Microsoft 365 Corp. VP on American Workforce

on how we work and on American workers overall. And on that point, I recently hosted a panel on the pulse of the American work in the future of work. Really digging into that. On that panel was jared' Spataro, corporate vice president of Microsoft three five. He had so many great statistics and findings that he and his team had pulled together and he shared with us, So I knew we had to do a little bit more. Jared joins us on this Monday on the phone in Seattle, Washington. Jared,

it is so nice to have you here. How are you. I'm doing great, Carol, Thanks for having me. Really looking forward to our conversation. Me too, because I was blown away. I know you guys are doing really digging deep into cut up finding out how we are we're working right now, and then you know, kind of making some conclusions off of that. So it is about a month since we last talked on that panel, how are things going for

you and your team? And the longer this goes on, what are you finding in terms of those that are working on Microsoft platforms how they are working now? You're bet you know, since we've spoken, we continued to see a surge of COVID and that's changed the outside environment

quite a bit. Um We have really tried, as I indicated them, to just be students of the moment and try and take in data from as many sources as we can and then piece together a mosaic a little bit of what's going on and where do we think it'll it'll go. Some of the numbers for me are really pretty astounding. I'll give you a couple thinking of one of our products called Microsoft Teams. This is a product that brings together, for instance, meetings and chat and

team workspaces. Teams users have had more meetings and calls per week now than they did pre pandemic. In addition, the work they span and teams, so that's the time between the first and the last active log in is up by an hour in many countries in the world. In some countries like Australian Singapore, it's up by over two hours. And then that's even bleeding over into the weekends. Teams chats on the weekend have spike since before the pandemic,

So there's a lot going on. I think workers all across the world are really feeling the stresses of this remote work and kind of trying to adapt. So none of that's really changed. I mean, those trend lines have stayed pretty consistent. They have. Um, we saw some countries starting to add back, as an example of university states in Western Europe, there was this hope that we could

kind of get back. But during the spikes that we have seen in both places here in the winter, UM, we've just continued to see people, you know, moving backwards kind of in their progression, deciding we need to stay remote for a while. So those trends just continue for us. I wonder, and I don't know if you guys are measuring this, measuring this, so forgive me if I'm going to no place that you guys aren't. But I wonder about productivity because there is such a debate are about

you know, people working from home? Are they as productive? I mean I felt like I was really productive of at home, and there were certain areas that I never were able to really make inroads on that I did at home, and vice verse. So I just wonder what people are seeing. You know. There was a really good article in the Well Street Journal today that I picked up on, and I thought one of the conclusions there

is worth repeating. Maybe it says that the research essentially says, you know, productivity for a lot of people is up for all the reasons that you say it, but it's coming at a cost. Again to data points that give us some sense. When we recently went out and around the world pulled workers just across different countries, we found that over thirty percent of workers, and that was in a pool of six thousand people we as so thirty percent of them said that the pandemic can increase their

sense of burnout at work. Imagine that almost a third of people saying I feel more burned out, and then a third of remote workers say that the lack of separation between work and life. So roughly about the same as negatively impacting what they would call their well being just overall. So I think productivity is up for many for many companies, many firms, but there is a cost associated with it. Well, and I wonder, you know, you guys talk this stuff, how much of it do you think? It?

Was interesting? I was just talking with Ken Swig Swig Equities, who is very involved in the commercial real estate market UM in New York and elsewhere on the country, and just this whole concept of working from home, you know, how much of it sticks ultimately going forward? And I'm just curious. Microsoft is a company right that has said, you guys want to work from home, you can continue

doing that, you know after the pandemic. How much of some of the trends that we're seeing, uh, you know, after hours weekend, how much of it do you think ultimately sticks. We'll take a step back for a second.

I think I would frame it this way. Um, when we look at what people are learning during this pandemic, they are learning that in many instances, they can use digital connections to more easily, more conveniently connect with other people when they previously had relied on physically being present.

