“Understanding the organization from different angles or dimensions, such as from a human impact perspective rather than just from a financial perspective, is paramount in this time of fast changes,” says E.J. Marin, Head of Solution Engineering, Nakisa in an exclusive interview with EnterpriseTalk.
ET Bureau: Are there any challenges in the current remote working model for enterprises as well as employees? If so, can you please elaborate?
E.J. Marin: Any large-scale change to a large workforce comes with various challenges. Remote work is not new in the technology space, but when the pandemic hit, not all departments were prepared to work remotely or to work from home. Companies and HR teams were forced to adapt quickly and develop policies to support employees. Employee engagement is as relevant and important in the office as in the virtual workspace.
Remote work assumptions are being challenged by the reality of understanding how work is done in the office vs. how work is done remotely. For example, for some functions, remote work has not signified any loss of productivity but rather an increase in productivity.
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This comes with a non-quantifiable price-tag on employee burnout. How companies protect their employees, especially vulnerable groups (single parents, caretakers, etc.), will be crucial as they look to 2021. It’s important to take this into account with the organizational changes they are looking to implement.
ET Bureau: How can enterprises redefine the organizational structure that will enable them to secure their workforce while also easing the burden on HR?
E.J. Marin: To successfully redefine organizational structure, HR departments need to modernize their data and technology systems. Using multiple spreadsheets to manage data was never a good solution, not even before the pandemic, especially for large enterprise organizations.
Now more than ever, the power of talent analytics needs to be unleashed. HR teams must step up their analytical capabilities and provide insights on diversity and inclusion efforts, core competencies, training and development, and more to guide the demanding organizational decision-making process.
Understanding the organization from different angles or dimensions, such as from a human impact perspective rather than just from a financial perspective, is paramount in this time of fast changes. Having a defined organizational structure will allow for clear visibility into staff location and reporting structure while decreasing unnecessary complexity for HR and managers. The agile/fluid organization is here to stay, while those who are late to rethink their organizational design strategies will fall behind.
ET Bureau: What impact will automation have on an enterprise’s organizational design strategies?
E.J. Marin: HR departments already have rich caches of data, but most of the time, it’s not easily accessible. When HR departments need to pull this data to get information in front of decision-makers, a lack of automation can greatly slow down the process, and companies suffer as a result. Automation is the key to efficiency on repetitive tasks across HR and other business functions.
Organizational design technology exists today, which is capable of pulling all relevant company information, such as hiring trends, diversity statistics, employee satisfaction, and more, with just the click of a button. With the right organizational design technology, companies can access an organizational chart and filter tools to gain visibility into the workforce and solve today’s most pressing business challenges.
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While some HR activities can be replaced by automation and HR technology to free up managers’ time, understanding analytical insights is still a human endeavor until predictive analytics are perfected. In the meantime, companies can implement tools that help reduce complexity in organizational design strategies.
ET Bureau: How will the HR policies evolve in today’s dynamic workplace?
E.J. Marin: HR policies are forcibly evolving toward supporting business continuity practices and designing the organization of the future. It’s all about change management at the end of the day.
From organizational design to business transformation, there is a long way to create impactful change. To help shorten that path, companies need real-time, hassle-free organizational design and workforce analytics tools to keep pace with continuous business transformation.
As companies are shifting their workforce daily and planning for the future at a rapid pace, a clear view of the organization, that is updated in real-time, is necessary to stay informed and strategic. This process supports and nurtures HR teams and talent throughout these difficult times and will sustain it well beyond.
Euclides J. (E.J.) Marin, Nakisa’s Head of Solutions Engineering – HCM, has over 25 years of experience in ERP technology and HCM management. Prior to joining Nakisa, he worked for SAP America and SAP SuccessFactors with key roles including Engineering Architect and LAC (Latin America and the Caribbean) Regional Service Delivery Leader.
In these roles, he led various customer experience improvement initiatives and service deliveries. Now at Nakisa, E.J. is a subject matter expert on business transformation through organizational design and leads the Center of Excellence, Business Development and the Pre-Sales team to discover customers’ business challenges and create enterprise solutions.
Vishal Muktewar is a Senior Correspondent at On Dot Media. He reports news that focuses on the latest trends and innovations happening in the B2B industry. An IT engineer by profession, Vishal has worked at Insights Success before joining Ondot. His love for stories has driven him to take up a career in enterprise journalism. He effectively uses his knowledge of technology and flair for writing, for crafting features, articles and interactions for technology enterprise media platforms.
