R U OK day is a national day of action highlighting the importance of meaningful conversations, held on the 2nd Thursday of September each year. It's the initiative of R U OK?, an Australian non-profit suicide prevention organisation. The key thrust of the organisation is, as you might guess, to check in with people around you and ask if they are ok.

Some take a cynical view that the day is unauthentic and tokenistic. Yet, the day's not for them. It's for the hidden people working and living amongst us who put on a brave face but are facing struggles and turmoils. We wouldn't even realise; they've become skilled at masking their pain. And even if your boss asking, "R U Ok?" before getting onto the days agenda may not be totally earnest, it's better to have a hundred of these than risk not having the sincere conversations.

And this year Kurt Hansen, the CEO from one of the largest cybersecurity companies in Australia, Tesserent, wants to encourage people to check in on the wellbeing of the company's Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) and the cybersecurity team.

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Cyber attacks are relentless; iTWire reports regularly of breach after breach. We report the ongoing research into cybersecurity showing ransomware is still profitable, and that even nation states are getting in on the act for their own political purposes.

Imagine owning a bricks-and-mortar store and finding at every moment, of every hour, of every day, of every week that criminals are right at your doors and windows testing every possible access point. The criminals are lined up behind each other in a never-ending queue.

This is the reality for cybersecurity defenders, except the walls are electronic not physical, and the bad guys aren't simply there in person but from far-flung corners of the world.

We've seen high-profile destructive data breaches in Australia in recent years. There are many we don't see because they are less prominent. However, there are loads more we don't see because they didn't happen. Make no mistake, the attackers tried, but were thwarted by an observant, prepared, and sharp-thinking cybersecurity team.

When the attackers only need to get it right once to breach your defences, but you have to get it right every single time to defend, it's no easy task.

The reality is, Tesserent reminds us, is that the cybersecurity experts in your business are facing stress, pressure, and burnout in a highly intensive role. This is not good for your organisation, and it's not good for Australia, if we can't attract and retain the people we need in the battle against cybercrime.

Leigh McMullen, Vice-President and security analyst at Gartner, expects nearly half of cyber security leaders will change jobs by the end of next year with about a quarter of those leaving for entirely different roles. This is at a time when AustCyber estimates the shortage of skilled information security workers will reach almost 20,000 over the next two years in Australia.

A recent global survey from Hack The Box found mental fatigue, stress, and burnout is running rampant, affecting 84% of workers within the cyber security field. A 2023 report by Splunk revealed that 79% of cyber security professionals experienced burnout in the past year.

It doesn't have to be this way. Tesserent CEO Kurt Hansen wants to encourage us all to check in on our frontline cybersecurity teams this R U OK day and ask what we can do to help - and, importantly, listen to the response.

“Cybersecurity is a shared responsibility that encompasses every individual in an organisation from the boardroom to the basement. It is not the sole responsibility of one CISO or a small team of cyber security experts. Organisations need to listen to the advice from their CISO about what they need to do to protect the organisation, its people and customers, not just on R U OK Day but all year round," Hansen said.

“Organisations also need to think more about how they can give incident response teams, much needed downtime. It is important to rotate the team to ensure that people don’t burn out if back-to-back incidents are occurring. While you need to maintain a constant 24x7 watch, it is a shared responsibility,” he says.

Hansen isn't simply spruiking rhetoric. It's a sobering reality that many members of his senior leadership team have bravely spoken up about their own personal experiences as CISOs in major organisations. As you read their stories look at their photos, see their titles, note their experience. These are people like you and I, hard-working individuals committed to their craft and found in organisations all around. Yet, in the course of their duties they experienced health issues that altered their mood, their perceptions, and their wellbeing. These could well be the stories of someone you know.

 

Tesserent managing partner - managed and professional services Patrick Butler

Patrick has been working in cyber security for 16 years. When he entered the profession, he was totally unprepared for the stress he would face. "It took a long time for me to learn how to deal with this stress, and even now I haven't fully succeeded. When we conduct simulated threat exercises, I still feel an incredible level of stress, even though I know the impacts are not real," he says. Patrick reveals he suffered burnout and health problems after one adversary simulation exercise in 2017, where the team simulated a sophisticated threat actor within the network over a week. He along with the management team worked for large parts of the day almost 24x7 to thwart the attackers. He says, "by the end of this the sheer exhaustion and burnout took months to recover from. And this was a simulation!" Patrick advises that organisations need to consider how their business is structured to be able to work 24x7 to contain and eradicate a cyber threat. "This is not just about your incident response team or your Security Operations Centre, but also your IT and management teams as they also need to be available 24x7 in a major crisis. Often organisations haven't planned for this resulting in the significant risk of not having key resources available, or burnout in teams working around the clock," he says. Patrick knows several CISOs that have departed their role over his time in the industry, moving into totally different careers or other roles within cyber security that had less responsibility for security and incident response. Patrick's advice to CISOs on how to cope with the stress and pressure of the role, is to know your weaknesses, measure your risk and prepare for the worst. "Being well prepared reduces stress during an incident. It is important to share the accountability of risk for security across the organisation. If you find yourself still in a stressful situation despite your best efforts, then you need to become great at compartmentalisation. Find a way to protect your personal time so you can switch off and teach your mind that you have transitioned from work to personal time so that you can leave the troubles of the day behind," he recommends. His advice for employers in the public and private sector is to recognise your employees are humans and, as an employer, create processes, structures and strategies to minimise the risk of burnout in a role and stress during a cyber security incident. "This is not just good for your people, but critical to managing risk and eradicating threats effectively," he stresses.

 

Tesserent CISO Jason Plumridge

Jason has been working in cyber security since he left the NSW Police Force in 2002. Prior to taking on the role of Tesserent's CISO he was Partner Advisory leading Tesserent's commercial advisory consulting group. When Jason commenced his current CISO role he didn't find it overly stressful due to his extensive background in law enforcement and emergency services and having to make daily decisions impacting the public and individuals in high stress situations. But Jason has witnessed the stress and pressure other CISOs are under working with Tesserent's clients across public and private enterprises. "I would estimate that on average CISOs and other security leaders change roles due to stress and lack of support in 50% of cases. But global statistics are reporting the churn is higher," he says. Jason candidly admits during his career he has experienced burnout and health problems including PTSD and minor depression triggered by traumatic events he encountered during his policing and emergency services career. "Due to my previous experiences, very little of what could be experienced as a CISO phases me, but I am not typical in the industry," he says. He characterises the role of CISO as a complex and encompassing portfolio that generates significant competing priorities for attention and action. "A CISO can control some of these and some they cannot. For many CISO's unfortunately the inability to obtain the needed investment in technology to bolster an organisation's security can cause stress," he says. Jason's advice to CISOs this R U Okay Day is to master the ability to separate work from personal life and create boundaries. "While a CISO role requires 24x7 contactability in the event of a security incident, this does not mean you have to be personally on call 24x7 mentally and physically. You need to learn to quickly assess and prioritise requirements based on risk and impact on the organisation to effectively manage your time and stress. "CISOs need to trust in the ability of their colleagues to continue the requirements of the role when you are not available and avoid micro-managing every event. The CISO role is strategic leadership. To be successful you need to extract yourself as much as is practical from the day-to-day operational security requirements and focus on the leadership, strategy, compliance and risk functions of the role," he highlights. His advice for employers is to understand it is not just about technology, but processes and other non-technical human factors that impact your security posture the most. "Be prepared to pay market rates for the security of the organisation and to obtain the skills and experience you need," he stresses.

