Watson, a Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow, will discuss key findings from the economics literature and their implications for where to focus immigration reform efforts.
Stephanie Headley, senior vice president of North America skin care and global Olay at Procter & Gamble, discussed the dynamic landscape of work and the critical need for building resilient teams and organizations with Dean Mary Margaret Frank April 2.
In this edition of the Dean Speaker Series, join us for an engaging fireside chat with Dean Mary Margaret Frank and Stephanie Headley for an exploration of resilient leadership navigating the complexities of today’s business landscape.
Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow Josh Lerner discussed "The Venture Capital Bust and the Resilience of Innovation" before an audience of UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School faculty and students on Feb. 15.
Dive into the value of private-public partnerships in growing enterprises, careers and communities to learn more about Wolfspeed's efforts to cultivate a sustainable workforce pipeline.
Dive into the value of private-public partnerships in growing enterprises, careers and communities to learn more about Wolfspeed's efforts to cultivate a sustainable workforce pipeline.
Universal childcare reform implemented in Quebec, Canada, in the late 1990s boosted the careers and earnings of new mothers and produced positive outcomes for some companies as well.
For many companies, it’s clear the hybrid workplace is here to stay. Explore executive insights on best practices for managing remote and hybrid teams and the importance of adaptable leadership amid greater workday flexibility and evolving team structures.
Each of the Kenan Institute's 2023 Distinguished Fellows has written a paper as part of their work to support our exploration of workforce disruption. Learn more about our fellows and read their papers, along with key takeaways from each.
Interested in a recap of the Frontiers of Business Conference: Workforce Disrupted? Read the key takeaways and powerful insights from the conference's speakers and panelists on the 2023 grand challenge theme.
Join IBM’s Tim Humphrey and former Domino’s CEO Ritch Allison for “Workplace Talent, Skills and Economic Competitiveness: A Fireside Chat with UNC Kenan-Flagler Dean Mary Margaret Frank” Oct. 12 at The Carolina Inn.
Our 2023 Frontiers of Business Conference will convene corporate executives, top researchers and policy leaders to share objective, evidence-based solutions for navigating the precarious road toward a labor market equilibrium. Learn more today.
As autoworkers continue to strike, there are concerns about how the work stoppage could affect the automotive supply chain, which is still adjusting to challenges imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow Thomas Stith, North Carolina Community College System President Jeff Cox and Capgemini’s Jennifer Paylor discuss workforce skills and the economy.
The increasing demand for electric cars is creating new opportunities for jobs and innovation in new locations, but there are differing views of the potential effect on overall auto sector jobs.
Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow Angelica Leigh, assistant professor of management and organizations at Duke University Fuqua School of Business, explored the effect of societal events, or “mega-threats,” on employees and employers in a talk Sept. 20.
Leigh, a Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow, will discuss the influence that societal events which occur outside of organizations have on employees when they enter the workplace and on individuals in society more broadly.
UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School Professor Jim Johnson, director of the Urban Investment Strategies Center, defines three groups facing challenges as companies return to the office and updates his forecast of demographic gale force winds.
Stith, a Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow, will moderate a panel on strategies to build a sustainable workforce pipeline in North Carolina.
Sekou Bermiss, UNC Kenan-Flagler associate professor of strategy and entrepreneurship, unpacks the topic of people analytics, discussing how firms can build better culture by supporting both managers and employees.
The American Growth Project explains why manufacturing remains essential for economic growth and how manufacturing in the U.S. today incorporates both regional shifts and “stickiness” in traditional strongholds.
UNC Kenan-Flagler Assistant Professor Tim Kundro fields questions concerning how managers and firms can best foster a healthy working environment.
UNC-Chapel Hill Professor Kurt Gray discusses how research can help us understand – and navigate – our rapidly changing professional and social lives.
UNC Professor Mohammad Jarrahi and IBM’s Phaedra Boinodiris address concerns about organizational adoption of artificial intelligence and how to include employees in important discussions, such as ethical considerations and potential job-related changes.
The Kenan Institute and UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School’s inaugural Conference on Market-Based Solutions for Reducing Wealth Inequality on June 1-2 highlighted research on market mechanisms that might also work to ameliorate inequality.
Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow John Haltiwanger of the University of Maryland sees the growth in startups and remote work as especially benefiting the South and the areas around urban downtowns.
The institute has teamed up to work with Fifth Third Commercial Bank Chief Economist Jeff Korzenik on research into second-chance hiring. In his new opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, Korzenik discusses Japan’s “miracle” workforce expansion and what the U.S. can learn from it.
Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow John Haltiwanger of the University of Maryland talks about why the Hollywood story of rising from the mailroom to the boardroom is less likely to happen now.
Ricardo Perez-Truglia of the UC Berkeley Haas School of Business discusses recent research on pay transparency, which shows that new laws may help reduce the gender pay gap but may also produce unintended consequences.
A recent meta-analysis from UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School Professor Elad Sherf and co-authors examines the literature on "seeking behavior" at work – such as asking for information, feedback or help. Why does it matter and how can it be harnessed to the benefit of both employers and employees?
Our American Growth Project examination of skills in the workforce begins with a discussion of why skills are difficult to measure, then moves to a broad look at two ways to estimate the skill level across our Extended Metropolitan Areas.
