It’s “spooky season” once again. The time of year when children and the adults who celebrate, dress up in costumes that represent ghosts, goblins, and other members of the underworld while they go out “trick or treating” in search of candy and other goodies.

While the kids are getting ready to go trick or treating, the grown-ups are having their own Scaries. In addition to global geopolitical issues such as the continued global COVID pandemic, the war in Ukraine that is also disrupting the world’s energy markets, and China’s new round of continued saber-rattling, there are several Business Acumen Scaries that should be top of mind this Halloween.

For your reading displeasure, here is a list of this Halloween’s top Business Acumen Scaries:

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The whispers of a coming recession have turned into shouts just as the leaves have accelerated their fall from the trees. Before we know it, the 4^th quarter, and the year, will be over and we will be facing much uncertainty as we enter 2023. Many business leaders and experts are predicting a significant recession hitting us soon and it seems inevitable that there will be a downturn in the economy.

The best companies are preparing today. They are preparing by assessing their talent and developing plans of action to close the talent gaps that are required to navigate through turbulent times. It’s at this point that leaders should be recognizing they have issues with people who can bring the entire company down as every company is going to be only as strong as its weakest link.

As a talent development professional, I know from decades of experience that every company is on a spectrum of weak to strong based on its weakest links. As you prepare for the inevitable recession, where do you think your organization falls on that spectrum and what can you do to support and develop the weakest links in your organization?

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Any professional or amateur athlete will tell you that the most frustrating thing in the entire world is the dreaded “unforced error.” An unforced error is a mistake attributed to your own failure or mistake rather than the skill or effort of a competitor or opponent.

In tennis, you could hear, “She made 88 unforced errors, including a double fault on match point to lose the match.” In business you could hear, “How can he portray himself as an emerging leader when he makes that sort of unforced error like constantly criticizing people and never embracing the power of coaching people for success?”

In the business world, these types of mistakes can be all too common, and they can completely derail success and business results.

During the past year, I have had the unique opportunity of writing several large business simulations in the areas of Coaching and Feedback, Resolving Business Conflicts, Executing Strategy, and Creating an Environment of Psychological Safety. The goals of these simulations are to provide an opportunity for leaders to practice new skills and learn by doing so they make mistakes in the simulated environment and not in the real world.

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Welcome to part three of Advantexe’s blog series, The Great Resignation through the Eyes of Three Generations. In part one we defined the Great Resignation and in part two, our panel provided their insights on why they thought people were leaving their jobs. Now we conclude the series with our panel responding to the question, What can companies do to retain employees?

Gen Z - Response – Allee Stidham, Manager of Project Management

To better retain employees, companies should start paying attention. The Great Resignation is not a fad, it will become the ‘new normal’, and companies need to shift their hiring strategies to reflect that. As employee turnover increases, they will need stronger onboarding practices, better information management, and flexibility in the job description.

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In Part 1 of Advantexe’s Great Resignation Through the Eyes of Three Generations blog series, our panelists began by defining how each generation Genz, Millennial, and Gen X defined the Great Resignation. In part 2, the team will discuss why they think people are leaving their jobs.

Gen Z Response – Allee Stidham, Manager of Project Management

I think people are leaving their jobs because they are finding better opportunities. The idea of staying at a company so you can hopefully get a raise, or maybe even a promotion, has been overshadowed by the idea of getting job experience for two years and then finding a company that will pay you more than that raise. It’s not so much that Gen Z or Millennials lack company loyalty, but more so that we know the idea of company loyalty is primarily one-sided. Do companies really care about us, or do they not want to spend the time and money teaching someone new to do it?

I think the Great Resignation has revealed this to employees, especially when talking with your manager about what you wanted from your job. If a company valued me as an employee, why not let me stay remote, increase my pay based on performance, or acknowledge burnout? When it became clear some companies would stay too rigid on policy, workers found that not all companies are inflexible and if they wanted a job more tailored to their lifestyle, they could find one.

Link with Allee – click here

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