Workforce 2020, a global study performed by Oxford Economics, provides information on better human resources practices and advances towards the creation of talent development strategies for the future of the world’s economy.

The Workforce 2020 report, performed by Oxford Economics and SAP, has identified the main changes the Brazilian labour market is facing.

To begin with, 66% of respondents stated that a fundamental change has come with the difficulty companies have to face when recruiting workers with base-level skills.

Globalization of labour supply (58%), closely followed by the increasing number of temporary worker (56%) and consultants (55%) are other important changes that have an impact on the Brazilian workforce. As a matter of fact, 82% of Brazilian companies say they a progressively hiring more temporary workers and/or consultants, but only 38% of such companies realize that this demands changes in HR policies within the organization (compensations, training and technology).

Around 50% of respondents said that another factor that impacts on workforce is workers aging.

When it comes to technology, 50% of Brazilian companies use quantifiable metrics and benchmarking to evaluate performance. In addition, less than half of Brazilian workers are trained on new technologies in the workspace and only 32% have access to the latest technology. These facts mean that both companies and workers are not prepared to deal with the growing demand of technological skills.

Actually, only 53% of workers expects to handle technological skills professionally in the near future, and currently only 22% of them have such skills. Besides, few companies provide training to develop these abilities, despite the fact that almost 60% of employees say their employers provide them with the right tools to enhance their working performance.

When looking into the future, another aspect that is lacking is leadership. In Brazil, over 50% of executives say their plans for growth were hampered by the lack of adequate leaders.

One of the weakest points is capacity of leading a diverse workforce, a skill that only 36% of executives say their organizations have. Nevertheless, workers are more optimistic and are confident regarding the leadership capacity of the company they work for.

Beyond this optimism, there are mismatches between what employees want from companies and what their employers offer them. Only 23% of the Brazilian workers say they are satisfied with their jobs.

The main incentives for these workers are: competitive compensations (70%), retirement plans (69%) and up-dated technology (62%). However, for example only 35% of employers say they provide competitive compensations.

To conclude with, Brazilian workers think that the aspects their employers value the most are loyalty and long-term commitment, interest in the wider business and the will to be leaded by others.