As a global engineering and construction firm, globalization is definitely one challenge SNC Lavalin is facing, according to Lyne Leclair, vice-president of HR and infrastructure engineering.
“The main challenge is the ability of our resources because we need to get the people that have the right skills… for the different projects we have to execute, in various markets,” she says. “We need to have the right skills, and some are extremely unique so, considering that, we need to have mobility in our resources.”
An ongoing need for engineers, for example, along with the retirement of baby boomers is driving the need for resources, both inside and outside of Canada, says Leclair. So it’s about providing an appealing workplace with a challenging, stimulating environment that attracts candidates for both full-time and project-based employment.
As for the effect of United States President Donald Trump and his policies, these are definitely developments to keep an eye on, says Leclair, citing the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) as an example.
“If it’s revisited, I’m sure this will have an impact considering the collaboration we have between Canada and the U.S. on major projects, and it’s important that we have the right skills and competencies to deliver to our clients... it is key that the movement between the two countries continues to be facilitated.”
However, SNC Lavalin has about 2,000 workers in the U.S., so if anything happens, the company should still be able to deliver to customers south of the border, she says.
But there are additional challenges when it comes to the multiple generations at the workplace, especially with millennials, says Leclair.
“They grew up with the technology, they are well-educated and very well-informed, they have access to various platforms of information around the world, etcetera, so it’s sure that we need to adapt to this new reality, and the way that we manage and work with them. They want to be involved, contribute, voice their opinion, grow, etcetera, so for us, the employee engagement, talent management is part of our main strategic discussion and thinking.”
It’s important to understand what motivates workers, what their interests and aspirations are, and have them participate to be part of the solution, she says.
“We have started to provide some awareness initiatives so managers can learn about the different generations and bring flexibility in the way they manage, their management style… so they will be well-equipped in that area,” says Leclair. “They need to adapt and learn on the diverse generations.”
However, regardless of the generation, people want a great place to work, they want to be involved, they want to collaborate, provide ideas and suggestions, and they want to be well-recognized and rewarded fairly, she says.
As the organization, the environment and the market change, so too is the workforce changing, she says. That means issues such as innovation and employee engagement are key to driving operational excellence. And that’s driven much of the strategy put in place over the past couple years.
“It’s all about talent management, mentoring, diversity, retention and engagement, and we need to continue and innovate and evolve in that area to ensure that we attract the best and retain the best.”
And as the business evolves, it’s important HR also evolves, so SNC Lavalin is currently reviewing the role and responsibility of human resources, says Leclair.
“We’re reviewing a bit the competencies that it needs from an HR business perspective, such as organizational changes acumen, talent management, business acumen, innovation — these are all competencies we’ll try to put in place in order to develop our HR community… to better align with the needs of the business and to provide added-value services.”
Francine Bolduc | executive vice-president of HR at Homewood Health
The 1,250-employee organization has multiple locations across Canada
These days, it’s not just about the rapid pace of change, but the amount of change that is happening — sometimes at the same time, according to Francine Bolduc, Vancouver-based vice-president of HR at Homewood Health, provider of mental health and addiction services.
“And also, (it’s about) the impact these changes have on people’s capacity to respond and cope with these changes.”
For HR to be able to deal with these changes, it’s important to be sitting at the executive table and senior management table to be apprised of the business strategy, she says, and to ensure “we have a voice to make sure that we identify early on the potential impact of the change on our workforce... and we also have to keep a very close eye on the culture and the HR matrix, like engagement and absenteeism, all of that in our management practice.”
For example, Homewood has implemented a talent management program that will benefit millennials, such as career pathing and developmental opportunities, along with focusing on succession planning for key critical roles currently filled by baby boomers.
“We have to make sure we have a succession plan identified for these roles, otherwise it will impact our business and our ability to deliver services down the line,” says Bolduc. “So we need to be on the lookout, really be in the know, and being a voice as well to flag this for our organization and make sure we are prepared for any upcoming major changes that are coming up.”
It’s important to build up the organization’s leadership capacity, so they are trained on change management, on embracing change and how to manage remotely, she says.
“(It’s about) building our leadership skills and capacity to be able to identify potential issues, and know how to deal with them, and how to best engage their team when changes are coming as well.”
Homewood has also implemented a program on psychological health that talks about change management, along with resilience, stress relief and mindfulness, so people are able to respond to changes and the impact on them, says Bolduc.
“We cannot just assume we can implement the change and people will respond and just deal with it, so we have to make sure we equip them with the capacity to respond well and cope well with the change that we are implementing.”
