New workplace concepts are decisive for most companies and they must be encouraged, especially in the service sector, to implement them quickly and consistently.
However, we should not be dogmatic and blind when we, as external consultants, make our proposals, however interesting they may be…
Indeed, it is advisable to remain pragmatic and humble when faced with situations that are not all the same. For example, new concepts generate more mobility, creativity, and speed among teams. These advantages are also coupled with reductions in direct and indirect costs.
These trends are certainly very often observed, as they constitute pillars for opting for these new concepts. But we must remain realistic: How many jobs in the service sector today require creativity, for example? How many bosses encourage creativity or a form of “emancipation” of employees by giving them a form of “free will”? How many processes allow for real flexibility? Let us be frank: few, if not practically none.
This is of course to be deplored by pointing out that the new generations entering the world of work want this creativity, this mobility of the mind, this permanent learning, this form of independence. However, most jobs are still repetitive, not very rewarding and are based on highly standardised processes.
All art consists first in changing mentalities, approaches to business management and, why not, certain processes by digitising what can be digitised in favour of more rewarding and creative activities. This is a long-term and popularisation work.
Remaining frank and honest with the interlocutors are cardinal values: looking together for pragmatic and evolutionary solutions so that the new concepts of workplaces are not alibis but ingenious supports for each other’s activities.
Let us beware of selling ice cream to Eskimos because the best consultants could quickly find themselves pilloried by certain bosses too inclined to demonstrate that only their truths are good to take… It would be a great pity because the potential in these areas is immense.
Good luck, good autumn, and good readings