EXECUTIVE SPOTLIGHT: Universum’s Mike Parsons

Young pinoy talents prefer to work for companies that offer professional training and development, and have a friendly work environment with flexible conditions, this according to the recent talent insight report published by Universum.

The research also uncovered that remote work is a popular preference among the respondents, while future talent pool’s annual salary expectation dropped by about 25 percent.

Within the context of the Universum Talent Survey 2023, Universum Managing Director Mike Parsons accommodated an exclusive interview with Buzz Capital.

The interest of young Filipinos in remote work, and their primary worries as well, almost remain unchanged from one year ago. Will the high interest in remote work setups be sustained in the coming years when, in contrast to this, there is an increasing number of companies realizing that on-site work setups are better for the company in terms of performance?

M: I would say that the data on what is best for the organisation, including for company performance, is mixed, so I would not necessarily conclude that one way is better than the other. From the perspective of this data, it is interesting to see what is most attractive to talent and to understand what they are prepared to trade off to get their dream job at their dream employer.

As of now, our data still suggests that this talent, despite being highly attracted to remote working opportunities, they will not consider it a deal-breaker if a dream employer has a full/highly skewed WFH setup. In other words, they will quickly trade off WFH in order to get the dream job.

The advantage will come when two employers of similar attractiveness make a similar offer to a candidate, but one offers better remote working options – these more flexible employers will find it easier to attract the talent they need. It is also worth noting that young Filipinos have an above average interest in remote working compared to their global peers in other countries.

Is it safe to say that the lower annual salary expectations of Filipino Gen Zs are in favor of better work-life balance and non-monetary benefits like career growth, work-life balance, and company culture?

Yes, to a reasonable extent, we can see that young Filipino talent report that they would forego some salary in favour of things like better work-life balance, growth and culture. In other words, it is not all about money.

The money aspect at this level is often viewed as a hygiene factor, with the range offered between similar employers in an industry not being so big.

Money tends to rise in priority as we go through our careers, peaking around 40ish (in general). It is worth noting that it is hard for employers to communicate much about compensation when they are building their employer brands.

In contrast, it is relatively easier for employers to communicate about and promote what kind of culture, professional development, and work-life balance they can offer.

The same goes for the lower annual salary expectations of female respondents versus male counterparts, is this linked to the prevalent gender pay gap issue across industries?

We speculate that the differences in expectations are based on the following reasons:

• In general, we can see that males tend to have more ambitious expectations compared to females. Sometimes, this can be related to the pressure caused by the traditional gender role of the male as the provider and other external and cultural influences.

• This compares to the often more modest expectations of the equivalent female (e.g studying a similar course and wanting to join a similar industry). We see that, in general, females are more likely to prioritise softer things over harder things (e.g. company culture over pay).

• We do not see much to say that the expectations are based on real employment data (e.g. they know that in company X, females are paid less) but there can be an anecdotal element to this that forms the basis for these respective expectations.

• Compared to other markets, the gap in expectations between the genders is about average in the Philippines.

In 2022, you emphasized the need for employers to “communicate their value proposition to talent skillfully and consistently.” Based on recent data, do you think these companies are performing well on this front?

I think that for the employers who really understand this and do it well, it gives them a big advantage with both talent attraction and retention.

From working with various employers in the Philippines and elsewhere, I can see that those who are good at using data/insights and strong/proactive comms tend to significantly outperform their industry peers in key talent metrics.

Of course, there are other factors that can have an impact, such as the attractiveness of the consumer brand, market performance and events (e.g. layoffs, scandals etc).

Other reports are saying that local young startups are losing out in the race for talent because of high talent acquisition costs. And according to your report, only 21% of students prefer working for startup companies. What’s your take on strategies like coding boot camps, internship programs, and university competitions being used to attract digitally-native Filipino talent? Are these still effective or is it time to rethink these strategies and develop a new approach?

Compared to other markets, 21% being interested in start-ups is relatively high. Of course, start-ups often won’t have the resources to competitive pay, comprehensive benefits, fancy office locations etc.

This is where things like attractive remote working policies and rapid development can be used to make start-ups more attractive to young talent. Start-ups really need to look at what they can offer by being smaller and more agile than the big corporates.

They then need to make good use of free/cheap tools, like social media, to communicate to the talent they are targeting. It used to be the case that the big corporate employers were worried about competition for talent from start-ups, but those days seem to have passed, and the larger organisations have regained the upper hand again.

In terms of things like hackathons, internships, competitions etc – I would advise companies to weigh up the costs and expected benefits. I see some of the leaders in the space, like L’Oreal and Unilever, spending huge sums on global competitions and then maybe only hiring a handful of graduates off the back of these.

Based on that, most people would say this is not worth it. However, in focus groups and surveys, we can see that these high-profile activities generate a significant amount of brand equity for these employers, and it really elevates them – and then the spending and effort start to make more sense.

So, I do believe these types of activities can be great, but any employer who wants to embark on these needs to know how much it will cost (money and the great effort required) and what they expect to get out of it, both in terms of hiring and in terms of brand building.