Flexibility in where, when and how people work are the hallmarks of a brave new workplace shaped by a historic, multigenerational labor force, globalization, and the rise of internal social media networks.
Jeanne Meister, founding partner of Future Workplace consulting firm and a columnist for Forbes magazine, has worked with more than 200 organizations on issues related to the changing workplace. The challenges involved, and what employers can do about them, are the subject of a book she coauthored with Karie Willyerd, The 2020 Workplace: How Innovative Companies Attract, Develop and Keep Tomorrow’s Employees Today (Harper Collins, 2010).
This is the second installment from a discussion between Meister and Diane Merlino, editor in chief of Travel Weekly PLUS, on the shape of the new workplace and how businesses can position themselves for success.
Merlino: In one of your recent Forbes.com columns you describe how social media literacy is becoming an increasingly important criterion for companies evaluating potential employees.
Meister: Companies are putting a number of new demands on potential job candidates, and one of those is social media literacy.
Social media literacy is becoming part of the core curriculum of many training programs, and a lot of companies are looking at how well potential candidates can navigate social media in a safe and secure way, regardless of the job requirements and the role. Beyond that, we are beginning to see companies trying to determine if a potential employee’s social media literacy level has the ability to actually add to their productivity on the job.
Merlino: How is it possible to evaluate that?
Meister: There’s something called the Klout Score. It’s a quantitative number from zero to 100 that measures how 
well you're managing your personal brand online and how you are perceived as a thought leader within your peer group. We’re beginning to see some companies asking potential candidates for their Klout Score in addition to requiring the expected degrees and experience.
Merlino: That’s an interesting addition to the recruitment process.
Meister: Recruiting is no longer about having a potential candidate send in a cover letter and a PDF of their resume. That's long gone. Employers have to source employees — their talent — in new ways.
Zappos now requires you to submit a video cover letter explaining why they should invite you in for a personal interview and how you live out the values of Zappos. MasterCard invites candidates to make a short YouTube video to talk about how they would make a contribution to MasterCard and how the MasterCard value of living in a cashless world relates to their own life. Companies are requiring candidates to be more professional, and this is occurring a global basis.
Merlino: You’ve talked about the exponential growth of internal collaboration via social networks. What’s cooking in that area?
Meister: We see more and more companies building their own corporate social networks. Think of this as Facebook and YouTube behind the firewall. And they’re leveraging these internal networks to drive how work gets done — and work's going to get done differently. There might be far less email because you can find the right person with the right set of skills to answer a question, then send them a quick text or a post on the corporate social network. You may not have to call them or send them an email.
Companies want people to collaborate and communicate more easily across the globe, and as they leverage corporate internal networks, they're going to reap big increases in productivity. A recent study by McKinsey Company estimates the business value of having people collaborate more easily across the globe by using these social technologies at about $1 trillion, and it confirms the direct impact on employee productivity.
These networks are also being used externally, to connect with customers and partners.
Merlino: We’ve covered a lot of trends that are changing everything about how companies do business, chief among them the multi-generational workforce. Can you give us some practical advice on how companies, especially smaller companies, can respond to that trend?
Meister: Many organizations have set up employee resource or affinity groups. They’ve been around for quite a long time; when women started taking leadership roles in business it was common to have a woman's leadership 
affinity group. Affinity groups meet on a volunteer basis maybe once a quarter for knowledge sharing. It’s sponsored by the company but doesn't cost the company anything except maybe for some refreshments.
We’ve seen a number of companies, large and small, create affinity groups around multiple generations in the workforce. These organizations are acknowledging that they have different generations working side by side and that sometimes this causes communication issues that need to be addressed.
For example, we know that millennials prefer instant communication, text, and IM versus email. We live in an increasingly mobile world, so larger companies are looking at how to cut down on the number of bulk emails by creating apps for different functions. Business leaders need to understand they will need different processes and different ways to communicate across the generations, acknowledging generational preferences.
Merlino: How can companies position themselves to take advantage of the ongoing trend toward globalization of the workforce?
Meister: They might want to evaluate a change in their big-picture policies regarding schedules. The days of working five days and 40 hours a week are over in some global companies because of the need to deal with people around the world in different time zones. Maybe we're entering a time when we're going to invite people to work six days a week, five or six hours a day. Business leaders need to make sure that flexibility is prevalent in where and how employees work.
ALSO SEE: More from Jeanne Meister inMillennials Hit Critical Mass in the Workforce in 2014.