ETHRWorld International spoke to Ramon about how the hybrid world of work is the new playground for
newer EX experimentation, some of the best practices edotco is following to attract and retain their best talent and his immediate focus areas as Chief People Officer for the new world of work.

Where do you think that most of the leaders lack when it comes to having the right leadership mindset,
especially when we are catering to the hybrid world of work?

Based on my general observations in the market, the 2 most common leadership pitfalls I foresee when it
comes to adapting to the hybrid world of work are:

Underestimating the pent up “disconnect” amongst employees over the past 2 years and failing to realise that hybrid work is beyond just logistical considerations

Given the unprecedented levels of disruption COVID has brought to the workplace, leaders generally place too much emphasis on the logistical aspect of the hybrid work (e.g number of days in office, physical space layouts etc). I believe that the pandemic has accelerated the way employees perceive the “how” and “what” aspects of work.

In the enthusiasm to return to office without considering holistic aspects of hybrid work, leaders may run the risk of exacerbating the “disconnect” between themselves and their people. In edotco, we developed our people strategies around the concept of the “Bionic Organisation”, comprising of:

1. Cultivating a cooperation culture and Championship mindset


2. Supercharging future workforce with a good balance of IQ, EQ and DQ (Digital Quotient)


3. Humanising digital people experience


4. Creating the “5R” structure – having the right people with the right skills in the right roles at the right cost and right time

Adopting a fixed mindset about hybrid work – rooted on past experience biases

Without a clear blueprint of the future of work, leaders need to adopt an agile and test-and-learn mindset todiscover what works for their respective organisation. Work strategies need to be tailored to their respective working cultures and norms.

Leaders should experiment with various work models and norms, workspace layouts and digital tools to
engage with their people more effectively. They need to carve a future that strikes a good balance between productivity, creativity, innovation, and collaboration across various levels –individual, team and the overall organisation.

Embracing a test-and-learn mindset will entail a real mindset shift for some leaders. We will need to get
comfortable with the fact that a clear solution may not be immediately apparent—the big answers may not emerge for years to come. In edotco, we are continuously experimenting with different ideas and concepts to understand what works or what does not work for our organisation.

The hybrid world of work is the new playground for newer EX experimentations. How do we see EX (Employee Experience) being driven by a people-first approach? What’s edotco Group’s story of keeping your engagement rates high?

In the future of work, organisations must embrace digital platforms and tools to enable seamless employee experiences no matter where or how work happens—whether it’s at home, in the office, or on-the-go. To thrive in this era, organisations would need to adopt a people-first mindset, appealing to their employees at a deeper level.

Our story in keeping our engagement rates is by placing stronger focus on the intrinsic elements of human nature, namely providing a stronger sense of purpose, higher levels of autonomy, opportunities for capability building and fostering meaningful connections in the workplace. This strategy has worked out very well for us, with our Employee Engagement scores consistently at world class levels (average of 94% over the past 3 years). In edotco, we have the highest levels of engagement between the leadership team with our people.

Given the success of our employee engagement model at a steady-state, we are progressively evolving our employee engagement approach from a once-a-year model (where insights are typically lagging in nature) to one that is dynamic, real-time and predictive.

We are in the midst of engineering distinct employee experience across the employee lifecycle via our inhouse “Returns on Experience (ROX)” strategy. We are leveraging on predictive AI-powered insights across the various employee touchpoints to detect potential employee disengagement on a real-time basis. We believe our ROX strategy drives direct Returns on Investment by assessing employee’s potential and performance,

The war for talent is a never-ending game and Covid-19 has changed the picture of how we see hiring. What are some of the best practices edotco is following to attract and retain their best talent?

Our focus over the past year was on building an “Entrepreneurial Championship Mindset” with an elevated sense of emotional collaboration, belonging and purpose – given that the pandemic has changed the way employees view why, where, and how they work.

Given our aspiration of becoming a global Top 5 Tower Company, we were focused on getting our employees to think and act like owners of the company – always acting in the collective best interest of the organisation towards a common goal.

Our key people focus areas included:

We enhanced organisation’s value system to create greater alignment on meaning and purpose. Since the pandemic, employees are re-evaluating the relationship and the company the work for. As such, we took the opportunity to enhance our 6 core values (namely Uncompromising Integrity, Exceptional Performance, Sustaining for Life, Innovating for Tomorrow, Ownership Mindset and Emotional Collaboration) to better reflect our aspiration of becoming the Top 5 Global TowerCo, co-created with our employees.

