Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Quick Takes. Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. I have
Speaker 1: to say I love the first line of a recent
Speaker 1: essay that was written by our next guest one is
Speaker 1: the year our relationship with work change forever. This is
Speaker 1: something I agree that we're gonna be looking back ten
Speaker 1: years from now and saying this is when it all
Speaker 1: started to change. The question is the question is what
Speaker 1: the what changes stick and what to what extent do
Speaker 1: we go back to the old normal? Hey? Those words
Speaker 1: were written by Dan Shapiro, the chief operating officer of LinkedIn.
Speaker 1: He joins us once again on Bloomberg Business Week from
Speaker 1: the on the phone from Palo Alto, California, Dan, how
Speaker 1: are you good? How are you Hey? We're doing pretty well. Um.
Speaker 1: It's really great to have you back, especially after such
Speaker 1: a wild year when it comes to the way that
Speaker 1: that people feel about work and the and the relationship
Speaker 1: and the changing relationship that they're they're having with work. Uh,
Speaker 1: you write about something that you call the Great Reshuffle.
Speaker 1: What is that? The Great Reshuffle? Is this idea that
Speaker 1: right now more people are reconsidering what they want to
Speaker 1: doing their jobs and what they want to do with
Speaker 1: their careers at any time in recent memory. We run
Speaker 1: a survey at LinkedIn that suggested that of professionals in
Speaker 1: America are going to rethink what they want to do.
Speaker 1: And what's interesting is that that is happening at a
Speaker 1: time when there's hasn't been a tighter labor market for
Speaker 1: professionals in recent memory. The economy is growing again, there's
Speaker 1: a massive imbalance in supply and demand for digital skills.
Speaker 1: And what that means is that as we come out
Speaker 1: of this pandemic period, as the world becomes more endemic
Speaker 1: and companies reconsider their policies for how they're going to
Speaker 1: work in this new world, that employees have a much
Speaker 1: stronger voice than they used to in this resetting the expectation.
Speaker 1: So it's gonna be a really interesting year. So I
Speaker 1: do wonder too, though, Dawn, like I feel like the
Speaker 1: pendulum can swing big time and workers do it does
Speaker 1: feel like they are in the driver's seat right now,
Speaker 1: as so many employees pick your employees. They're all scrambling
Speaker 1: for workers. So employees in many ways and set their terms.
Speaker 1: Does that stick when the labor market corrects itself and
Speaker 1: a more normal labor market is back with us To
Speaker 1: do workers continue to have that leverage and that power.
Speaker 1: The only time will tell that. I think there's reason
Speaker 1: to believe that digital skills in particular are going to
Speaker 1: remain very tight for the foreseeable future. If you look
Speaker 1: at what's happened over the last few years, we were
Speaker 1: already on this journey around companies going through this idea
Speaker 1: of digital transformation really digitizing their businesses, and the pandemic
Speaker 1: only accelerated that. If you think about the expectations consumers
Speaker 1: have now about what they expect when they interact with
Speaker 1: a restaurant or a retailer, it is a much more
Speaker 1: digital experience, and that's placing more and more burdens operationally
Speaker 1: on the companies that need digital talent to make those
Speaker 1: things real. So that is likely to continue for quite
Speaker 1: some time, and that will likely drive some of the
Speaker 1: policies and practices that many companies adopt. So I think
Speaker 1: that there's some real staying power here. What about for
Speaker 1: elements of this that that don't stay do we? You know,
Speaker 1: we're already seeing companies call their workers back to work
Speaker 1: right now, but we're seeing some shifts. You know, Carol
Speaker 1: and I talked about Apollo for for for private equity
Speaker 1: employees offering that one month of remote work. That's something
Speaker 1: that Carol, I mean, you've covered this stuff forever. That's
Speaker 1: that was unthinkable a few years ago, right, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: It's really fascinating to see, like even the financial firms
Speaker 1: have been pushing back, saying, okay, you can work from home.
Speaker 1: So Dane, where are the things that go back to
Speaker 1: what they were where they were before? What are the
Speaker 1: changes that don't stick? I wish I had a crystal ball.
