Business News

What is ‘The Great Resignation’?

The Great Resignation is an idea proposed by Professor Anthony Klotz of Texas A&M University that predicts a large number of people leaving their jobs after the COVID pandemic ends and life returns to “normal.” Managers are now navigating the ripple effects from the pandemic, as employees re-evaluate their careers and leave their jobs in record numbers. Companies have a record number of open positions in the US, and to explore what has been driving this recent shift, a recent in depth analysis by Ian Cook and his team of more than 9 million employee records at 4,000 global companies revealed two trends: Resignation rates are highest among mid-career employees Resignation rates are highest in the technology and healthcare industries At the onset of the pandemic, the job market was full of uncertainty and mass layoffs: millions of people lost their jobs, and those lucky enough to remain employed remained put in their roles for survival. However, as we now turn towards recovery, workers in privileged positions who don’t live paycheck to paycheck are now finally moving on. Most in non-developed economies with the absence of social security and unemployment benefits cannot afford this luxury but may still be undergoing duress and pent-up frustration from the disruption caused by the pandemic. These trends highlight the importance to understanding why people are leaving and what can be done to prevent The Great Resignation. It also calls for a data-driven approach to determine not just how many people are quitting, but who exactly has the highest turnover risk. Given the buzz generated around the term “The Great Resignation”, we turned to Professor Dr. Isabell Welpe at the Technical University of Munich. Dr. Welpe conducts research in the area of leadership, innovation, and organisation from a behavioural science perspective, with a focus on the selection of managers, managing teams, […]

This is How They Tell Me the World Ends

This is How They Tell Me the World Ends (Bloomsbury 2021), Nicole Perlroth’s alarming look at the world of underground cyberarms, has been named the 2021 Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year. “Digital sabotage,” Perlroth said after her win, “is the immediate threat that we can do something about—if we wake up. The goal of this book is to wake people up.” The book draws on nearly a decade of the author’s cybersecurity and digital espionage reporting for the New York Times, where she worked with hundreds of sources including hackers and government officials. On December 1, Perlroth left the Times to join a new committee with the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. “Maybe one day I will hopefully get back to journalism,” she said, “but in the meantime, the threat is too great for me to keep doing what I was doing.” Nicole Perlroth has written a book that is more than just a timely wake-up call to the profound implications of the arms race among hackers, cybercriminals, businesses, and national governments. It is an alarming book, one in which the author makes a granular and matter-of-fact case demonstrating how vulnerable global computer systems have become and an urgent plea for specific and systematic action. The Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award is given annually to the book that provides “the most compelling and enjoyable insight into modern business issues.” Each of this year’s shortlisted authors receives £10,000.

Why scaling investment is crucial for sustainable development

Ahmet Burak Dağlıoğlu, President, Investment Office of the Presidency of Turkey. Climate change has been on the international agenda for a long time, but recent developments have upped the urgency of taking immediate action for both humanitarian and developmental reasons. World leaders gathered in Glasgow to discuss climate change at the United Nations Climate Change Conference COP26, following the G20 summit in Rome in late October, which also prioritised sustainability. Keeping climate change at bay through mitigation and adaptation is imperative to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which were set by the United Nations in 2015 and made social, economic and environmental sustainability central to economic development. Achieving the SDGs will, in turn, require an integrated approach and close cooperation among all stakeholders. Mobilizing financial resources will play an especially important role in reaching the SDGs and addressing the adverse effects of climate change. In this regard, foreign direct investment (FDI) has been a significant source of external finance for many countries, especially developing economies, to help achieve sustainable economic development. Commitment to SDGs can mobilise foreign direct investment Today, all economies vie for greater FDI inflows as it not only brings capital but also generates employment, transfers technology, and helps move up the value chain. Moreover, FDI can be instrumental in a country’s economic transformation towards a greener economy, as multinational corporations (MNCs) have both the financial wherewithal and technical capacity to help transform local operations to greener global best practices. MNCs have been increasingly incorporating environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles into their investment strategies, not only to achieve ESG investor score targets but also to save costs and mitigate risks, helping achieve both more sustainable and more profitable operations. The international community is putting more efforts into scaling such investments through establishing effective mechanisms to support cooperation on investment […]

