By Martin Padulla for Staffing Latin America

Last year, the British Collins dictionary chose the term “permacrisis” as the word of the year. It refers to a prolonged period of instability and insecurity stemming from a series of catastrophic events: COVID-19, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the energy crisis, among others.

As this year began, the World Economic Forum in Davos introduced another vivid term. The term “polycrisis” refers to the coexistence of five crises at once, each of which on its own would pose significant challenges for leaders. The world is facing simultaneous crises: a health crisis, a geopolitical crisis, an inflation crisis, an energy crisis, and a climate crisis.

Is it worth adding the crises that the region faces in addition to those mentioned?

The accumulation of crises destabilizes and challenges leadership. This is primarily seen in the focus and the way questions are formulated, as they define the quality of potential answers.

Reading a Global Risks Report from the same Forum, based on the perceptions of 12,000 leaders from 121 countries (academic, business, and social sectors), I recalled a conversation with a Harvard Professor in 2017. This friend told me that they were in the midst of a profound change, that for centuries they had been training Risk Managers and that at that moment (pre-pandemic), the challenge was to educate the best Uncertainty Navigators

What risks are we talking about when we are navigating through simultaneous social, environmental, economic, and geopolitical crises? With an uneven recovery from the pandemic, food and energy insecurity, debt payment crises, skill gaps, high levels of insecurity, inadequate action against climate change, and a significant erosion of social cohesion, is it effective to discuss risks, or do we need to achieve a positive trade-off between the speed of events and the capacity for reflection to implement immediate social innovation actions?

Recession, overindebtedness, and social polarization seem to reinforce short-term leadership. In contrast, responsible leadership that promotes social innovation appears to be appropriate for the moment.

Social innovation is nothing more than a set of (innovative) solutions to address social challenges. It’s a process of creating, designing, promoting, and disseminating new social practices. Stanford defines it quite simply: a new solution to a social problem that is more efficient and sustainable than the current one.

In the context of the world of work in our region, two very clear problems exist: on one hand, employers urgently need to acquire relevant talent with flexibility to address challenging projects; on the other hand, workers need to continuously develop demand-driven skills to avoid becoming obsolete and simultaneously require rapid access to the formal labor market in a region with alarming levels of informality.

Private employment agencies offer a more efficient innovative solution than the current one to solve these problems. The efficiency is such that they even transform into career advisors for workers and strategic consultants for employers.

Having a proven efficient mechanism that provides training and flexibility while ensuring full compliance with labor legislation and not taking advantage of it is reckless.

Modernizing and invigorating formal labor markets is a way to contribute to social cohesion, reduce food insecurity, narrow the skills gap, and increase productivity and competitiveness.

In several countries in the region, essential labor reforms are currently being designed to modernize outdated regulatory frameworks. Policy makers have a reliable strategic ally to achieve immediate results. If the goal is to create relevant talent and formal employment, any reform must consider the ratification of ILO Convention 181 on private employment agencies.

Latin America can quickly become more inclusive and sustainable. There’s a globally recognized sector that is already prepared to make a significant contribution to the social innovation agenda.

Dialogue with private employment services cannot wait and must be deepened; no other sector is capable of generating immediate impact.

The time is now. There are many families that cannot wait.