You know, right with someone. And so then if we kind of translate that into what are they saying about work post pandemic, we found that um, excuse me, managers expect to have more flexible work from home policies post pandemic. So overcent of managers saying, yeah, we expect that we will give people the option to work from home. Seven one percent of employees want to continue to work from home at least part time, and part time in many ways as we're seeing the data come in is at

least two days a week. So that's a pretty big change from pre pandemic. I think almost everyone felt like they needed to show up at work. If you imagine your workforce where just across the week people who choose two of those days not to be there. We think even if just that sticks, it will dramatically change in the dynamic of how people are getting their work done and when you guys are checking out, you know, when

people you're doing your research and gathering the data. I mean you're talking about employees companies from all different types of industries, correct, that's correct. Yeah, we go across all different types of industries and we try to be broad based.

At one survey I decided the moment to go, for instance, with six thousand workers across the world, so across different nations, in all different industries, so we're not just looking at one We're trying to get a really nice broadly segment size so that we can make sure we see the trend well. And I wonder if you and you know, give me some insight into you know, with the promise

of a vaccine. Here we are on a day where we've seen the first you know, vaccine happened in the United States, so we are seeing it's certainly a different narrative when it comes to a vaccine specifically and maybe getting some control of the virus, you know, with that promise of a vaccine here and on the horizon for for most workers, how quickly do you think we see employees kind of you know, get workers back in the office and just got about forty seconds and then we'll

take a break and come back and do some more. Sure, we we think that it's going to take time for the vaccine to roll out, and so we'll see that kind of rollout over time. We love the fact that we're seeing the vaccine go to those that need it most. Perhaps healthcare workers and others. So we think that you look at one and it won't be all of a sudden. We think that there will be a long time being in this hybrid state. And is that similar to what

you guys are doing internally as well? Just got forgive me saved another thirty seconds here. Well, we haven't quite made the decisions are announced exactly what we're doing internally, but our announcement has been that people won't have to come back to work, but we won't even be opened back to work until the summer, so July is what we've talked about this year. We're hearing a lot of

that too here on the East coast, Jared. One of the stats when we did the panel together that stuck out for me is you guys, actually are there some research and I think you guys were involved in it or let it on brain waves and what happens when we're in a video meeting. Can you share some of

that with our audience? You bet. I think all of us who have been involved in kind of these virtual meetings have helped a sense of fatigue, and so we were pretty curious about that early on, wondering you know, was it was it just made up or were we actually feeling something. So we went into the lab and actually put these sensors on people, allowed them to both interact in person and interact in virtual meetings. What we found wasn't surprising if you were in online meetings, but

there was science now behind it. It turns out that these online meetings really do tax our brain more. They make it more difficult for us to concentrate, They make it more difficult for us to stay in the meetings and be productive, So that was really interesting. From there, we decided that we they're probably some innovation that was going to be necessary, and so we did create some kind of product features that were meant to address that in teams. Well, that n fun is fascinating. Look, listen,

crisis leads us to different ways of doing things. And I think this whole rise and all the stuff that we've been able to do socially virtually is pretty impressive and the work that we've been able to get done. But you know, what, do you feel like you are learning about how people work and how we can maybe

do it better so that it's not so taxing. Because I know when we were on the panel together, part of What we also talked about was the burnout that you've mentioned previously, and just making sure that our mental wellness was taken care of in this environment where we were connected to technology mostly not really too people. Yeah,

that's right. Well, that the things we found that are making a big difference um consists somewhat of technology and somewhat of just us learning new ways of doing things. So let me tell you one that was surprising to me. One of the pieces of research that we did that now has made its way into the product is the

idea of virtual commute. Awesome, not to be able to not to have to jump into a car and or a subway and commute into work, But what we found was that people were having a really high hard time creating boundaries between their work and life. And so we've actually introduced a bot into the team's environment that allows people to kind of ramp up into their work day, have just a little bit of a buffer, and then to ramp down out of the work day to really