How to stop supply chain issues disrupting the economic recovery

Covid-19 revealed that modern supply chains are a house of cards, collapsing the moment they come under any kind of sustained pressure. Many businesses that were caught flat-footed by global lockdowns have found the speed of the recovery just as treacherous to navigate. Clogged ports and widespread shortages have led to record order backlogs across major supply chain hubs. The crunch on container capacity could last until Q4 2022, according to maritime research firm Drewry. Shortages of key components, including semiconductors, could take even longer to resolve. Is the answer to carry on pushing orders through in the hope that these problems resolve themselves? Two years into the pandemic, there are strong signs global businesses are starting to realise that supply chains actually need root-and-branch reform. Bursting at the seams Recent data from Tradeshift suggests buyers are beginning to question the wisdom of putting fresh orders into a system that is coming apart at the seams. Global order volumes fell by 24 points in Q3 2021 (see figure 1), the biggest quarterly drop since the first lockdowns in early 2020 and 15 points below the pre-pandemic forecast range. Rising invoice volumes provide an indication of how supply chains are reacting to demand signals. Invoice numbers moved five points closer to the expected range in Q3 2021, but the upward trajectory is flatter than anticipated given the significant spike in order volumes during the previous quarter. The data suggests it may be some time before order volumes start to align with invoice flows. The longer this gap persists, the more likely it is that the downward trajectory in Q3 signals the beginning of a more prolonged slowdown. The International Monetary Fund recently cut its forecast for US growth by 1 percentage point to 6%, citing supply chain disruption and weakening consumption. Tradeshift’s data indicates that activity across US supply […]

The Premonition

For those who could read between the lines, the censored news out of China was terrifying. But the president insisted there was nothing to worry about. Fortunately, we are still a nation of skeptics. Fortunately, there are those among us who study pandemics and are willing to look unflinchingly at worst-case scenarios. Michael Lewis’s taut and brilliant nonfiction thriller pits a band of medical visionaries against the wall of ignorance that was the official response of the Trump administration to the outbreak of COVID-19. The characters you will meet in these pages are as fascinating as they are unexpected. A thirteen-year-old girl’s science project on transmission of an airborne pathogen develops into a very grown-up model of disease control. A local public-health officer uses her worm’s-eye view to see what the CDC misses, and reveals great truths about American society. A secret team of dissenting doctors, nicknamed the Wolverines, has everything necessary to fight the pandemic: brilliant backgrounds, world-class labs, prior experience with the pandemic scares of bird flu and swine flu…everything, that is, except official permission to implement their work. Michael Lewis is not shy about calling these people heroes for their refusal to follow directives that they know to be based on misinformation and bad science. Even the internet, as crucial as it is to their exchange of ideas, poses a risk to them. They never know for sure who else might be listening in. Michael Lewis is the best-selling author of Liar’s Poker, Moneyball, The Blind Side, The Big Short.

The long read:Why cybersecurity needs a more diverse and inclusive workforce

As cyberattacks increase in scale and severity, so too does the global demand for cybersecurity professionals – in all aspects of the field and across all sectors. The supply seemingly cannot keep up, resulting in an acute talent shortage. But in this talent shortage, there is an even bigger and more troubling gap: the lack of diversity in cybersecurity. Improving the work environment for underrepresented groups The latest statistics on demographics in cybersecurity are troubling: according to the Aspen Digital Tech Policy hub’s latest report, underrepresented groups such as Black (9%), Hispanic (4%) and Asian (8%) professionals make up an increasingly low percentage of the industry. For example, women make up 51% of the population, but only comprise only 24% of the cybersecurity workforce. On the flip side, there are almost 500,000 open jobs in cybersecurity in the United States alone, signalling a systemic, yet not-insurmountable divide. If we work together through individual and collective action to improve the current environment for underrepresented groups, there could be lasting positive impacts across the field of cybersecurity. Cybersecurity professionals work long hours. In many circumstances, they exhaust themselves to safeguard infrastructure, IT systems and institutions. Almost everyone in cybersecurity is stretched thin. Organisations and nations alike need more qualified people to work in cybersecurity. Professionals must truly understand the threats while producing more robust solutions. To do so, the industry must fix parts of recruitment, retention and leadership development. Choosing candidates with the right core traits Focusing on the barriers to inclusion and success in the industry, instead of just overt discrimination, can help reduce the talent shortage. Cybersecurity leaders play an important role in this. They should focus on diversity and inclusion when selecting candidates. Instead of merely recruiting new diverse candidates into the workforce, they must also provide those professionals already in it […]