Speaker 1: I think that the thing that is most resonant with
Speaker 1: employees right now is this concept of flexibility. Uh, people
Speaker 1: are happier, They report being happier when their jobs are
Speaker 1: more flexible. You see that looking at remote jobs is
Speaker 1: something that if you look at all the jobs on
Speaker 1: LinkedIn and how many people were viewing different kinds of jobs.
Speaker 1: Just a few years ago, less than ten percent of
Speaker 1: the jobs were remote eligible that people looked at. That
Speaker 1: number is now for a percent of all the job
Speaker 1: viewing as people curious about remote roles, and so I
Speaker 1: think that the idea of flexibility is something that has
Speaker 1: staying power exactly where the lines are drawn about what
Speaker 1: kind of flexibility works such that businesses can meet their
Speaker 1: needs and the teams can be functioning. I think that's
Speaker 1: going to be something where everyone's watching everyone in time
Speaker 1: will tell you know. I recently UM caught up at
Speaker 1: the CEO of Cisco and Chuck Robbins, and even he conceded,
Speaker 1: and a company like Cisco, they have been doing hybrid work,
Speaker 1: you know, for years pre pandemic. That's just the way
Speaker 1: many of the tech industry have been working. But even
Speaker 1: he acknowledged Um being a little surprised at how innovative
Speaker 1: everybody really could be during the pandemic. Technology has made
Speaker 1: that much more possible. Like I think about, you know,
Speaker 1: as much as we make fun of all the zoom
Speaker 1: calls and things, you really can almost feel like you're
Speaker 1: with people. Yeah, I think we're going to see a
Speaker 1: tremendous amount of technological innovation in this space. Every leader
Speaker 1: has likely gone through a journey of being skeptical about
Speaker 1: how teams would operate when they were from home or
Speaker 1: in a hybrid capacity, and things have worked in a
Speaker 1: lot of ways better than expected. And that is coming
Speaker 1: at a time when there's more investment from software companies
Speaker 1: and trying to make this better for people. So if
Speaker 1: those things come together, I think, I think there's a
Speaker 1: lot of optimism. At least I hold that these working
Speaker 1: styles will be effective. But exactly where we land, I think,
Speaker 1: is it's going to be something we'll have to see.
Speaker 1: Do you think, Dan, honestly, anything is lost without being
Speaker 1: in person with one another because I do what I can.
Speaker 1: What I can say is that we have, on occasion
Speaker 1: at LinkedIn had opportunities in a way that was safe
Speaker 1: and in compliance with health guidelines. We've had opportunities for
Speaker 1: some teams to spend time together in person, and it
Speaker 1: is like a spark of energy. It is a breath
Speaker 1: of share. People love having those moments. Now, whether that
Speaker 1: becomes people something people do more periodically as opposed to
Speaker 1: every day, it's interesting. Um, But I think you will
Speaker 1: continue to see the power of being together and creating
Speaker 1: connection is being really fundamental to how great teams work. Uh.
Speaker 1: Dan eager to talk to you about this story that
Speaker 1: we highlighted a little earlier in our broadcast about New
Speaker 1: York City requiring employers to list the minimum and maximum
Speaker 1: salaries on job postings. That's going to start this spring.
Speaker 1: According to the Wall Street Journal, it's getting some opposition
Speaker 1: from business groups. Can you talk a little bit about
Speaker 1: the way that being transparent with these positions when it
Speaker 1: comes to salary can empower workers? Absolutely? Well, it's a
Speaker 1: broad trend. Um. The trend towards salary transparency has been
Speaker 1: happening for years, and I think one of the guiding
Speaker 1: principles behind it is that there's evidence to suggest that
Speaker 1: it helps remove bias in the process. Um. Some people
Speaker 1: of different backgrounds negotiate differently, and oftentimes the transparency that
Speaker 1: you can bring to the conversation yields outcomes where there
Speaker 1: is less bias in terms of pay um. And so
Speaker 1: I think that's one of these is driving it, and
Speaker 1: it's it's something that we think it's a positive. Are
Speaker 1: you seeing more companies post on linked in those salary
Speaker 1: ranges for jobs that are being offered, Like, do you
Speaker 1: have any data that that that shows that the trend
Speaker 1: is happening on LinkedIn too? I don't have any data
Speaker 1: myself right now, but I know it's a broad trend
Speaker 1: that's going on in the industry. So it's no please continue, please.
