As we look ahead to 2023, I’ve been reflecting on the workplace trends I predict will continue to emerge this year. In my role both as an employee engagement communications professional and career coach, I often gain insight into businesses’ strategic priorities or focuses for the year. This ranges from discussions with my individual clients, who are often senior leaders, sharing their experiences, through to HR professionals with whom I work with to deliver coaching programmes, workshops or communication packages for businesses, and this keeps me abreast of emerging trends that affect how we all work. 

The last couple of years have been particularly fascinating as we emerge from the pandemic, and see how the adaptations we made to work remotely continue to influence how employees want to work now and how businesses are managing this shift in workplace culture. 

Top workplace trends for 2023 

1. Hybrid working will stay, but I believe organisations will continue to be challenged by employee engagement and maintaining culture, which is a great opportunity for C-suite, HR and communications to work together on employee sentiment activities. I believe that workforces will continue to become more disparate, with those who are tech-savvy benefitting the most.
2. There will be lots of movement in the jobs market and more jobs advertised with salary bands.
3. Organisations will make efforts and progress on their gender pay gap. I’m working with organisations on initiatives that have the intention to make a short and long-term difference towards gender equality.
4. More organisations will trial flexible working arrangements, from four-day to compressed weeks.
5. Inclusion and Diversity will remain at the top of the agenda for many organisations. The key will be to get the right balance and ensure that all voices are represented fairly. Many organisations will be touching on topics for the first time and these should be communicated with specific nuances.
6. Taboos will continue to be smashed, from talking about menopause to miscarriage and men’s mental health: there’s so much organisations are doing to push these conversations positively forward for society. 
7. Managers must lead with empathy, otherwise they will risk losing their best employees. Training must be identified for those that find it tricky.
8. Meetings will continue to make all of our lives challenging (as per this research cited in the Financial Times).
9. Many employees are feeling burnt out and exhausted and workplaces must create awareness of the signs and symptoms of burnout and provide tools, resources and adjustments for employees experiencing it. Also start to track data and trends – are there specific departments where burnout is prevalent and are there cultural reasons or leadership reasons for this as examples?
10. Workplace fashion will continue to change with more of an emphasis on relaxed and loose clothing! Some of my favourite brands: Me & Em, The Fold (UK), Massimo Dutti and of course, eBay and Oxfam/ your local charity shop for vintage and second hand finds. 

How I can support your business

Coaching programmes

I am a qualified coach and offer coaching services to businesses: I can work with your company to create bespoke packages to suit the needs of your employees (either individuals or groups). As an unbiased sounding board, I can help you retain female talent in your business by offering them the support they need for career progression and to help them tackle the challenges they may be facing (and could be too nervous to raise with managers or colleagues).

Communications packages

With my background in communications (15-years working in the banking and finance industry), I bring this expertise into companies to support them with internal and external communications. This can include strategy, coordination and content creation for both new or existing initiatives, whether that be Diversity and Inclusion, the development or evolvement of flexible work policies, employee wellbeing programmes (covering topics such as menopause, miscarriage or mental health), or any other key business priorities.

Corporate:

Some of the ways that I will be working with corporates this year – please do get in touch if this is of interest:

• Miscarriage in the workplace: 60min keynote speech with Q&A on how organisations, leaders/managers and colleagues can support team members who have experienced miscarriage or pregnancy loss – I will soon publish a blog and LinkedIn article on this topic. Right now, one in four, or 250,000 UK pregnancies end in miscarriage. I’ll also share my story of multiple miscarriages in 2022 and miscarriage policy case studies. Part of my speaker’s fee will be donated to The Miscarriage Association, UK. 
• Imposter Syndrome and why it’s the biggest issue holding women back: 60min keynote speech with Q&A. According to a KPMG study, 75% of women experience Imposter Syndrome which results in them not feeling “good enough”, and holding themselves back from taking promotions for example. This speech can be followed with my popular 6 week group coaching program: Overcoming Imposter Syndrome. This program is being run with a national organisation with 20 women this year.
• Confidence and Career Accelerator Training Day: For mid to senior level talent that the organisation would like to invest in as part of their diversity & inclusion initiatives. Please contact me for a case study of an asset management firm that I ran this with last year