REMOTE working and a borderless environment will become a new normal in the workforce following the Covid-19 pandemic, said market research and advisory outfit International Data Corporation Asean.

Its research manager, Mohit Raizada, said a survey conducted in May found that some 50% of Asian firms are expected to add or expand remote working in their human resources policy.

The survey was conducted among 149 companies with more than 500 employees each.

As organisations readjust operations amid the virus crisis, many are expected to adopt formal policies to allow a borderless working environment, including working remotely, with more “human-machine collaboration” rather than face-to-face engagement.

“Human-machine collaboration will vary from industry to industry,” said Raizada in an email interview with The Malaysian Insight.

This means the greater use of automation, artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR) and robotics to support the post-pandemic workplace, which will require quick responses to changing scenarios.

“Due to fast-changing requirements, organisations will focus on finding, attracting, training and retaining top talent by offering a more creative, collaborative and productive work environment,” said Raizada.

He said most organisations are still operating in a traditional business environment, which includes manual and repetitive processes, non-integrated applications, and time- and space-bound work activities.

These traditional approaches impact employee effectiveness, collaboration and innovation, as well as limit organisations’ growth.

“Technology advancements have always changed the way we work, but now, technology adoption will change the work culture, workspace and workforce,” added Raizada.

Another tendency of traditional organisations is operating in silos and under a function-focused structure, instead of being outcome-focused.

Organisations of the future, on the other hand, will operate cross-functionally, with outcome-focused and reconfigurable teams that stress on collaboration and innovation.

However, collaboration and productivity may be affected by remote working if employees continue to perform tasks according to the traditional manual process.

As such, most organisations appear to have leveraged technology to promote collaboration among teams and business units working remotely.

The greater use of technology in teleworking will also see the creation of “digital identities” as part of organisations’ security measures.

“Currently, employees must follow repetitive security protocols that impact their productivity and are unfavourable to the overall work experience, and this is primarily due to the security concerns that organisations have,” said Raizada.

“(In the future,) employers and employees will have secure and unique digital identities (like a single sign-on), which will allow them to access company resources efficiently.”

On the cons of remote working, he listed the lack of real-time collaboration, communication gaps, unsecured information, limited visibility of employees’ activities, need for further training and development, and impact on work-life balance.

Reskilling to embrace tech

The future workforce will favour those with skills like imagination, creativity and strategic thinking. These types of people will become key drivers in organisations.

Monotonous tasks, meanwhile, will be automated.

Given this, there will be a need for reskilling so that the human workforce can focus on high-value activities that involve data and digital skills.

“These will be key skills required due to increasing automation and digitisation, and organisations will heavily focus on retaining the best talent and developing those skills,” said Raizada.

The future human workforce will work alongside “digital co-workers”, which are technologies like AI, robotics, AR and VR.

“The adoption of these technologies will also lead to new skills requirements across industries,” added Raizada. – July 3, 2020.