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Climate talks, Glasgow

The climate talks in Glasgow are just days away, and may be the last chance to coordinate global efforts to stop the planet warming beyond 1.5℃ this century. More than 100 world leaders will attend the summit to try to agree on the details of crucial issues, such as timetables to deliver on emissions reduction commitments. So which countries hold the cards? Well, the nature of these particular climate talks make it less likely one or more states – regardless of their power or contribution to climate change – will determine the summit’s success. But this wasn’t always the case. In 1997 Kyoto Protocol talks, all developed states needed to agree on targets, timeframes and what could be included or excluded from calculations. This meant Australia was able to hold the agreement to ransom by threatening to withhold support, unless demands were met. In 2009 talks in Copenhagen, the plan was to develop a new post-Kyoto Protocol agreement, based on new binding emissions targets. The reluctance of China, and even the United States, ultimately prevented a new agreement being reached. Organisers of the Paris talks of 2015 learnt their lesson. Rather than aim to agree on a fair allocation of responsibility across almost 200 countries, organisers allowed states to develop their own nationally determined contributions – targets for reducing emissions. Unity in Glasgow is still crucial While the success of the Glasgow summit doesn’t depend on a consensus across all participating nations, there are three big reasons international cooperation is still crucial. First, the summit serves as the default target date for nations to articulate new emissions reduction commitments since the Paris Agreement. States will also need to agree on the next deadline for updated national climate targets. Second, it will determine commitments from wealthy countries to finance developing states’ transition away from greenhouse-intensive development like […]

The World for Sale

Meet the traders who supply the world with oil, metal and food – no matter how corrupt, war-torn or famine-stricken the source. The modern world is built on commodities – from the oil that fuels our cars to the metals that power our smartphones. We rarely stop to consider where they come from. But we should. In The World for Sale, two leading journalists lift the lid on one of the least scrutinised corners of the economy: the workings of the billionaire commodity traders who buy, hoard and sell the earth’s resources. It is the story of how a handful of swashbuckling businessmen became indispensable cogs in global markets: enabling an enormous expansion in international trade, and connecting resource-rich countries – no matter how corrupt or war-torn – with the world’s financial centres. And it is the story of how some traders acquired untold political power, right under the noses of Western regulators and politicians – helping Saddam Hussein to sell his oil, fuelling the Libyan rebel army during the Arab Spring, and funnelling cash to Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin in spite of strict sanctions. The result is an eye-opening tour through the wildest frontiers of the global economy, as well as a revelatory guide to how capitalism really works.

Business in a World of Good

Market research reveals a multi-billion dollar consumer demand that is being starved of supply. Guided by the eco-savvy consumers of today, its more than just a fad or a trend to fade away in three years; sustainability is at the core of this consumer choice, and that means the demand is also here to stay. More consumers than ever are using their purchasing power to make a genuine statement about their concern for the environment. Combined, they make a dedicated group, fond of everything from organic potatoes to hybrid cars, and marketers have given them their very own name to wear as a badge of honour; ‘Lohasian’. The latest research shows that 80% of these environmentally mindful consumers say their purchase decisions are directly influenced by a companyÕs Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) policies. A far more wide-reaching term than the semantics of ‘eco’ or ‘green’ could encompass, LOHAS is Lifestyles Of Health And Sustainability and represents a social movement that has conscious consumption at the centre of its values. Stemming from a business movement in the USA, LOHAS has morphed in Asia to become a brand used to describe all manner of environmental products and services. First taking off in Japan, then China and Taiwan and now spreading rapidly through the Asia-Pacific region. Companies gaining the leading edge recognise that customers expect them to act more so than do their under-performing competitors, are more interested in lowering their carbon footprint, and are much more in tune with creating the image that they care. They associate environmentally sound practices with their brand image to consumers and the industry, and associate these practices with their ethical responsibility to the community in anticipation of stealing market share as the customerÕs green demands grow. Natural Marketing Institute (NMI) and LOHAS Asia’s first in-depth survey […]

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