 

Tesserent senior partner - offensive security services Silas Barnes

Silas has worked in cybersecurity for the past 17 years. For nine of these years, he was CISO with major Australian companies including Virgin Australia, UnitingCare Queensland and Air Services Australia prior to joining Tesserent. Silas has watched how the role of CISO has evolved significantly since he started his first position in 2015. "Expectations are higher than ever with the continuing, relentless battle against rising cybercrime and the roles changing remit. Today the role of a CISO is very different from a decade ago when it was smaller in scope and more specialised," he explains. Silas has seen CISOs who were his peers depart the role due to stress and pressure. "One resigned and took a whole year off to recover," he reports. Silas has suffered burnout and exhaustion during his security career with the stress and pressure affecting his sleep and his ability to switch off mentally. "The combination of critical responsibilities, high pressure, and devastating consequences of breach events can make it difficult to disconnect, even when on annual leave," he says. To cope with stress and ensure more work life balance Silas has embraced skydiving to switch off from work and immense himself in the present moment. "Apart from jumping out of planes, I also make sure I take reasonable sized breaks when I take leave, ensuring it is longer than one or two days, to give myself a chance to fully unwind," he says. Silas recommends people working in cybersecurity make time for some physical activity, try to stick to a healthy diet and take it easy when it comes to alcohol. "Recognise you can only do your best. Don't waste time chasing perfection and don't beat yourself up about not being perfect, instead focus on the value you are bringing to your organisation and on continuous and sustainable improvement," he recommends. Silas suggests that security leaders consider their relationship with business social media content to support their own mental wellbeing and career satisfaction. "The increased pressure to develop a personal brand or be seen as a 'thought leader' by the wider community can bring on feelings of insecurity, inadequacy, and anxiety for those who focus on their day-to-day work," he says. "We should recognise the picture presented on social media platforms doesn't necessarily reflect the realities of working within our industry. Staying focused on your own personal journey and avoiding the trap of comparing yourself to others is important for mental health and wellbeing, no matter where you are in your career," he adds. For employers of cybersecurity talent, he recommends, "make sure that people take breaks throughout the day. It is important a CISO has a supportive and capable second-in-command they can trust. Having a capable and trusted team to share the load is really important so you can take your annual leave and benefit from the full effect of a proper disconnection. And the CISO should feel the support of the whole senior leadership team because cyber resilience is a joint responsibility," he says.

 

Tesserent senior partner Mark Jones

Mark has spent over two decades working in cyber security, with six years as a CISO at major Australian businesses. He reports that many CISOs come to the role unprepared for the challenges they will face with constantly changing and evolving adversaries and emerging technologies being leveraged. They also face challenges inside the business around unlocking funding, managing budgets, communicating in a way that the Board and senior business leaders can understand and managing a team. "During my career, I have witnessed many people burn out and leave cyber security, some moving into other tech roles or leaving the sector completely. I know at least five former senior professionals depart the industry because the unrelenting pressure was too much. There is a lot of out of hours work required, and this can take a toll personally on relationships and an individual's wellbeing," he says. Mark stresses that organisations should make sure that they are not placing the sole responsibility for security on the shoulders of the CISO. "It is a team effort, the entire senior leadership team needs to own the responsibility for security," he says.

 

It doesn't end here ...

What action will you take after reading these? Will you ask your friends, family, and colleagues if they are ok, and will you listen to their response?

Check here for some workplace resources to help.

 

Interactive says Logan-Bell will be responsible for driving sales strategies, expanding market presence, and delivering “exceptional service to Interactive's customers”.

“Angela brings over 25 years of experience in the ICT channel across ANZ and APAC, with a distinguished career marked by expertise in sales leadership, channel and alliance management, and marketing leadership,” notes Interactive.

“Before joining Interactive, Angela served as Senior Director of Enterprise Sales, Public Cloud APAC at Rackspace Technology. Throughout her career, Angela has held various roles, including positions at Optus, Dicker Data, Express Data, Ingram Micro, and Tech Pacific.”

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"We are thrilled to welcome Angela to our team," said Dan Cox, Chief Technology Officer, at Interactive. "Angela’s extensive experience and strategic vision are invaluable as we continue to innovate and deliver superior multi-cloud solutions to the market. Angela's proven track record in team cultivation and business growth will be instrumental in reinforcing our position as a market leader and a trusted technology partner for our customers."

“I am thrilled to join Interactive and lead the Cloud Sales team,” said Angela Logan-Bell.

“Interactive has a stellar reputation in the market for its commitment to superior customer service, and I look forward to working with the talented team here to build on that success. I am focused on growing Interactive’s presence in the Cloud Services space and building on the strong partnerships we have with the Hyperscalers to ensure Interactive is the go-to partner for customers needing deep expertise in the transition to Cloud.”

“Interactive offers a robust suite of multi-cloud and hybrid cloud solutions designed to provide businesses with flexibility, scalability, and resilience. Interactive’s multi-cloud solutions enable organisations to leverage the strengths of various cloud providers. Their hybrid cloud solutions seamlessly integrate on-premises infrastructure with cloud resources, allowing businesses to balance workloads and enhance data security,” says Interactive.

“Complementing these offerings is Interactive's Slipstream Cyber business which operates a true 24×7, sovereign Security Operations Centre. Slipstream Cyber's range of cybersecurity services includes Cyber Risk consulting and technical assurance, 24/7 Active Defence, and Digital Forensics and Incident Response, delivering a robust defence system that enables clients to operate securely, and ensures comprehensive protection against evolving cyber threats.

“By offering tailored cloud strategies, comprehensive support, and industry leading cybersecurity, Interactive empowers its customers to achieve their digital transformation goals safely and effectively.”

iTWire spoke with Sharryn two years ago when she first took the reigns in APAC. At that time, her appointment was intended to accelerate momentum in the APAC region for the open source and software developer hub.

And what a two years it has been; in this time the region has grown from 960,000 developers using the platform to over 1.4 million, with 20% growth year-on-year.

GitHub, of course, is the largest source code repository on the Internet, with millions upon millions of projects, authors, and petabytes of code. It provides free source code hosting, as well as enterprise features for teams, and caters for both public open source programs as well as private repositories. It's in a remarkable position where anything GitHub does literally affects developer productivity worldwide, whether good or bad. If GitHub can shave a second off an interaction here or there, this magnifies to huge time savings globally. Conversely, if GitHub damages a workflow, then that similarly ripples to the corners of the Earth.