These values are strengthened via our regular townhalls, All Blacks Leadership Summits and all hands
sharing sessions. Employees are kept abreast on organisation development and align their day-to-day work with the organisation’s broader mission. We believe in leading with a compass and context, equipping employees with information to make the best decisions for the organisation. Clear value system enables distributed decision-making with a high level of clarity, aligning resources to what matters most and accuracy to the corporate mission. We also embarked on an exercise to enhance our compensation strategy with heavy emphasis on self and organisational empowerment.

We developed an in-house “Championship Barometer” tool as an enhancement of our digital 360 feedback tool to gauge where we are today against where we want to be for continuous progression. Given the solid leadership values we have today, the main objectives of this tool are to assess the Championship drive across our people, “1 team” mindset and alignment to our Championship vision.

We appointed Gilbert Enoka (New Zealand All Black’s Rugby team’s Leadership Coach) as our leadership
mental coach. Gilbert is responsible for instilling championship mental models and motivating our people
towards our Global Top 5 aspiration. He consults all 323 of our Middle and Senior Management team on a
quarterly basis.

We also provided opportunities and platforms for employees to explore their diverse interests. We worked with different employee groups to set up various employee resource groups (ERGs) that represent diverse interests and goals (e.g ESG, D&I, wellness). This provided our people the freedom to explore and create their own experience in the workplace.

We also institutionalised a practice of employees dedicating ~10% of their time on innovation projects to help them discover their innate interests. As part of our Performance Management system, employees have the opportunity to achieve stretch targets by working on 3 innovative ideas on a yearly basis, on top of their dayto-day responsibilities.

Leveraged on our >300 people managers as an extension of HR. We provided various upskilling avenues to help our people managers manage more effective in a hybrid and dynamic environment, such as:

• Providing mentoring capabilities across >320 of our people managers


• Certified >30 in-house coaches


• Specialised training on HR-related areas (e.g performance management, rewards, workforce planning,
  recruitment etc)


• Career conversation/development guides and training


• Accelerated upskilling for our high-potentials by partnering with Melbourne Business School


• Partnering with Franklin Covey for leadership upskilling across the general population

What are the 3 major changes that you foresee in the world of work that go back to the office
completely and your 3 immediate focus areas as the Chief People Officer for edotco Group?

The 3 major changes I foresee in the world of work are:

1. More coaching and mentoring taking place in the workplace as a way of life: Younger employees received less mentoring and coaching during the shift to remote work during the pandemic. To bridge this gap, I foresee organisations taking the coaching and mentoring culture a lot more seriously to retain and develop their best talents. In edotco, we are key proponents of the “Take 5” concept (5 minutes feedback daily) to inculcate a culture of real-time feedback.


2. Virtual meetings will continue to become a norm despite being in office: Employees have become
   accustomed to virtual meetings and collaboration tools during the pandemic. Despite being in the same
   office, I foresee employees leveraging more on these digital tools daily to augment their face-to-face
   interactions. Offices are going to be viewed as hubs of innovation and exchange of ideas.


3. More face-to-face brainstorming occurring in the workplace: One of the key areas of work lacking during the pandemic was the ability to physically brainstorm with team members in the office. Given that most organisations are embarking on some form of transformation in the workplace post-pandemic, we foresee more brainstorming meetings happening, where employees are free to share and discuss ideas more openly. I also foresee more design thinking and agile practices being practiced in the workplace, to be able to adapt rapidly to the changing pace of work.

My 3 immediate focus areas are:

1. Re-thinking our organisation operating model to thrive in a hybrid environment. Our key people strategies in edotco Group are anchored around the “Bionic Organisation”. Every 12 to 18 months, we are constantly rethinking and re-engineering how we organise ourselves via organisation redesigns and re-structuring. Creating a “5R” structure (having the right people with the right skills in the right roles at the right cost and right time) is crucial for us to adapt to the changing world of work.


2. Creating a more inclusive workplace for our diverse talent pool. I believe the diversity of people and
   talents across our 9 footprints is a source of strength for edotco Group – tapping into our collective
   wisdom from a technical, culture, leadership, and behavioral aspect.


3. Continue building a “Championship Mindset” among our people, with an elevated sense of emotional
   collaboration, belonging and purpose. I am focused on helping the organisation achieve its aspiration of
   becoming a global Top 5 Tower Company and bringing the trophy home.