Haltiwanger, a Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow, will discuss implications for the continuing restructuring of the U.S. economy associated with the surge in new business creation.
Perez-Truglia, a Kenan Institute Distinguished Fellow, will summarize the latest research, including his own, to provide a better understanding of the effectiveness of pay transparency laws.
Generative AI such as ChatGPT holds the potential to alter many kinds of work, but analysis of a new report shows the occupations most likely to be affected are populated by more women than men.
The institute's Distinguished Fellows comprise an exemplary set of global scholars leveraging their individual expertise to further the institute’s efforts to examine and drive solutions to issues facing business and the economy today.
How do firms try to retain workers in a tight labor market? New research finds that employers use a variety of pay and nonpay mechanisms but that multiplant companies may find the nonpay options more cost-effective.
ChatGPT and other generative AI programs can replicate much of the work performed across the knowledge worker class. This gives us a glimpse of what ever-more-powerful AI tools might be able to do, which is both exciting and, to say the least, unsettling.
A panel of industry and academic leaders discusses what ever-more-powerful generative artificial intelligence tools might be able to do.
Academics and business leaders shared a panel at our recent Frontiers conference, showing how each can offer insights to help one another develop a broader, shared understanding of changes in the labor market.
With direct care facilities and workers in crisis, we explore trends behind the labor shortages in the industry as well as a menu of solutions that could possibly alleviate the issue.
As generative AI tools embed themselves into everyday society, all of us are trying to understand their short- and long-term impact on organizations. The Technology Applications and Implications Model can help.
How will sweeping changes in primary care services and providers affect the primary care workforce? We examine this question as well as how well the increasing demand for these services can be met in the future.
As part of our 2023 grand challenge, we survey factors such as demographics, health trends, immigration and childcare that are essential to understanding the dynamics now at play regarding the supply of workers in the labor force.
Failing to consider neurodiversity when trying to create truly diverse and inclusive workplaces has crucial implications for productivity and general life satisfaction. Organizations should consider these three points of action to improve their work environments and cultures.
UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School Professor Mark McNeilly discusses how ChatGPT and other AI tools will change the workplace - as well as how workers can best prepare themselves for these changes.
Issues constricting the supply of workers, the sector-by-sector employment effects of a potential recession, the emergence of new technologies – these are the primary labor demand themes we’ll focus on in our 2023 grand challenge.
COVID-19 sent shockwaves through the global economic system, disrupting financial markets, slowing productivity and exacerbating inequities. But its unprecedented impact on the labor market may serve as the pandemic’s most enduring economic effect.
Kenan Institute Chief Economist Gerald Cohen discusses the power of productivity and what that means for the U.S. economy.
COVID-19 and the subsequent rise in work-from-home policies by firms have changed the landscape of skilled labor in the United States. The Survey of Working Arrangements and Attitudes finds that 15% of employees are working from home full time, as of September 2022. This dramatic increase in remote work has led to an equally dramatic physical migration of workers across the U.S. Census data shows a sharp decline in populations of the largest U.S. cities and increases among midsize cities and smaller metro areas. For example, from 2020 to 2021, the counties of Manhattan (New York County) and San Francisco both saw a decline in their population of 25- to 54-year-olds by nearly 10%.
Nonwage benefits have become more important to employers and employees alike. A new look shows where you work plays a far greater role in the level of benefits you receive than it does your paycheck.
Unions seem to be popping up everywhere these days. In fact, the National Labor Relations Board reported that requests for union elections during the last nine months are up 58% over the prior fiscal year. This trend has received significant coverage in the media, with particular interest in successful organization efforts at Amazon, Starbucks and Apple.
Seventeen states have enacted salary transparency laws to combat pay gaps historically experienced by people of color and women, but the laws take different forms and have produced varying results. How does requiring companies to provide summary salary statistics compare with, for example, preventing companies from asking applicants about their previous salaries? Can such laws actually work against employees? Two experts address these questions and more in this week’s Kenan Insight.
UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School Professor Al Segars and co-author Anselm Beach have written about their new model for developing diversity, equity and inclusion in an organization, the Values/Principles Model, in the most recent issue of the MIT Sloan Management Review. At a time when recognition of DEI’s benefits has become widespread, their approach gives leaders the tools to create real change that will allow their whole companies to prosper. Learn more by clicking below.
Much has been made about the labor force participation rate, or the percentage of Americans over 16 who are working or actively looking for work — and for good cause, given the number of unfilled vacancies at U.S. firms. If fewer Americans are working, it is going to be harder for firms to staff all of their openings. Currently, 62.2% of adult Americans are working or looking for work. This compares with a historical average of 63.9% in 2019. With 259 million adult Americans, this 1.7 percentage point decrease in the labor force participation rate translates to a missing 4.4 million workers. And the narrative to date has primarily focused on how many Americans made changes following the COVID-19 pandemic (in response to lockdowns, layoffs, health concerns or care responsibilities) and the sizable fraction of these Americans who are still sitting on the sidelines. Given the steady drumbeat of news about how firms are unable to fill all their positions, there is much interest in how and when we expect these workers to return to the labor force. So, when can we expect them to join the labor pool?