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Ideally, the company is providing the first type of change, and these kinds of changes are something Sharryn Napier says is resonating well with large enterprises. "Over the last two years we've seen a lot of simplification and tool consolidation of large enterprises," she said. "It's something GitHub can solve for big organisations, particularly banks, who are leaning in because of our AI-driven developer platform."

"Getting rid of noise and other point solutions brings communities together inside an organisation," she says. "And, taking on GitHub allows them to integrate better, and be more productive and share more together."

"As we've moved towards a full AI-driven platform we're going to find additional benefits beyond productivity, that will be enormous."

Anecdotally, customers have reported to Napier that they've seen improvements in code quality and build times through GitHub. These conversations were developer-focused, and while these reports continue to be positive, it's a "super different story now," she says, with an increasing number of conversations coming from the business side of large organisations.

In the past, it was unheard of for a bank executive to come out to GitHub and talk about developer tools. "But now, CBA, Westpac, NAB ... they're all talking about GitHub Copilot," she said.

Over 50,000 organisations are now using Copilot, Napier advised - an especially impressive number when you consider the product was only released to the enterprise market in February last year. "We're 12 months in, and to have the impact on these organisations, 1.3 million people, it's a bit of an indication of where it is going to go," she said.

This AI-infused approach is something GitHub is increasingly offering, with Copilot that provides intelligent, predictive assistance in writing code itself, through to identifying credentials and shared secrets inadvertently exposed in code, to automatically remedying potential vulnerabilities coming from dependencies.

"The whole platform AI-infused approach will see organisations create pull requests, raise issues, fix code vulnerabilities automagically," Napier said. "Companies, particularly banks, are seeing extended value in these AI offerings beyond Copilot itself."

It's one thing to make the claim AI is helping people write code faster and better, reducing vulnerabilities, and another thing to prove it. "We have the emperical evidence," Napier said.

GitHub has previously released figures that found its AI tools have helped a whopping 87% of developers preserve mental energy, and 74% experienced an increase in overall daily workflow satisfaction. Code is being produced 55% faster, and 85% of developers feel more confident over their code quality.

GitHub saw a lot of people looking at GitHub Copilot and saying "let's prove what we can do," Napier says. "We saw a lot of experimenting and a lot of emperical evidence, moving into full-blown use cases in generative AI and Copilot."

"A lot of organisations have now gone 'tick' - it gives us greater productivity, greater code quality, improved build times, and now identifies and autofixes vulnerabilities."

"These organisations are now saying 'how do we really use this?'," she said. "In the next 12 months, we're going to see more practical applications of all this work."

For example, Napier explains new developers can come in and instead of taking months to get familiar with legacy code they can simply ask the chatbot "What does this code do?". Or, they can summarise the backlog. All kinds of things become possible when you have assistive AI tools, that are proven and trustworthy.

"The next 12 months will be the practical evidence, with companies touting what they will have achieved, not simply testing and evaluating."

In addition, Napier is involved in the Code without Barriers initiative. This was born in Microsoft in Asia and is now being deployed throughout the rest of Asia and Australia and New Zealand.

"The initiative reduces the barrier to women in tech," Napier explained, and this offers another lens where we see the benefits of generative AI.

For instance, a lone female coder in a team of men might feel intimidated and reluctant to ask questions. "Copilot never says 'that's a dumb question'," Napier said. "It will always help people learn, and can lower the barrier to entry. GitHub's AI tools offer several aspects beyond productivity benefits alone, and opens us up to bring in and enable more people in the tech platform and environment."

Another example Napier offers is from one of her big bank clients. "It dawned on them they can ask Copilot to explain legacy code - old COBOL code that was never documented," she said.

Code like this can be scary; developers - many of whom may not have been born when the code was first written - don't want to break it. "It runs ok, so they adopt the mantra 'don't touch'," she said. "AI allows us a different dynamic."

Whether it's new projects, understanding historically frightening legacy code, onboarding new team members, and reducing gender imbalances, "all these different pieces can be peeled back with an AI-infused platform like GitHub," Napier said. "It's super exciting."

"Australian financial services like ANZ and CBA can really showcase to the world what innovation and creativity can do for them."

So what else is coming up on the GitHub roadmap? "It's all about using generative AI in practical use now," Napier said. "We will see different business models around AI services, different things, new business models. We will see interesting things created in the next 12 months to two years that we never thought about before."

"It's a time of innovation and GitHub is at the forefront and leading," she said. "We see, lead, and project what people are doing, and help them make solutions."

"The next few years will be incredible for this whole space," she said.

"As we continue to infuse AI through GitHub, the benefits will be exponential. Things will be done more automatically, and we won't have to do things that developers hate like pull request summaries. The infusion in the platform will help them - not just developers right now, but the people coming behind them."

"It's a great thing to see as we move into the GitHub AI platform."

 

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BONUS DATA: Facts and figures on GitHub's AI products

GitHub Copilot

• Over 1.3 million paid GitHub Copilot subscribers and over 50,000 organisations across all geographies and sectors using the tool.
• Developers are writing code over 55% faster with Copilot.
• Last year, GitHub saw 35% of newly written code was suggested by Copilot. Now, in files where Copilot is enabled, up to 60% of the code is being written by Copilot in popular coding languages like Java.
• In the next five years, GitHub expects this to grow up to 80%.
• We recently did an experiment where participants authored and reviewed code using Copilot and Copilot Chat, and found that 85% felt more confident in their code quality, code reviews were completed 15% faster, and 88% felt less frustrated and more focused when coding.

Australian stats from the 2023 Octoverse report

• Over 1.4M developers on GitHub in Australia
• 21% increase in developer growth on GitHub in Australia in 2023

ANZ Bank

• GitHub Copilot has steered software engineers at ANZ Bank toward improved productivity and code quality.
• From mid-June – July 2023, ANZ Bank conducted an internal trial of GitHub Copilot that involved 100 of the bank’s 5,000 engineers.
• The group that had access to GitHub Copilot completed their tasks 42% faster than the control group participants.
• This research provides compelling evidence of the transformative impact of GitHub
• The adoption of this tool has marked a shift, empowering engineers to focus more on creative and design tasks while reducing time spent on repetitive boilerplate tasks.
• GitHub Copilot has now been widely adopted within the organisation, with over 1,000 developers using it in their workflows.

CBA

• The bank’s team was among the first in Australia to test GitHub Copilot, seeking to deliver code faster, protecting the bank and getting more done for its customers.
• CBA began testing the service with 200 people and discovered that 75% of its engineers found it “very helpful”. They accepted nearly 80,000 lines of code that GitHub Copilot recommended – a third of all the recommendations made.