process what happened. As funny as it may sound, that makes a huge difference. We actually found that that the people in our research said that they felt like it impacted their productivity in really positive ways, and so we've introduced that into the product. We've also done some really interesting things that I wouldn't have guessed made a difference. Going back to the idea of the brain wave study, we found that one of the things that was happening is that we stare at each other in this Brady

bunch few oftentimes of just everybody together. We see our backgrounds and that makes it hard for each of those different squares that it's hard for our brains to parse out kind of the social cues were used to seeing the nodding, turning away, the yawning, and so we found it by using a check knowledgy, we could cut people out of their backgrounds, put them into a shared background,

and the brain actually reacts remarkably well. Of that, we feel more connected number one and number two, the amount of effort required to read those cues goes down. And so again that's that's an application of technology that we think is pretty novel. So there are these types of things that can really help us, and we'll make a

difference a little longer. Yeah, that's really fascinating, right, and you do wonder you know, we know, listen, we've been so critical of our kids sitting in front of screens, right, and you know that there is an impact of that. And yet here we have been doing it now for you know, nine months and counting, and and there is an impact. And so we can figure out ways to do it where it's healthier and better. Um, that's the

way to go. Indeed, you know, the the other thing I'll note is, in some ways, when you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And I think that's what happened in this pandemic. You know, we couldn't walk down the hall and see each other, and so all of a sudden, man our only way to get in touch was to start up an online meeting. And we are finding that increasingly people are learning, gosh, I don't have to do everything and a meeting. And fact, we talk

about the flow of work contains meetings. You know, as you get things done, you certainly want to meet together and do things. But increasingly people are getting back to a little bit more normalized flow where sometimes they work on their own, sometimes in small groups. Sometimes it's just a chat, sometimes a voice call, sometimes a full fledged meeting, but varying kind of the mode that you're working really makes a difference in your ability to also concentrate and

to get that work. I love that you said that, because I've done that to a couple of people now and then just said, you know, we can just talk on the phone. We'll be good. We'll be good exactly. Hey, listen, one of the things that's so important of the work that you're doing is that you know, we have talked about this a lot, that the pandemic has really uh laid bare once again so many inequities in our society,

and that includes the skills gap. And I do think how are you guys thinking about that um in terms of trying to maybe act as a community, the tech community, you know, working to make sure that people aren't once again left behind. Here. Well, let's take a look at the numbers, because I think they again give us the backdrop. According to our calcul relations, we think global unemployment in this year before we finish over the next few weeks may reach a quarter of a billion people. So the

numbers are pretty big. At the same time, we see opportunity because over the next five years, we estimate that the global workforce will be able to produce, to create a hundred and fifty million new tech oriented jobs. So we look at that kind of tension between the two and have looked long term at kind of what's happening in this skills gap and what are the big trends

that we can address. We've seen three things. First, there is a rapid emergence of AHI power technologies that are definitely propelling a new era of technology coming into the workforce, so you know, we feel it and the numbers bear us out. Second, um we're increasingly seeing that people need these technological skills, they need technology acumen to get their work done. And then third is the real counter balancing one.

Even though those first two are true, we've seen employers actually reduced their training investments over the past two decades and employees so more need but less training happening. So as we looked at that ten ship and kind of

have the shape of that tension. In June, we actually launched something called the Microsoft Global Skills Initiative, and this is where we decided that we were going to help twenty five million people worldwide game more digital skills, particularly in this year right and year today, we've been able to get thirteen million learners in every US state in two or thirty one country. So we're excited. We still have work to do, but we're excited that we're starting

to be able to reach out right. And it's amazing how like just all this stuff is is ramping up and reaching out to people who really need it. Um, Jared, I see, I knew it when we heard these statistics. I knew we needed to dig even deeper. So thank you so much for coming on and sharing that with our audience really appreciated. Jared's Pitaro, he's corporate vice president at Microsoft three sixty five, joining us on the phone

from Seattle, Washington. Really just digging down into the numbers based on what they're seeing on those Microsoft platforms in terms of how we've been working, what the impact has been, and uh, how we can maybe learn from it, And they certainly are in terms of some of their initiatives