2023 AND BEYOND: WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD FOR THE FIELD OF PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT?

A new year seems to be the impetus for a pause to see the trends that we are faced with and what that possibly could mean for the field of performance improvement. As the world is focused on recovery and growth after the pandemic, it is a continuous call for organization leaders to adapt to volatile market conditions as most are confronted with the impact of inflation, supply chain crises, energy sourcing, and digital skills (Groombridge, 2022). A scan of the business horizon highlights some of the following trends (Marr, 2022; Groombridge, 2022; Vogel, 2023):

• Hybrid work, where organizations are integrating flexible work arrangements and remote work into their culture.

• AI is critical to customer experience where chatbots are used to answer simple questions, voice recognition can now handle routine inquiries, and more.

• Predictive analytics will facilitate businesses' improved decision-making by identifying patterns in data and predicting future events (Vogel, 2023).

• Increasing need for secure communications as we become more globalized and interconnected.

• Unified Communications as a Service that integrates voice, video, and messaging and allows for content sharing is a trend in business communications for 2023 and beyond.

• Industries are still affected by supply chain issues that emerged during the pandemic, which were compounded by the war in Ukraine. This requires businesses to combat market price volatility and rising supply chain insecurity.

• The Great Resignation and quiet quitting have compelled employers to offer fulfilling work, opportunities to learn and grow, and an enticing work environment and work culture.

• Increasing preference by investors and consumers to support businesses with the right environmental and social credentials. This requires organizations that place environmental, social, and governance processes at the center of their strategy.

• A call for an immersive customer experience (CX) where consumers will interact with brands through immersive technology. 86 percent of customers are willing to pay more for superior CX (Pratt, 2022).

• “Forecasts suggest that 50 percent of the population will be daily active users of multiple superapps, where users can discover and activate their own set of apps, thus, providing a personalized and contextualized digital experience inside a single app” (Groombridge, 2022, p. 21).

BRINGING IT BACK TO PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT

As these trends dominate the business landscape, we must raise questions such as:

• How are proponents of the field of performance improvement shaping and contributing to these trends. Are we equipped to do so?

• Are our lenses to view the landscape of performance improvement and models appropriate for the competitive landscape we find ourselves in?

• • What efforts are being undertaken to update our models, approaches, and theories to accommodate for the technological advancements taking place in society? And

• What efforts are being made to document the involvement and best practices of performance improvement professionals across these trends?

THE ‘BEYOND‘ OF THE FIELD OF PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT

As practitioners devoted to the field of performance improvement, our primary objective cannot be solely dedicated to competitive advantage, growth, and the ability to thrive among these trends and threats. But, it behooves us to recognize that as technology becomes pervasive and dominant, and as strategic conversations veer towards harnessing the potential of artificial intelligence, data analytics, the internet of things, virtual reality, and more, so that we can foster speedy and cost-effective solutions, we must also encourage conversations about these advancements that are taking place in a society rife with income inequality; lack of adequate healthcare; dwindling natural resources; climate change; environmental damage; geopolitical conflicts; poverty; mistrust in institutions; aging population, uneven growth, and other population dynamics; and so on. Our discussions are heavily skewed, influenced, and dominated by the rapid advancement and sophistication in technology, in the midst of many prevailing ills of society and environment.

How do we engage in a conversation that leverages the multiplicity of trends to highlight the lack of attention and decline that is increasingly prevalent within societies? How are we engaging in improving our critical, competitive, and reflective lens, one that is fueled with wisdom, maturity, growth, and sustenance of the field in the face of conflicting priorities and complexities? What needs to happen not only within organizations and societies, but also what needs to happen to train and educate the next generation of performance improvement practitioners and thinkers? And are educators in performance improvement skilled to educate the next generation of scholars and practitioners? And, more importantly, in the fading acceptance and presence of the field as we know it, where does any of this take place, if at all?