An MSP - a managed service provider - is a pillar of the IT world, providing support and services to businesses of all sizes. This may be because your company is not large enough to justify having your own internal IT team, or it may be because the MSP brings in skills and strengths you don’t have in-house but need for a specific project. There can be many reasons.

However, it won't be a surprise to those in the industry that not everybody loves their MSP. The promises of providing help when needed suddenly become big charges if you ask for help on a weekend, at night, or even simply too many times in a month. Or the promises of ensuring uptime on your critical infrastructure are conditional on buying certain software or hardware. Or you find yourself endlessly encountering the same problem only to be told each time, “reboot your PC” without identifying the root, recurring issue.

If you've found your MSP relationship is a bit like a “bad romance,” in the words of Versent customer engagement director Stafia Giannakis, then you need to know there are alternatives.

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In fact, Giannakis says many MSPs have a set-and-forget approach, or set tight boundaries around precisely what they will do. However, “customers want to deal with people who are about them,” she says.

The traditional MSP service model hasn’t delivered on the evolution of platforms - across cloud, data, and security - and results in a lot of wasted opportunities for customers, who simply are not receiving value, Giannakis says.

Additionally, Giannakis refers to “ticket tennis” - a large volume of incidents shift from one group to another, even back to the customer, without ultimately bringing a result. This problem is underpinned by static contracts that “don’t breathe in and out with the customer’s heartbeat,” she says.

It's easy to point out flaws. After all, this writer himself has been exasperated by MSPs who let mail servers run out of disk space, or who failed to resolve underlying problems and only treat the symptoms time and time again. In each case it appeared the MSP rated its ticketing system on such criteria as “how quickly the ticket was allocated to a team member” - but not how swiftly it was resolved, only how rapidly it was allocated. Or, the ticket was rated on how quickly it was closed which inevitably led to the bandaid approaches and not long-term problem solving. And certainly none of this leads to innovation, merely responding to tasks.

So what’s Versent doing differently then? “We take the opposite approach,” Giannakis says. “We call it ‘modern run’, not ‘managed services’ and we focus on evolution, relentless automation, and sending multi-disciplined squads to customer sites instead of having a single focus.”

"We attack problems that frustrate companies,” she says. In fact, not only attack but “attack with anger. This drives tickets down right away. “One of the things we do is look at ticket queues and smash it down to the absolute minimum.”

Next, Versent focuses on the customer ambitions, and in this, keeps the customer’s platforms fresh allowing the customer themselves to continue to innovate.

In a nutshell, Giannakis says, “the Versent secret sauce is to focus on improvements first, bring multi-disciplined teams to the customer, keep themselves and the customer up-to-date with tech, and to give the customer the space and time to focus on what matters to them.”

This differs from the traditional MSP model that might be described as very transactional, SLA-bound, and with typical contracts.

Versent is "definitely about respectful relationships,” Giannakis says. “We educate the customer respectfully along the way, to leave them in a better way than we found them.”

The proof is in the pudding, with Versent finding its approach is a huge differentiator, with hugely positive reactions and feedback from customers. The company isn’t small either; it’s grown to more than 600 staff around Australia.

Versent is so focused on doing right by the customer that it has an internal lingo where something is not done until it’s “done done.”

"'Done done' is our way of talking about our completeness of work,” Giannakis says. “It’s not about simply meeting a contract obligation but about what success means for the customer.”

"'Done done' is purposeful, and a complete end-to-end result. It’s not simply about an SLA dashboard,” she says.

You might worry service like this can break the bank. Fortunately, that’s not so. The business offers different flexible, pricing options. These start with some obvious metrics - “most customers want some in terms of uptime and recovery of platforms,” Giannakis says, but also includes a portion of continuous evolution. The focus here is “definitely not ticket-based” but on creating multi-disciplined pods, understanding where the customer is going, and running sprints to bring value to the customer in an agile fashion.

"I call it commercial empathy,” she says. “We look after the customer’s money and give back more than they bargained for.”

"Our services span multiple industries, but we have deep domain knowledge, especially across banking and finance, and increasingly in state Government,” Giannakis says. “We see tech problems in those environments and apply in a horizontal fashion, taking what we have from one domain to solve other customers’ challenges.”

So what's your MSP relationship like?

“If there are people today caught in a bad romance or disillusioned with the speed in which their traditional managed service is working, and that MSP is not pursuing being better every day, now is the time to look at an alternative,” Giannakis says.

In fact, you can speak to her directly. “I’m happy to take the initial call and talk about your interests and align it with the right part of the company,” she says. “I’m part of the modern run organisation. We're all about continuous evolution, operational stability, and scaling with the customer through agile delivery and modern processes.”

“We want to leave our customers in much better shape, with better process maturation, better technology, and staying fresh. We do in a way that makes it easy to engage with us, and that’s fun also.”

“Versent was born in the cloud and has always been about challenging traditional behaviours and standing out. We’ve always adopted modern ways of working.”

During my conversation, I couldn’t help but note that Giannakis speaks so enthusiastically and with infectious gusto about the delight and joy she gains from helping customers. “I’m proud to work here. It’s a bunch of talented people, we’re extremely passionate about tech and staying fresh and applying it in the right way for the customer. It’s an amazing place to be.”

"If you don't have passion for your own job, and for your customer’s success, you’re in the wrong job,” she says.

Progress, the noun, is the movement towards a refined, improved, or otherwise desired state. Progressivism refers to the proposition that advancements in technology, science, and social organisation have resulted in the betterment of the human condition. It's no surprise that Progress chose this name for its company, setting itself the goal of being the trusted provider of the best products to develop, deploy, and manage high-impact applications using the right architecture that delivers an engaging experience with connected data.

Progress has been doing it for a long time, and its results speak for themselves. For fiscal 2023, Progress expects over $US 680M in total revenues, with operating margins of at least 39%, free cash flow of about $180M, and earnings per share of more than $US 4.09. The company has more than 2,300 employees in over 20 countries. That's a lot of numbers but ultimately, Ainsworth says, it means the company has a high degree of customer loyalty and the business is continually investing in its product development. "When people partner with Progress they tend to stick," he said.

As in every country, organisations in Australia are under growing pressure to modernise their digital systems quickly. Ainsworth has been in Australia meeting Progress’ clients and prospective clients and says this is a common thread across discussions he's had.

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"When you talk about modernisation, many different perspectives come up about what that means to an organisation," he said. "The question I ask back is what is the business driver for an initiative you're calling modernisation? Is it creating a headless environment so you can iterate faster with new user experiences like chat? Leverage APIs for supply chain transformation? Moving from Windows apps to mobile or web delivery? Is it a security and compliance issue, with pressure to better govern data managed by the applications? Transition from in-house app to SaaS? All these things come into the realm when talking about modernisation."

Modernisation comes down to what people are trying to do, and the primary driver, Ainsworth said. "It's hard to justify changing with no intrinsic business value."

