Adapt | Welcome to the Never Normal

Having previously written about and discussed “the new normal” in many posts over the last couple of years we can now start to remove this terminology from our phrase book.

It was purportedly originated in 2010 by the Dutch entrepreneur and author, Peter Hinssen, who used it with respect to digital transformation. His view now, and ours, is that it could be outdated and perhaps replaced with the term, “the never normal”.

Things it seems are in a continuous state of change these days

Many of us will have had first-hand experience of current issues triggered by reduced labour and skills available, predominantly in the hospitality, health and travel sectors. Returning from holidays abroad we see competing arguments from airlines and airport ground staff as to who is to blame for delays, cancellations, and rescheduling of flights. Too few employees, with reduced skills, working excessive hours has the knock-on effect to other areas of the business, and continues the escalation of the issues in a never-ending cycle – meaning that no matter where it started, ground staff and airline staff become increasing infuriated, exhausted and demotivated.

This eventually will no doubt lead to poor retention and increased recruitment difficulties. Throw in the fact that the unique issues of this industry in the pandemic were widely ignored, this has meant cost pressures initially led to wide-ranging layoffs. It has continued with businesses taking the opportunity to rehire or engage new employees on far less favourable terms and conditions.