Being in the health-care field, Homewood has enjoyed steady growth through the years, so the effects of a new presidency in the United States or an uncertain economy are not as impactful as they may be on other employers, she says. The 1,250-employee organization has not usually relied on bringing in foreign workers to fill vacancies, for example, and when it comes to the gig economy, Homewood mostly hires on a permanent, full-time basis.
“We think that this is creating a greater level of commitment to the organization,” she says. “What we have seen is an increase in the number of people wanting to work from home, so this is how we need to be flexible there, and to encourage that level of commitment.”
The organization is focusing on work-life balance and offering flexibility to employees when needed.
“Everybody has a busy life, seriously busy… and we look at people in the ‘sandwich generation,’ how they have to cope with their parents and children, so that’s creating a lot of pressure in their personal life. And at the office, we have multiple challenges, (with the) volume of work and tight deadlines as well that people have to cope with, so these pressures, you see more of that,” says Bolduc.
“And there’s less of a clear distinction between home and office — people can work anywhere now and they have access to technology at home or elsewhere, outside of the office, and they can also bring their personal life into the office now, with Facebook and other social media,” she says.
“We know that working from home is not for every job and for everyone, but we have to look at the specific circumstances of people and really provide flexible work options.”
Greg Conner | vice-president of HR and corporate secretary at BC Transit
The Victoria-based company has about 1,000 employees
Greg Conner believes human resources is — or should be — on the cusp of truly significant change. Essentially, the vice-president of HR and corporate secretary at BC Transit in Victoria feels HR should shift the way it provides its services.
“We lag behind our colleagues in sales and marketing, and with our external clients. We should be treating our internal clients the way you get treated when you log into your Starbucks app or… any of the apps on your phone — HR should be there.”
That means, for example, using chatbots for payroll and benefits questions.
“Those questions can be easily dealt with with automation,” he says. “There is some cost associated with that, but I think there’s more value in the services we provide should we start thinking about employees as customers and treating them the exact same way.”
The 1,000-employee transportation company has four different employee groups and three unions, so consistency and efficiency are important.
“If you don’t have it all mapped out or you have a new employee, they may get the wrong information because every group’s benefits and pay and entitlements are different, so it’s easier to make an error in that way. If you’ve automated it and you’ve run through all your screens properly, then you’ll be giving everybody the proper information.”
It’s about just-in-time service when employees need it — a valuable proposition for an organization that has many remote workers and people working shift hours.
“What we need to do is be there when they need us, and we can’t do that through people, we need to do that through tools, apps; we need to embrace the digital world and move into it in a smart way that meets the needs of our employees,” says Conner.
“Once you start bringing in tools that help all your employees in terms of making sure they have their questions answered when they ask them, it frees you up to do more value-add work, which is more around the strategic side of HR.”
Overall, there’s no question the pace of change has increased, he says, as seen with the amount of material facing people every day.
“We’re much more in a triage mode than we were 10 years ago, and that’s a bit of concern, actually, because the more you’re in a reactive mode, reacting to the stimuli of 250 emails and texts that come in everyday, the less you’re thinking about what the future could bring or should bring. So that’s my big concern is that if (we) want to be forward-thinking, we need to do a better job of allowing for and in fact requiring people to spend a certain part of their day on being strategic, and that means getting off email and actually working on what would make us a better place — and it’s hard to do.”
As for potential challenges around multiple generations in the workforce, Conner is not convinced it’s a real issue.
“In my opinion, we all want the same things, but millennials are just better at asking or saying, ‘I want to feel part of a team’ or ‘I want interesting, stimulating work.’ Well, we wall want that.”
And when it comes to the gig economy, that just makes sense, he says, as short-term assignments help people develop and grow.
“That’s really what the gig economy is about, it’s people going in and seeing a project to completion, and then going and doing something else. And with each one, you learn how to work with different people, you learn different skills, and that just makes you a better employee, so… I don’t fear someone coming in and just doing the job and leaving and going somewhere else. You embrace it and hopefully you create an environment where other people say, ‘I want to work there.’ That’s where the value starts to come in,” says Conner.
“In no way, shape or form am I saying we’re there yet but that’s one of the things were trying to instil in my own team.”
And down the road, automation will definitely have an impact on BC Transit’s 1,000 buses — it’s just a matter of when, he says.
“When we get to driverless vehicles, they will still require someone on there because we’re a public transport and it’s difficult for a totally autonomous vehicle to both pick up people with different needs and abilities, and also make sure that they’re monitoring and aware of what’s going on on the bus at the same time,” he says. “It will happen in a limited and fairly drawn-out way, as far as I can see.”