Ainsworth notes technology is evolving phenomenally, and the expectations of usability and user experience are evolving. "Those application experiences are changing at a rate of probably 18 to 24 months," he said. "Whereas the layer behind that, business logic and so on, are evolving but at a slower pace."

Progress provides software tools for each layer, of course, with Telerik and Kendo on the top line, its OpenEdge database at the bottom, and Sitefinity in the middle, among others. Sitefinity had a stellar time in the spotlight as the platform used by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and stood up to its enormous uptake in traffic during COVID.

Yet, it doesn't begin with the tech. If your business is seeking to prioritise where modernisation is most needed, "it goes back to the business imperative," Ainsworth says. Technology leaders who "align with business goals are more likely to get support and success."

Ainsworth says he thinks of application modernisation and digital transformation as a journey, and an application evolution. "It's an ongoing journey as the tech evolves," he says. And what's key to not seeing yourself in the same conundrum year after year is "if you approach it the right way you create a baseline for future projects to help you adapt to future trends, rather than simply rewrite and end up in a box again. So I think of it as evolution more than modernisation per se."

This doesn't only come in the form of your product output but how you run your projects too. "Very few organisations are going to be successful if they remain thinking about projects the old way - start, do, finish - vs. more modern practices like continuous delivery, continuous integration, agile, and the approaches that go along with that. It allows you to build, test, and iterate faster on a continuum of evolution."

So here's where Progress really comes in. Sure, it can provide you with a whole heap of tools, but the crux of John Ainsworth's message is app modernisation isn't simply an IT project - it's about the business imperative and outcome, and about your organisation embracing it from a practices and approach perspective. This is what then drives the tech you are going to use to achieve the outcome, instead of starting with the tech.

And Progress is here to help you; "we engage with customers to assess their current state of tech and the state of their skills. Maybe they have the skills they need to build the original app but if they're going to move forward in, say, container/cloud, micro-service, event-driven applications, do they have the skills they are going to need and can we make a recommendation around the ecosystem to bring it forward? Agile practices, cloud, migration from older operating systems like AIX to Linux, and so on - whatever it happens to be," he said.

In short, if you want to modernise, Progress can help you progress your app progression. You identify the business case, and they'll work with you to build the process, the skills, and the platform to make it happen. They can also supply supplemental developers to assist.

In other news, Progress recently acquired MarkLogic and is in the process of integrating its capabilities into the portfolio. The acquisition brings two pieces, Ainsworth says. Firstly, is the multi-model database itself. "What's interesting is it brings a NoSQL database," he said, "but in this case that means 'not only SQL'. Unlike other document or graph databases, MarkLogic fully supports SQL and is fully ACID compliant, while many multi-model databases follow a practice of 'eventually consistent'. It also natively supports graphs, tuples, and so on."

Progress says MarkLogic is complementary to OpenEdge; the traditional Progress database is suited to be the lowest cost database behind transactional databases, while MarkLogic is suited to analytical, search-based data lake and data lakehouse models.

The second piece that MarkLogic brings to Progress is Semaphore; this tech "allows you to define a knowledge model for your enterprise so different terms and taxonomies for different things are well understood, so you can search using many terms and languages and link it back to an item in the MarkLogic layer," he said. That is, Semaphore helps make sense of unstructured content by applying AI and knowledge models to the data, to aid in making informed decisions.

For example, if you search for "Hamilton", do you mean the racing car driver? The locality? Even the musical? "Context matters," Ainsworth said.

"It's an exciting time for Progress. An exciting time to be engaged with our customers," he said.

"It is a time for evolution."

 

The research is titled the Decision Dilemma, and was conducted across more than 14,000 employees and business leaders from 17 countries, including a thousand Australians. Despite the mantra of this decade exhorting us to be data-driven leaders, the reality turns out that almost everybody is suffering from data overload and the end result is an inability to make effective decision making.

Key findings from the report indicate 99% of people want decision-making help from data, yet the explosion of data is working against them.

• 82% of Australians are so overwhelmed by data they simply give up on decision making
• 95% of business leaders have suffered from decision distress - regretting, feeling guilty about, or questioning a decision they made in the past year
• 82% admit the sheer volume of data and their lack of trust in data has stopped them from making any decision at all
• 95% have changed the way they make decisions over the last three years

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“People are drowning in data,” said Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, data scientist and author of Everybody Lies and Don’t Trust Your Gut. “This study highlights how the overwhelming amount of inputs a person gets in their average day -- internet searches, news alerts, unsolicited comments from friends -- frequently add up to more information than the brain is configured to handle. People are tempted to throw out the confusing, and sometimes conflicting, data and just do what feels right. But this can be a big mistake. It has been proven over and over again that our instincts can lead us astray and the best decision-making is done with a proper understanding of the relevant data. Finding a way to get a handle on the stream of data at their fingertips, to help businesses distinguish between the signal and the noise, is a crucial first step.”

Australians recognise the significance of data in making accurate and reliable decisions and understand that decisions shouldn’t be made based on gut feeling alone (95%). However, 93% of Australians also believe the volume of data has made decision-making more complex in both their personal and professional lives – the highest in the world. With the ever-increasing volume of data, Australians are now confronted with a decision-making crisis, unsure whether to rely on their intuition or the data in front of them. As a result, many Australians are simply avoiding making decisions altogether. Interestingly, this number was higher for business leaders (89%) than employees (75%).

“Australia understands that data is instrumental to making accurate and reliable decisions. However, today, business leaders and employees are faced with an unprecedented volume of data, leaving many feeling overwhelmed and stripping them of confidence in decision-making,” said Oracle ANZ regional MD Stephen Bovis. “Australians are famous for our laissez-faire, “she’ll be right” attitude. This study shows that perhaps, this attitude boils down to a lack of confidence in decision-making capabilities with many Aussies choosing to avoid making a decision altogether.”

The number of decisions we are making is multiplying and more data is not helping

People are overwhelmed by the amount of data and this is damaging trust, making decisions much more complicated, and negatively impacting their quality of life.

• 88% of Australians say the number of decisions they make every day has increased 10x over the last three years and as they try to make these decisions, 90% are getting bombarded with more data from more sources than ever before.
• Australians are the most likely (93%), compared to other global cohorts (86%) to say the volume of data is making decisions in their personal and professional lives much more complicated and 66% admit they face a decision dilemma – not knowing what decision to make – more than once every single day.
• 41% don’t know which data or sources to trust and 82% have given up on making a decision because the data was overwhelming - the highest globally - which is perhaps the cause for Australia’s famous laissez-faire, “she’ll be right” attitude
• More than any other country, 93% of Aussies say this inability to make decisions is having a negative impact on their quality of life. It is causing spikes in anxiety (40%), missed opportunities (39%), and unnecessary spending (34%).
• As a result, 95% have changed the way they make decisions over the last three years. 44% now only listen to sources they trust and 26% rely solely on gut feelings, which is less than the global average (26%), showing Australians recognise the significance of data in making accurate and reliable decisions

Decision distress is creating organisational inertia

Business leaders want data to help and know it is critical to the success of their organisations but do not believe they have the tools to be successful, eroding their confidence and ability to make timely decisions.

