Merry Christmas and a Happy New Career!
Holiday hustle. (Photo: TheJobNetwork)
Is it the most wonderful time of the year? It’s ‘ber’ months once again. Christmas is coming which means holiday spending is about to begin.
The good news is, for some of you, this might be the very first holiday that will be spent in person with family and friends again in a long time. The bad news is, you won’t have an excuse to not get them gifts. Prepare those wallets.
Merry employment
The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) offers a bit of comfort as they’re anticipating companies will hire a bit more than usual in the next few months due to more production operations.
Labor and Employment Secretary Bienvenido E. Laguesma mentioned that the July round of the Labor Force Survey showed the employment rate rose to 94.8%, while the unemployment rate slowed down to 5.2%. While it may sound like a really good thing, 13.8% of the existing jobs were of poor quality. In other words, underemployment is still prevalent.
In order to address the issue, Laguesma stated that the government is working with the technology-business process outsourcing (IT-BPO), manufacturing, construction, tourism, and healthcare sectors to generate better quality jobs for those who need it.
Sign of the times
Other than decent wages, bosses who aren’t abusive, and supportive work environments, one of the main factors anyone looks for nowadays when choosing their next employer is whether or not the job will allow you to work from the comforts of your own home. Which unfortunately, has been a rare privilege nowadays.
The IT & Business Process Association of the Philippines Inc. mentioned last Wednesday that the Philippines should follow in the footsteps of India wherein they allow their workers to work-from-home while still keeping their tax incentives.
In case some of you have forgotten, as soon as COVID-19 cases started to slow down, the government announced that BPO workers should report back to their offices or else they’ll lose tax breaks. Anyone can guess how well that went. Spoiler: It most definitely didn’t go great.
“It’s high time the (Philippines) follows India at the risk of losing more ground, market share and the opportunity to add more IT-BPM jobs for more Filipinos. The future of work is here… and it’s hybrid,” said Madrid in a LinkedIn post last Wednesday. As someone who is typing this right now in his pajamas, I agree.
The head of the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA), Tereso Panga extended his support for the idea, stating that India is the Philippines’ closest competitor in the IT-BPO industry. If we are to continue requiring all employees to physically report to the office every day (amidst a still ongoing threat of a global pandemic by the way), then we’re just being left behind by “forward-thinking economies” that have fully embraced work flexibility.
It’s not just a matter of whether it would be nice to be in the comfort of your own home while still earning money (although that’s already a major factor), it’s also the fact that the public transportation system in the Philippines is anything but great. People lose precious time and resources just getting from one place to another.
And with the recent statement of Department of Transportation (DOTr) Secretary Jaime Bautista saying that the Libreng Sakay Program, which provided fare-free public transport rides to millions of commuters, is not sustainable in the long run, then so is going to the office every day.
We already have, more or less, two years worth of proof that there are jobs that can still work while being a couple of steps away from your bed, why stop now? It’s less pressure for employees and less operational costs for employers.
But that’s just a writer’s opinion (from home).
