The year 2024 has been a wild ride for worklife, packed with game-changing technologies that are reshaping how we work and all sorts of tinkering with employee value propositions (EVP) from Google to the Ontario Teacher’s Pension Plan. Generative AI has become our trusty sidekick at work; however, tools like Anthropic’s Claude and Microsoft’s Copilot are not yet realizing their productivity potential at scale. GenAI is helping us automate boring tasks, sure, but it is also hamstringing organizations and governments to scale such productivity boosters because the skills, rules, and policy governing and enabling AI cannot be built fast enough.
No less than 17% of my work as a senior people and culture leader is dedicated to engaging with the continuing tension generated by hybrid work. The pandemic introduced remote work to knowledge workers everywhere and now we’re trying to find the sweet spot between making work from anywhere happen and connecting on campus through moments that matter (the fairly gross HR/Execspeak phrase folks like me have ushered in for the last two years). Any honest executive and/or people leader and/or every knowledge worker (and many other workers!) will agree that no company, organization, community, or family has figured out the sweet spot of hybrid work (we’re still tinkering with all sorts of ways to adapt the model, such as normalizing four-day workweeks).
DEIA (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility) – also called “wokeness” in the 2024 nomenclature/zeitgeist/Internet – initiatives have stayed in the spotlight and continue to shape our politics at pretty much every level. The rejection of “wokeness” by the majority reflects deeper systemic issues; however, dismissing identity politics as “woke” is more about perception than policy. Social justice integrated into economic policy and organizational design hasn’t been meaningfully scaled by most companies, organizations, and/or voters for many reasons. Josh Bersin argues that, despite the measurable success of DEIA initiatives in organizations (especially big ones), growing such programs (or even sustaining progress on existing ones) presents a “chilling problem” for HR leaders, DEIA executives, and prosocial organizations around the world.
The past few years have witnessed seismic shifts in how skills and qualifications are valued. Gone are the days of obsessing over degrees and years of experience. While we’re not yet living in a skills-economy, 2024 is way more about what workers can do, as opposed to where we’ve done it or learned it. Employers are laser-focused on skills and employees’ ability to deliver. Whether you honed your coding skills in a college classroom or mastered them through late-night YouTube marathons, what counts is your knack for solving problems and creating value as part of a team.
Bold worklife predictions
With these 2024 trends (and some other pretty concerning ones from Gallup) setting the stage, here are my three bold predictions for worklife in 2025.
Work will be the thing that builds community and connection in peoples’ lives
Loneliness is the realist, most root-causey, explainable, saddest, solvable (and intractable) explanation for all the bad shit that is happening in the world today. My take is that social media is gasoline to the fire of loneliness, but technology ain’t the embers or root cause of this problem.
We’re all better, happier, and more engaged when we’ve got a friend at work (like StatsCan … which is evidence-based-serious/hilarious). Connected workplaces are more engaged and productive, too.
In 2025, work will be the primary driver for creating social circles, friendships, and human connections. The hybrid work model will play a crucial role in making this happen. Companies will need to craft hybrid models that foster meaningful interactions and a sense of belonging. This could mean regular social events, fun team-building activities, and intentional coffee chats that bring people together with the primary purpose of getting to know each other (as opposed to talking through specific work tasks). Managers will need to expand their skillsets to create environments that address conflict, turn colleagues into friends, and co-create support networks that make performance and growth enabled by what HBR’s David Burkus calls “multiplex relationships”.
The rise of cross-functional, skill-based teams
My second bold prediction for 2025 is that cross-functional, skill-based teams are here to stay because organizations will embrace and scale the benefits of interdisciplinary thinking. Bringing together people with diverse skills and experiences to tackle specific projects for a specific timeframe will become a mainstay of organizational design in 2025. Forget traditional hierarchies; it’s all about assembling the right mix of talents and perspectives to solve problems together.
Organizations will embrace this model to stay agile and adaptable in a fast-paced world. Cross-functional, skill-based teams will be able to pivot quickly to seize new opportunities and fend off threats. Leaders will need to adopt a more facilitative and supportive style, which means emphasizing coaching and resource-procuring, as opposed to doing all the work as domain or subject matter experts.
Asynchronous communication and collaboration will grow, but not take over
My third bold prediction is that asynchronous communication and collaboration will continue to grow, but much to the chagrin of my awesome, asynchronously collaborative colleagues, Courtney and Dolly, it won’t completely replace in-person, real-time meetings just yet. Asynchronous communication is like the Netflix of work because it lets employees communicate and collaborate on their own schedules without sacrificing collaboration and co-creation. This is a win for remote and distributed teams who can blend their worklife schedules to manage dropoff, pickup, elder care, and neighbourhood responsibilities with document editing, recognition, or product design.
There are still hurdles to overcome before the value of asynchronous work will be fully realized. Real-time, in-person meetings offer immediate feedback, spontaneous brainstorming, and the chance to build rapport – such things are hard to replicate in an asynchronous format. In 2025, we’ll see a hybrid approach to communication, with organizations using both asynchronous and synchronous methods to suit different needs. Asynchronous tools will get smarter, but real-time interactions will remain essential for collective decision-making (and, let’s be honest, extroverted senior leaders’ taking over and grandstanding); my hope is that 2025 is the year of fewer useless meetings because leaders see the value in asynchronous collaboration because this approach brings out more strengths from diverse teams.
How AI will enable and hinder these predictions
All these predictions will be backed by the evolving use of AI as our trusty sidekick at work. While AI has the potential to enhance various aspects of work, its implementation will come with its fair share of hiccups. Organizations will need to navigate the complexities of integrating AI into their everyday operations and ensure that whatever tools are added to the toolbox improve the employee experience without creating new headaches.
Effective use cases of AI will be rare gems at first because, to date, there is not one tool to meet everyone’s needs – for example, Copilot and Claude complement each other, but neither serve exclusively as AI-backed project management software, advanced analytics platforms, and virtual assistants. The key will be to identify the right applications of AI and develop the skills needed to leverage its full potential.
The worklife landscape in 2025 will be shaped by workplaces being the driving force of community and connection in peoples’ lives. AI will play a pivotal role in this evolution, offering opportunities for enhancement but requiring careful and thoughtful implementation. As we navigate these changes, the focus will be on creating work environments that are inclusive, dynamic, and enabling friendships, growth, and human connection.