• Australian business leaders suffer from decision distress more than any other nation (95%) – regretting, feeling guilty about, or questioning a decision they made in the past year – and 99% believe having the right type of decision intelligence can make or break the success of an organisation.
• Almost all respondents (99%) want help from data. In an ideal world, they want data to help them: make better decisions (34%), reduce risk (35%), make faster decisions (34%), make more money (38%), and plan for the unexpected (32%).
• In reality, 89% of Australian business leaders admit the sheer volume of data and their lack of trust in data has stopped them from making any decision at all and 99% believe the growing number of data sources has limited the success of their organisations.
• Managing different data sources has required additional resources to collect all the data (68%) for Australian leaders made strategic decision-making slower (37%), and introduced more opportunities for error (32%).
• Business leaders do not believe that the current approach to data and analytics is addressing these challenges. 89% say that the dashboards and charts they get do not always relate directly to the decisions they need to make and 90% believe most data available is only truly helpful for IT professionals or data scientists.
• Business leaders know this needs to change. They believe the right data and insights can help them make better HR (99%), finance (99%), supply chain (99%), and customer experience (98%) decisions. Australian business leaders clearly understand the impact the right data can have on their businesses.

Data needs to be relevant to the decisions people make or they will give up on it

Collecting and interpreting data has driven people to their breaking point at a time when the stakes are incredibly high for business leaders.

• 86% of people say the headache of having to collect and interpret so much data is too much for them to handle.
• This is particularly evident in the business world. 90% of Australian business leaders say people often make decisions and then look for the data to justify them, while 76% of employees believe businesses often put the highest-paid person’s opinion ahead of data, and 14% feel that most decisions made in business are not rational.
• The situation is so challenging that 81% of people – and 64% of business leaders - would prefer for all these difficulties to just go away and to have a robot make their decisions.
• Despite their frustrations with data in their personal and professional worlds, Australians recognise, more than any other country, that without data their decisions would be less accurate (55%), less successful (25%), and more prone to error (49%).
• People also believe that an organisation that uses technology to make data-driven decisions is more trustworthy (88%), will be more successful (85%), is a company they’re more likely to invest in (85%), partner with (85%), and work for (85%).

“Australia’s business leaders have a sophisticated view of data, with only a few preferring to make decisions based on gut feel alone,” Bovis said. “But while they recognise the value, they do need help in making the data work for them. This study's hesitancy, distrust, and lack of understanding of data indicate that many people and organisations need to rethink their approach to data and decision-making. What people really need is to be able to connect data to insight to decision to action. With our span of connected cloud capabilities, ranging from foundational data management, to augmented and applied analytics, to our suite of operational applications, we are uniquely positioned to meet this need providing insights for more confident decision-making and making their lives easier.”

"Our doctors and nurses welcome every advantage in making the best decisions in critical moments - such as the end of a long shift - and this is where data insights can add value to real-world patient outcomes,” said Royal Flying Doctor Service CIO Ryan Klose. “But without the right tools, an organisation’s ability to use data for better decision-making is severely hampered. There are real people at the end of all the decisions we make, so in this way, I.T. isn’t just delivering technology outcomes, we’re delivering real-world patient outcomes.”

Methodology

This global sample of 14,250 people was surveyed in January 2023. In each country, the sample represented employees and business leaders, including titles such as President, CEO, Chairperson, C-Level Executive, CFO, CTO, Director, Senior Manager, HR Manager, and other select leadership roles, confirmed by consumer-matched data accessed via the global insights platform Prodege. Employee samples were calibrated, where possible, to reflect the age and gender demographics of the nation’s workforce.

DKC Analytics conducted and analysed this survey with a sample procured using the Pollfish survey delivery platform, which delivers online surveys globally through mobile apps and the mobile web along with the desktop web. No post-stratification has been applied to the results.

Today, organizations have a much clearer understanding of how technology can weave connections and supercharge productivity but there are still questions that remain: how can we make hybrid work, work.

But to remain an attractive employer and appeal to burgeoning talent, business leaders today need to meet employees where they are. This requires a mindset shift, including embracing technologies that can enable borderless collaboration and redefining traditional notions of productivity.

Embracing hybrid

No two businesses are the same and by the same token, there is no ’one-size-fits-all' approach to the future of how and where we work. However, what businesses in 2022 do share is one universal truth – their employees want a hybrid model.

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As more and more people experience the upsides of flexible work the more heavily it factors into the decision-making of if a job is “worth it”. For younger generations like Gen Z, there is simply no going back. In fact, Gen Z’s likelihood to engage with a company posting on LinkedIn if it mentions “flexibility” is far higher (77%) than Millennials (30%) and others on the platform[1].

They say necessity is the mother of invention. At the onset of the pandemic, we saw this to be true in how businesses transitioned entire workforces onto virtual platforms. Although the pandemic has largely passed, the force of today’s zeitgeist necessitates that businesses embrace hybrid and think seriously about establishing clear and detailed workplace strategies that champion employee experience in the long run.

Indeed, we have seen that companies who push for a full return to the office have faced serious ramifications, and many companies have experienced severe backlash on social media for making such calls.

Making hybrid work, work

One way to make hybrid work work is by really examining team needs. Business and team leaders should consider what work should and could be done remotely versus what is needed in person. To get the most out of the hybrid model, business leaders should encourage an intentional culture for setting meetings by questioning whether meetings are really required when an email might suffice.

Acting in this way ensures that when meetings do happen, they are valuable and collaborative experiences. Particularly when it comes to in-person meetings which should be treated as team bonding opportunities and ways to problem solve and ideate.

Technology is also central to ensuring the efficacy of the hybrid model. When hybrid meetings do happen, with a mix of physical and virtual participants, it is important for the right technology solutions to be in play to ensure all present voices, whether physical or virtual, feel heard and seen and are able to participate.

For hybrid to work, employees must have digital access to all the resources they need – data, Wi-Fi, applications, team channels, audio and video equipment etcetera, so that they have what they need no matter where they are. Businesses that fail to implement technology exhaustively to create a highly productive hybrid workplace will fail to harness the opportunity of a truly empowered workforce.

Not all technology is the same

Technology didn’t just help weather the pandemic storm; it reshaped itself for the pandemic. Today more innovative solutions exist released specifically for businesses and employees alike to optimise hybrid working across both physical and virtual environments.

Hybrid working has often been defined by an upsurge in virtual meetings. In fact, since February 2020, Microsoft reports that the average Teams user saw a 252% increase in their weekly meeting time and the number of weekly meetings has increased by 153%[2]. Workforces need to be armed with the right technology solutions to meet the demands of hybrid work, solutions that empower productivity, individual ways of working and help to manage the cognitive load on the brain.

