Shuffling the Deck
The job market in digital communications has been crazy in the last few years. Coming out of the pandemic, digital staff have seen mass layoffs as management reorganize and shed the people they hired to work in an all-virtual office. Digital marketers, content managers, and communicators who always worked remotely before the pandemic are captured in aggressive—and unnecessary—Return-To-Office mandates. RTO are frequently underhanded layoffs since most remote workers don’t live a commutable distance to the office that they rarely if ever visited.
Cutting digital staff from the payrolls (through layoffs or attrition) doesn’t remove the work that needs to be done. Employers eventually must hire freelancers or a digital agency to fill in. Ironically, contractors often work remotely and agencies are expensive, so the temporary staffing stop gap fails to solve both the budget issue and onsite work requirement. It’s a lot of shuffling around with no dividend.
For digital workers forced to move into “gig” employment, jobs are ephemeral and wages depressed. The mass switch to contracting creates a constant job hunting cycle, and everyone is competing for the few decent-paying and permanent jobs out there. We hop from one contract gig to another every few months. The quality of work suffers, and the profession is in free fall.
A Bad Hand
The job dynamism trend is well documented across industries, but the reasons are clouded in macro-economic theories or crystal ball readings of employment data. According to mainstream economists, the job market is bad due to the lingering effects of the pandemic and political decisions in Washington. Employers are too skittish to hire, the story goes.
I don’t think post-pandemic angst is the sole cause the dynamism. Using temporary contractors and agencies to replace digital departments was tested during the pandemic. Employers fleshed out how much digital staff can be exploited or cut—but didn’t calculate the long-term costs or impact. Anxious digital communicators contributed to this market realignment by knee-caping themselves while in survival mode—and never rebounded.
Management and staff panicked and learned the wrong lessons.
Lessons for Managers
During the pandemic, management had to make adjustments to staffing and experiment with new arrangements. Unfortunately, they incorrectly gleaned that digital staff are forever fungible.
What they should have learned: Digital staff not only kept operations going despite the trying times but enhanced digital experiences to meet the virtual marketplace. They are foundational to your organization’s survival and growth.
Lessons for Digital Pros
Digital professionals rallied to meet the crisis without communicating to leaders the toll of budget cuts and extra workloads from doing multiple jobs. As layoffs hit or piling on of work became unbearable, they sought relief in contract work, but new employers faced the same problems.
It's a draw
The zero-sum gambit in digital staffing benefits no one. Employers damage customer relationships by delivering out-of-date and frustrating user experiences due to a lack of consistent updates and quality control. And digital professionals damage their profession by acquiescing to wage reductions and unstable employment.
Adept digital communicators have always managed the core work and maintained operations, while external experts are hired for larger projects and to supplement staff when needed. The post-pandemic workplace doesn’t change this fundamental. Small but mighty digital teams are essential to every organization’s success—during good times and bad.