Written by Kieran Delamont, Associate Editor, London Inc.

COMING OUT OF the pandemic, it was widely suggested that job-hopping in a tight labour market was the most effective way to boost your salary. New data out of ADP’s payroll data department still backs that up: job-hoppers in April saw 9.3 per cent increases in pay, compared to five per cent for the job-stayers.

The data suggests that while we’re a ways off from the heyday of late 2021 and early 2022, when job-hoppers were seeing increases of 15 per cent or more, the start of 2024 has been a particularly good time if you’re playing the employment game of musical chairs. The premium paid to job-hoppers spiked to 10 per cent in March and is still higher than it’s been for most of last year.

“In Canada, there’s long been a similar trend, but it got extreme during the pandemic, with some job-switchers reportedly upping their pay by as much as 20 per cent,” wrote Wealthsimple’s Sarah Rieger. “Such a dramatic jump might be a smidge harder to come by now that the labour market is cooling, so maybe temper your expectations a bit.”

The good news is that it does look like the era of big layoffs has passed, and the expectation of upcoming rate cuts looks like good news for businesses looking to hire and job-hoppers alike. More than half of companies told Robert Half earlier this year that they were planning on adding new roles, and around four in 10 Canadians were looking for a new job.

It creates an interesting dynamic, especially if hiring picks up in the remainder of 2024. We could see a return of the conditions of 2022, which were great for job-hoppers. But employers are also wary of playing that game too much. They are more willing to be selective, as we’ve seen in hiring trends over the past year, too. It may have paid historically to hop around, but will that effect hold forever? That’s harder to say.

“On the one hand, progressive companies recognize the value that job-hoppers bring to the table. They appreciate the fresh perspectives and innovative ideas that these professionals infuse into their organizations,” wrote consultancy firm Morgan McKinley. “However, some employers remain wary of job-hoppers. They fear that investing time and resources in training these individuals might be in vain if they leave for greener pastures relatively soon.”  

PRODUCTIVITY

Sick of sick notes

To ease the burden on family physicians, the province is planning to scrap sick notes for short absences from work. Even businesses are giving it a healthy reception

EMPLOYEES FIND THEM annoying, doctors hate writing them and employers burn trust with their team by requesting them ― so rejoice in the fact that last week, the Ontario government signalled that it would force employers to stop requiring doctor’s notes for staff using their provincially-mandated sick days.

It brings us back full circle to where we were in 2018, before the Ford government reintroduced sick note requirements as part of its Making Ontario Open for Business Act. The move was criticized by doctors at the time, though some business owners cheered it on, saying they felt like they were being taken advantage of.

On paper, the move to reverse course on doctor’s notes is being pitched as a bit of help to the medical profession, freeing up time that doctors would have had to spend seeing patients who don’t really need medical help but are being asked to prove that they were sick. Doctors ― who in Ontario aren’t reimbursed by OHIP to write the notes ― have long been annoyed by employers who request them; some have even (semi-jokingly) started sending invoices to employers.

“This is not the role of the health system, to police employee attendance,” Dr. Kay Dingwell told CBC earlier this year.

Requiring doctor’s notes has long had critics, both within and outside the medical profession. “Sick notes set up skewed incentives for everyone,” wrote Monika Dutt and Edward Xie in 2020. “For employers, they hinder trust with workers and replace effective management. Besides being unpopular, sick notes are unreliable and, economically speaking, inefficient. They’re used to ‘prove’ someone is sick, but for many short-lived illnesses there’s simply no way to accurately confirm them.”

Others are more blunt: “These policies are inconvenient by design,” wrote Hirsh Chitkara. “Doctor’s notes often serve as a bureaucratic buffer, allowing corporations to shirk whatever benefits they owe sick or disabled employees.”

If you’re thinking of shirking work with a little fake cough, though, the government isn’t letting you off the hook completely: in place of the doctor’s note, they are allowing employers to request some other form of proof, including a receipt for over-the-counter meds or a self-attestation that you were sick.

Ultimately, advocates say, the best approach is one of two-way trust between employer and employee. “When an employee calls in sick, it is best to trust they are being honest and leave them to recover in peace,” wrote Marie-Eve Bernard for Dialogue Health. “A better climate of trust between the boss and his workforce would truly be healthier for everybody involved.” 

WORKSPACE

Playing through

Forget the foosball. Pack up the ping pong. Golf simulators are the new hot office amenity

WHITE-COLLAR WORK AND golf have always gone together like peanut butter and jelly. It used to be that the golf course was the escape from the office, the place the boss went to close the big deal or just take it easy on a sunny Friday (or Tuesday) afternoon.

Now, thanks to an explosion in golf sim technology (and a reduction in its cost), golf is coming right into the office. “Design firms like TPG Architecture, Perkins&Will, and HLW have all recently completed golf-simulator amenity spaces and say they’re an important differentiator in today’s competitive talent market,” reports Digiday’s Worklife.

“They’re not as niche or gimmicky as we may have initially thought,” said TPG Architecture’s Ken Tracey. “They really truly have a purpose and are used on a more regular basis than I think we initially had anticipated.”

Hitting the links year-round could, at least theoretically, be a real boon to employee satisfaction. “It’s that decompression in the middle of the day. It’s like, ‘I’m going to kill somebody, I’ve got to come down to swing a golf club,” said Bill Elder, head of leasing for the commercial property manager RXR, which installed a golf simulator in a marquee New York office tower recently. “We all know work’s not easy sometimes. These are spaces where you can kind of escape.”

It may be a useful amenity if you’re trying to fill your offices back up, too. Golf, both real and simulated, exploded in popularity during the pandemic, in part because it was a safe way to socialize. Office developers have started to view golf simulators as a way to “encourage tenants back into the office, and offer something different within the market,” said HLW’s Louise Sharp. “Simulator lounges provide a way to incorporate that [social] experience into the workplace.” 

TRENDS

Wheels up

Zooming less, flying more. It looks like the death of business travel has been greatly exaggerated

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