Combined with the upsurge in meetings, hybrid working has proven that modern life poses an increasing subset of challenges in the environments where we’re now taking calls and meetings outside of the office. From the background noise of road work, the buzz of a noisy café, or interruptive flatmates and family - working from home or on the go is not always as simple as it might seem. But for truly hybrid organizations in 2022, audio issues can be a thing of the past.

The onus falls on business leaders to better equip their workforces with the solutions they need to work effectively. At EPOS, our research and development teams are working on solutions that are designed for hybrid workforces. We understand that hybrid workers require versatile and dynamic collaboration solutions that can keep pace with working styles, and for business leaders, it means investing in solutions that can stand the test of time.

As part of any hybrid working strategy, business and IT decision-makers need to invest in technology and collaboration solutions that marry up to worker needs. Ultimately this means optimising performance and minimising sub-par audio experiences. With so many solutions on the market, decision-makers need to make sure they are investing in equipment that features future-proofing technologies like active noise cancellation or AI for enhanced voice pick-up.

While it may be tempting to choose cheaper collaboration tools at a time when budgets are constrained, this is often a false economy – one that causes a drop in efficiency and risks equipment needing to be replaced quickly.

Re-defining what productivity means

In the pre-pandemic world, productivity felt definable. There simply was no question about where work could get done and how we could collaborate with colleagues. But the hybrid world is different, and in a changed world we cannot apply the same frameworks to codify how we work and live – the shift to hybrid necessitates a more expansive definition of productivity. Therefore, there is both a need and an opportunity for businesses to become more intentional by re-evaluating what productivity means and where and when it happens.

Businesses have now built high levels of trust with their employees and hybrid work models have boosted productivity and performance. By empowering employees through a truly hybrid model, one that entrusts employees to manage their time and ways of working using collaborative technology - new levels of productivity are made possible. But productivity isn’t just about getting as much as you can out of each day. It’s about achieving the work you have set out to accomplish.

The correlation between hybrid working and improved companies’ performance has been well documented, and it can sometimes be tempting to equate higher levels of employee activity with business success. But to adopt this thinking risks overlooking the factors conducive to longer-term innovation. Re-defining productivity in the hybrid era comes down to assessing individual business compromises between the following: individual well-being, work styles, business needs and the culture and social connections of an organization that can spur innovation.

Leading from the top

Redefining a company’s culture is a complex task. From a day-to-day perspective, it is important for business leaders to define a hybrid strategy that has clear and intentional tactics for employees creating a greater balance between work and life and encouraging people to connect by coming together at physical sites to get the social and cultural interaction they crave.

In the longer term, it also means investing in collaboration solutions that enable hybrid strategies to succeed, particularly as more and more businesses recruit talent across a more geographically diverse network. That’s why business leaders need to be intentional when it comes to equipping workforces with collaboration solutions for hybrid working, this means tailoring tech solutions to the specific requirements of a role as well as individual preference.

But despite the ways in which technology has changed the workplace, it is not a substitute for leadership and culture. Leaders today face the challenge of harnessing the capabilities of technology while retaining a sense of culture and community that can keep employees engaged and motivated for the long term.

Business leaders who can deliver on this type of hybrid strategy will be well-positioned to secure future talent as it enters the workforce by offering flexible work, well-connected technology solutions and meaningful cultural experiences.

 

^[1]  https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index/hybrid-work

^[2] https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index/great-expectations-making-hybrid-work-work

The Logicalis research, Global CIO Report 2023: The Meteoric rise of the CIO, shows CIOs are playing a leading role in delivering a digital-first future, and that we are seeing a move to a more strategic CIO role. Organisations are now better able to reimagine customer and employee experiences with such a CIO behind them.

Yet, this drive and growing field of influence at the board level is not something that the traditional company executives - accountants, lawyers, marketers - readily embraced. The research finds that CIOs have continued to see digital as a strategic priority over the years, but faced with organisations lagging behind due to a lack of digital awareness in the wider business it was the CIOs themselves who pushed through. Faced with an urgent need to innovate, CIOs stepped into the role of digital evangelists and strategic advisors.

There are clear lessons here for the boards who relegate their technology leaders to sit under, say, the CFO, as opposed to those who embrace IT as part of their company strategy and direction.

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The Logicalis research demonstrates a monumental shift in the role of the CIO from tech implementor to business leader. In fact, 41% have some level of responsibility for business strategy while 81% say they are spending more time on innovation. These CIOs are using their technical expertise to deliver innovative solutions which both drive value and competitive advantage. 77% of CIOs are now spending more time selling ideas to the board. Further, 80% of CIOs say that business strategy will become a bigger part of their role over the next two years.

“CIOs are playing a leading role in orchestrating transformation and are stepping up in response to the changing industry dynamics,” says Logicalis CEO Bob Bailkoksi. “Yet, CIOs are faced with challenges to navigate including a potential recession and talent shortages. In addition to this, they are experiencing increased pressure to deliver digital-based outcomes for their organisations, giving them more exposure to their Boards and requiring a different way of operating.”

It's clear CIOs are, for a large part, forging transformation on the journey towards a digital-first future. The report identified four critical focus areas for CIOs:

• innovation - 50% of CIOs are expected to deliver continuous innovation that elevates and differentiates customer and employee interactions
• strategy - 80% of CIOs say that business strategy will become a larger part of their role over the next two years
• digital transformation - 57% of CIOs say building and operating new digital platforms is still a core part of their job
• reimagining service partnerships - 74% of CIOs expect to increase spending on IT outsourcing in 2023

“Modern CIOs have the right leadership skills and technical expertise to ensure their organisation is well equipped for the digital world”, says Logicalis CTO Toby Alcock. "Rather than just supporting business needs through technology, the CIO is now using technology to help create new business models and tap into more revenue streams.”

You can find the report here, and also view a summary video with some of the key findings here.

Logicalis surveyed a thousand IT leaders around the globe.

You might not know Debrett's - or, perhaps I misjudge your poise and graces and you do; the London-based firm has been the standard-bearer for etiquette since 1769. In fact, you can read over 2,000 pages on the proper way to carry yourself on their website, or you could read their smaller book, The A-Z of modern manners. Perhaps Kitty Flanagan's rules are more your style, but there's no denying Debrett's know their stuff - from the appropriate tie knot for any occasion to whether you ought to be photographing food. They're to etiquette like, well, Poly is to high quality audio and video hardware solutions for offices, individuals, and anything in between.

Hybrid work is fully entrenched, but sometimes its greatest proponents can be the strongest arguments against it by virtue of their hybrid working behaviours.

