WORK IT

“The Great Resignation.” “Quiet Quitting.” “Rage Applying.” Workers and working have been through the wringer over the last few years. COVID didn’t kill every opportunity, but it certainly led employees and employers alike to reconceptualize the workplace; a workplace that is also being transformed by artificial intelligence (AI). As the CEO of Flex HR, a rapidly expanding human resources and payroll outsourcing and consulting firm with offices in Chicago and Atlanta, Jennifer Morehead has a front-row seat to this shifting landscape.

A Nebraska native, Morehead began her career in the analyst program at a consulting firm after graduating from Northwestern University. She then spent seven years at the Tribune Company while earning her MBA at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management. In 2010, she started a digital marketing company, then sold it in 2020 and bought Flex HR. Armed with estimable skills and insights, Morehead continues to succeed in a time of change by achieving spectacular growth for her firm—which has been named three times to Inc. magazine’s annual Inc. 5000, the most prestigious ranking of the nation’s fastest-growing private companies—and solid results for her clients.

“It’s interesting to have been both a founding CEO and an acquiring CEO,” shares Morehead, who lives with her husband, Brad, and three young children in Winnetka. “I was lucky to acquire a company where the leading subject matter expert at the company—its founder—wanted to stay on and we got along and still do. I feel very grateful to help our clients with their HR and payroll because these are such essential functions to a business.”

Facing a shrunken pool of job candidates and a population of employees demanding flexibility and better life/work balance, companies must strategize effectively to meet the new normal. When it comes to the transformation that characterizes the American workforce these days, Morehead observes, “Employers need to be nimble and open to designing a work team that looks different than it did before by incorporating gig workers, consultants, and W2 employees, often in a remote or hybrid setting.”

While many major players—JPMorgan Chase, Meta, Twitter— are playing hardball when it comes to returning to the office, Morehead is a big proponent of remote and hybrid work. “Overall, I think remote work is good for the American family, for the default parent who maintains the bulk of child-rearing responsibilities, and it can bring down some of the overhead costs for businesses,” suggests Morehead, whose book, CEO From Home, details how someone can start, acquire, or continue to run a business on their own terms while working from home. “Employers are able to recruit talent beyond the geographical confines of their city and evolve with the changing geographic needs of current employees. In order to do a remote or hybrid work setting well, employers should design virtual get-togethers like regular town hall meetings and offer ways to connect in a remote work setting outside of specific work tasks, such as virtual yoga sessions or virtual book clubs. Employers can incorporate monthly or quarterly in-person time. Training and relationship building take longer in a virtual setting, so there must be a plan for this along the way that could include a comprehensive mentor program. In addition, while quiet quitting is a trend with remote work so is quiet hiring, so it can go both ways between employer and employee.”

The fast-accelerating reality of AI is firmly on Morehead’s radar. “AI will most likely start displacing workers at the bottom rung of knowledge industries like marketing, publishing, banking, and consulting and will reach many other industries as it proliferates,” she observes. “It will be important to retrain existing employees to interact with AI effectively to be more productive in their own roles without sacrificing data security, client confidentiality, integrity in the end product, and overall tone. These workers will need to be upskilled or reskilled, so they won’t lose their jobs. Employers need to be evaluating job descriptions and scope of work for their workers to plan how they might evolve in an AI setting. In addition, employers should decide how to incorporate the allowed or prohibited use of AI in their work setting in their employee handbook.”

Looking back at the evolution of her career, Morehead recalls a moment that came to inform all that followed. “I was about to turn 25, I had worked in a consulting job out of college and was supporting a husband through business school at Kellogg. When we moved back to Chicago, I took a risk in a 100 percent commission sales job for WGN Radio, which at the time was owned by the Tribune Company. The AM radio industry certainly wasn’t sexy, but it taught me how to sell and take entrepreneurial-related risks. At age 26, I was quickly promoted to a sales management position running a $30 million sales department. I don’t think I would’ve had the opportunity in another job to get that type of experience so quickly, and it changed the trajectory of my career. It taught me that sometimes, it’s good to take the road less traveled.”

For more information about Flex HR, visit flexhr.com, CEO From Home is available at amazon.com.