Speaker 1: The other thing that's going on is Obviously we're an
Speaker 1: increasingly inflationary environment and companies are trying to figure out
Speaker 1: how that's going to play out in their in their
Speaker 1: compensation packages, and particularly as it's a tight labor market,
Speaker 1: workers are asking questions around how does that what does
Speaker 1: that mean for my pay? And similarly, companies are grappling
Speaker 1: with as employees are working in different locations in the
Speaker 1: same job, how do they reconcile whether they pay different
Speaker 1: amounts in different cities for similar work. So what we're
Speaker 1: going to find as we enter two is a world
Speaker 1: where executive teams are gonna have to think through pay
Speaker 1: policies um as one of the core questions that they
Speaker 1: asked themselves. Yeah, that's an interesting one because you know,
Speaker 1: we've seen over the last few decades Americans just don't
Speaker 1: move around anymore. And this flexibility of being able to
Speaker 1: work at home, if you think about it, even on
Speaker 1: a global scale, you can kind of potentially work anywhere,
Speaker 1: raise your family anywhere, um and maybe work for any company.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's kind of mind blowing, Dan, if you
Speaker 1: think about that, it's opening up a lot of opportunity
Speaker 1: for people, and honestly, it's opening up a lot of
Speaker 1: opportunity for companies that are able to adapt to these
Speaker 1: new working styles and tap into labor pools that weren't
Speaker 1: possible in the past. So I think this is like
Speaker 1: any moment where the rules are changing, there are going
Speaker 1: to be winners and losers. And I think companies and
Speaker 1: people that adapt to the new norms are going to
Speaker 1: do quite well well. And so that's something I want
Speaker 1: to just push you a little bit because there are
Speaker 1: companies that are like, Yeah, this is just a temporary thing.
Speaker 1: Do you think they're wrong in thinking that? And those
Speaker 1: companies that don't embrace more flexibility in their workforce where
Speaker 1: they can, will they be left time? Will they be penalized?
Speaker 1: I think that flexibility is here to stay. I think
Speaker 1: what that means in a given industry or for a
Speaker 1: given company, I think we'll learn over time. But the
Speaker 1: reason the flexibility I think it's here to stay is
Speaker 1: because they're continue to be core talent in digital areas,
Speaker 1: technical skills that are going to remain an incredibly high demand,
Speaker 1: and those are some of the loudest voices that are
Speaker 1: asking for this kind of flexibility. And so until we
Speaker 1: see a market where those dynamics aren't in play. I
Speaker 1: think flexibility in some form is going to be part
Speaker 1: of our future. Dan, I'm I'm wondering about what you
Speaker 1: think about how employees can help shape the future of
Speaker 1: their workplace. If somebody's listening right now, are watching us
Speaker 1: right now, what advice would you give them about how
Speaker 1: they can use this as sort of this rare moment
Speaker 1: in the history of us work to really shape the
Speaker 1: workplace how they want to see it. Well, I would,
Speaker 1: I would uh encourage everyone to think about what it
Speaker 1: feels like to be a manager right now. It's a
Speaker 1: hard job to be a manager. The playbooks that you
Speaker 1: probably learned over the course of your career. Two, connect
Speaker 1: with your team to help them learn their job, to
Speaker 1: onboard new employees. It is a very different environment than
Speaker 1: we had just a few years ago. And so I
Speaker 1: would start if I were at a UM, you know,
Speaker 1: if from a company perspective of think about the roles
Speaker 1: that your frontline managers are playing, Interview them, listen to
Speaker 1: what they're going through, and help bring them tools and
Speaker 1: frameworks to help them be successful. Because the greatest companies
Speaker 1: and the greatest employee cultures often are built off of
Speaker 1: exceptional frontline managers, and I think that's a place where
Speaker 1: every company can focus. All right, we're gonna leave it
Speaker 1: on that note. Hey, so nice to catch up with you, Dan.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Have a good weekend. Dan Shapiro,
Speaker 1: he's chief operating officer at LinkedIn, on the phone from
Speaker 1: Palo Alto, California,