“With people increasingly splitting their time between the office and home, how we conduct ourselves at work has changed drastically,” says Debrett's etiquette advisor Liz Wyse, “It’s clear that hybrid working offers many benefits, including greater flexibility and a better work-life balance. However, that’s not an excuse to let etiquette slip, and standards should stay the same regardless of where you’re working from. What’s the dress code when working from home? How do you eliminate distractions and present a professional façade online? This guide seeks to answer these questions so that both staff and employers can get the most out of a hybrid working arrangement."

Thus the Poly guide to hybrid work etiquette was born!

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The comprehensive guide offers insight into everything from how to behave on video calls and how to dress yourself and your background, to body language tips and the importance of eliminating distractions.

Key takeaways include these - and how many are you currently following, or neglecting?

1. Give a Royal wave: Ending a video call can sometimes feel a bit awkward. To make calls feel more friendly and inclusive, you can soften the abrupt finality of pressing ‘End call’ by giving colleagues a wave goodbye.
2. Avoid video motion sickness: Stay in a fixed position during video calls. Carrying your device while you answer the door or wander around the office during video calls risks giving your colleagues a bad dose of motion sickness.
3. No meeting munchies: You should try to avoid eating – you don’t want people to focus on the contents of your lunch rather than what you’re saying. It’s preferable to eat before you join a meeting.
4. Beware the danger of diversions: Your home is full of diversions. Be it domestic chores, the garden, or visits to the fridge – it’s all too easy to wander around doing jobs or making snacks, which ultimately distracts you from your job and impacts your productivity.
5. Eliminate virtual background clutter: Indulge in a little set-dressing before your call. Evaluate your video background. Try to eliminate chaotic bookshelves, discarded clothing, empty takeaway containers, and distracting artwork. You want your colleagues to focus on you, not your background.
6. Say no to stoic sickness syndrome: Don’t struggle into the office if you’ve got a cough or cold or anything contagious. Nobody will applaud your stoicism.
7. No meeting multitasking: It’s inappropriate to multitask during meetings – for example looking at your phone. It is also very bad form to carry on working while on a call; everybody will realise your mind is elsewhere and hear the incriminating clatter of your keyboard.
8. Mute your workmates: Noise in the office can be distracting when joining calls. It’s quite acceptable to politely ask your colleagues to keep their voices down and to turn down their radio or music.
9. Dress for success: People will choose to wear more relaxed, comfortable clothing when working from home, but it’s important to be aware of the psychological impact of truly letting yourself go. Aim to dress as if you are in the room with other meeting attendees. 
10. Embrace long pauses: Don’t be alarmed by long pauses during meetings and scramble to fill them with chatter; they are an invaluable way of giving people space to interject or expound.

“The shift to hybrid work was so abrupt, we’ve not really taken stock of how our behaviour should change to accommodate this new way of working,” says Poly APJ senior director hybrid work solutions and peripherals Bill Zeng. “Should we be amending our behaviour to make hybrid work and hybrid meetings feel more normal? For example, waving at the end of calls or having neutral virtual backgrounds. Thinking about how to make hybrid meetings feel more natural will create an equal meeting experience, whether people are in the room or dialling in from home.

“Delivering an equal experience can come down to employers providing staff with the right technology and training,” Zeng adds. “Managers should be trained on how to make hybrid meetings inclusive. And instead of giving everyone the same equipment, organisations should understand how people like to work and collaborate, and the spaces they use – including their home office setup. This can be used to tailor the equipment provided, allowing employees to look their best, be heard, feel included, and avoid distraction, irrespective of where they’re working from.”

Get your own copy here and amaze your managers, charm your co-workers, and lead the charge for the best in hybrid work practices in your organisation.

Here's what Deel forecasts for 2023:

 

1. Overemployed (by choice)

Remote workers are gaming the system by using flexible hours and asynchronous tools to juggle more than one job at the same time. For them, it's all work, and more pay. There's even a subreddit on the topic - /r/OverEmployed - though the first rule of being overemployed is you don't talk about being overemployed.

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2. The rise of the Chief Remote Officer

With remote work on the rise and here to stay, the title CRO is popping up on job boards everywhere. Most job descriptions entail all the elements around remote team set-ups, including hosting in-person events, how to work in different time zones, comp strategies, and internal comms tools.

 

3. Workcation

Work while travelling the globe? Well, it’s now a reality and more often than not, seems to become the norm. New tools like Deel are enabling people to not only work from their couches but even those gorgeous huts on the water in the Maldives.

 

4. Flex Holidays 

Not everyone celebrates Thanksgiving, and with more and more companies embracing distributed work, teams are leaning into the idea of flexible holidays. More workers are getting the power to decide what holidays they take off instead of a one size fits all calendar. After all, global teams are, well, global.

 

5. Gen Flex

The latest generation entering the workforce is having one of the most unique experiences in decades. While some entered during a recession or the pandemic, the latest generation has never even stepped foot in an office for work. Virtual work is … well, their reality.

 

6. Flexetariat

Today’s workforce is putting flexibility and freedom at the top of their working requirements (and life). Now more than ever teams are trading perks for the non-negotiable of being a Flexetariat.

 

7. Talent Snatching - another day, another offer letter

In the midst of ongoing layoffs, one interesting trend is bubbling up. A bidding war for talent. Some workers are finding themselves working at one company for only a few months before getting a more appealing offer elsewhere, oftentimes out of nowhere. Talent Snatching can be savage, but competitive offers sure do have their benefits.

 

8. Sukima - extra time is extra money

In Japan, Sukima is something young people are embracing. They’re turning free time into extra cash with new apps, such as Jobcase, Timee and LINE Sukimani,  that help match them with jobs like waiting tables or making deliveries, so there’s no time wasted; just money earned.

 

9. Casual e-signatures

With apps like BeReal on the rise, Gen Zers are skipping the pleasantries for more… “authentic” sign-offs and OOO replies. There’s been an influx of language like, “Lukewarm regards;” “Another day, another slay;” and “In case of emergency, dial 911; not an emergency, try Google.”

 

10. Pick-up Parties - There’s a new type of Tupperware party in town

Since fewer people are working from offices and together less IRL, people are finding new ways to connect at in-person brand events called Pick-up Parties. You order a product and instead of it being delivered to your home you collect it from an in-person party event where you meet other like-minded purchasers.

 

11. Career Bouncing

Slightly different from salary bouncing (jumping from job to job in under a year to increase salary with each jump) - moving from one career to another, i.e., teacher to a marketer, to determine which career is preferable.

 

12. Save-from-home

Deel found in a survey with Momentive that people are saving more than ever thanks to things like reduced travel, food expenses, and increased salaries. More than 59% have increased their salaries and 64% say they’ve increased their savings while working from home.

 

“In the past few years, the way we work has changed dramatically due to the pandemic, ongoing skills shortages and more widespread acceptance of remote and flexible working styles, which is why we are seeing new trends evolve like the emergence of the Chief Remote Officer and a rising appetite among workers for a Workcation,” says Deel country leader ANZ Shannon Karaka.