The hiring process is not, on the whole, a fun experience. It is not a great hang.
I know this is not some great revelation, regardless of whether you are the hirer or the hiree. It is time-consuming, painstaking, leads to a fair amount of soul searching, and you’re constantly mindful of not wanting to screw things up. And if you’re a veteran of the hiring process, you want to believe you’ve found the perfect candidate in the very first interview so the process will not be protracted while, with a nod to Schrödinger, simultaneously cognizant that: a) it won’t be, and b) it will be.
On top of that, we at CFO are always proud to bring you the latest and greatest new terms when it comes to talking about the challenges of the labor market, and the latest one is what they are calling...
...A “richcession.”
Like other old workforce trend terms that have been getting a new paint job, a richcession is a term surfacing that has previously described a rolling recession, where some economic indicators are expanding while others are contracting. But what makes this a newish kind of moment is, per U. of Chicago professor Tomas Philipson, “In most recessions, unemployment rises more for lower-income groups ... Although we are not in an overall recession yet, the demand for and wages of lower-income groups are outpacing higher-income groups.”
The impact may fall squarely on finance teams with higher-level key needs, such as FP&A experts and chief accounting officers.
As if CFOs needed another degree of difficulty in filling out their key roles to survive these economic headwinds.
While filling out white-collar finance jobs isn’t exactly the same as labor shortages in high-stakes sectors such as law enforcement and air traffic control, there are ripple effects as leaders are in a constant state of discerning how to keep their teams motivated, engaged, and connected in a progressively hybrid state.
When we asked a handful of CFOs what their people are actually asking of leadership, there were myriad responses, but one that stood out was from Michael Bayer, CFO of Wasabi Technologies:
“We hear that our new employees want to have opportunities to learn and develop. We do this through a variety of means: engaging roles with lots of responsibility, opportunities to try new things, and formal and informal mentoring among them.”
And on top of that, as reporter Adam Zaki writes, continuing to prop up your teams to travel on behalf of the company doesn’t hurt either. “According to the data from Mastercard, 62% of respondents said business travel is a bedrock of growth, with the top benefit being building new client relationships and prospecting,” Zaki wrote.
This may be one of the more crucial perspectives to have — learning and development (L&D) is one of the best ways to demonstrate to staff how much they matter, which can then manifest in engagement, team cohesion, career development, and company growth overall. But the challenge of continuing to do this in a hybrid environment, well I suppose that is why we have to keep making up new labor trend terms.
What are your employees asking of you in today’s economic climate? Let us know.