Asim Rais Siddiqui, Author at ReadWrite https://readwrite.com/author/asim-rais-siddiqui/ IoT and Technology News Sun, 08 Oct 2023 18:13:31 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.2.2 https://readwrite.com/wp-content/uploads/cropped-rw-32x32.jpg Asim Rais Siddiqui, Author at ReadWrite https://readwrite.com/author/asim-rais-siddiqui/ 32 32 Using Augmented Reality to Level up your E-Commerce Business https://readwrite.com/using-augmented-reality-to-level-up-your-e-commerce-business/ Sun, 08 Oct 2023 18:00:00 +0000 https://readwrite.com/?p=236776 Using Augmented Reality to Level up your E-Commerce Business

With 20.8% of all retail transactions occurring online in 2023, technological advancements are the driving force behind how customers shop. […]

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Using Augmented Reality to Level up your E-Commerce Business

With 20.8% of all retail transactions occurring online in 2023, technological advancements are the driving force behind how customers shop. In today’s dynamic landscape, everything is rapidly evolving, from how we browse through our favorite stores to how we purchase something, and Augmented Reality is one of them.

Since customer preferences are ever-changing, businesses seek new ways to captivate their audience. Integrating augmented reality (AR) into ecommerce experiences is just one of these ways.

Related: Evolution of Ecommerce – A Glimpse of Its Past, Present, and Future

Augmented Reality in Ecommerce

Augmented reality is an innovative technology that helps sync digital elements with the real world, providing an immersive experience for customers. Leveraging AR is proving to be a game changer for several businesses, transforming the way their customers interact with their products and services.

Augmented reality first gained prominence through entertainment apps like Pokémon Go and is now slowly progressing onto the e-commerce stage. According to industry experts and market analysts, AR will soon become a cornerstone of e-commerce success. A Statista forecast survey reveals that by 2025, around one-third of shoppers in the United States will have used AI-powered technologies when buying products online.

So, if you’re ready to hop on board the AR hype train, let’s review some of its benefits to your business.

Better customer engagement

A lot of businesses hesitate to incorporate AR technology into their business strategies. Mostly, they think it’s just a gimmick or a fad that will die soon. But I can assure you it’s not and will not fade away soon. According to a Deloitte report, by 2025, roughly 4.3 billion global consumers will use AR technology frequently.

Harnessing the power of AR will allow you to engage your customers better and attract other potential customers as well. A survey conducted by Retail Perceptions revealed that 71% of customers would be more willing to frequent retailers that offer augmented reality experiences. This engagement isn’t just temporary; it translates directly into conversions and long-term brand loyalty.

By creating immersive shopping experiences to captivate their audience, brands can leverage AR to bring interactivity and engagement to their campaigns that couldn’t have been done previously using traditional marketing methods.

Personalized shopping experience

‘Personalization’ is the buzzword on everyone’s lips these days. Customers want their shopping experience to feel unique and tailored to their needs. AR helps elevate a mundane and generic shopping experience to a personalized one for every customer.

Augmented reality can do this by curating product recommendations based on individual preferences, behaviors, and shopping habits. McKinsey research shows that 71 percent of customers expect brands to deliver personalized shopping experiences, and not only that, but 76 percent of them actually get frustrated when this doesn’t happen.

This makes AR more of a necessity than it was before. And it’s a win-win situation for both the business and the customers. By seamlessly merging the digital and physical realms, AR offers a unique opportunity to create bespoke shopping journeys that resonate with customers.

Related: How Augmented Reality (AR) Continues to Transform Customer Experience?

Improved product visualization

AR actually addresses a common pain point that many online shoppers face – visualizing how the product would fit you or look on you. The frustration of buying a product only to find it doesn’t quite fit or look as good on you as you thought it would is an all-too-common scenario. Time suggests that people return almost 40% of what they buy online due to sizing issues.

Being able to visualize how you would look like in a particular dress or wearing a shade of lipstick that looks really good can save a lot of time and money for both customers and retailers alike. AR helps turn their imagination into reality by enabling customers to visualize products in their real-world environments before purchasing.

Shopify’s research indicates that retailers who add 3D and AR content to their stores experience an impressive 94% increase in conversion rates. A lot of it has to do with customers being assured of what they’re buying. AR can significantly reduce the uncertainty associated with online purchases.

Success Stories of Brands Leveraging Augmented Reality

Augmented reality isn’t exactly new on the market, and several brands have recognized its transformative potential and used it to curate immersive experiences for their customers. Let’s look at some prominent ones.

NikeFit

Nike has recognized a vital pain point their customers face: the inability always to purchase the correct size when buying shoes online. According to them, three out of five people are probably wearing the wrong shoe size. To address this concern, they’ve developed NikeFit – a mobile app made using AR technology that scans customers’ feet to determine their correct shoe size. Using this, customers can ensure they purchase the right size and don’t face any hassles when exchanging or returning the shoes.

L’Oreal Virtual Makeup and Hair Color Try-On

A common issue many women experience when purchasing makeup products or hair colors is that they look great in ads or other women, but they don’t end up looking as good on them as they thought. L’Oreal has come up with an intelligent solution for this with the help of AR technology. They have created a virtual try-on experience for all their products on their website and app. So now customers can see how a shade of lipstick or a particular hair color will look on them before purchasing it. This proved to be a really effective strategy, with L’Oreal’s ecommerce sales increasing by a massive 49% following the unveiling of the technology.

IKEA Place

Home furnishings giant IKEA didn’t fall behind in the race to adopt AR for continued success. The launch of their innovative app, IKEA Place, ushered in a new era of visualization for home decor. Imagine having the ability to see how the rustic armchair fits in your living room.

Picture-checking if the stylish coffee table goes well with your current interior design. The app turns these visualizations into reality. It uses augmented reality technology to achieve this. The app lets users place 3D models of IKEA’s products virtually in their living spaces. This is done using the camera on their smartphones. The 3D models are true-to-scale representations of the actual products.

This helps customers make a buying decision and decide whether to go through with the purchase or not.

Implementing Augmented Reality in Your Ecommerce Strategy

According to Mobile Marketer, 52% of online retailers are not yet ready to integrate AR technology into their shopping experiences. Venturing into a new realm of technology, especially one that can be as overwhelming as AR, is indeed daunting. But its benefits to your business will ultimately be worth it.

So, before you embark on your AR integration journey, it’s imperative to keep a few things in mind.

Understand your target audience

All your efforts and money will go in vain if you don’t understand your target audience’s preferences and technological familiarity. Different age groups have varying degrees of comfort with technology. For instance, Millennials and Gen Z, having grown up in the digital age, are more likely to embrace AR experiences compared to their predecessors.

Choose the right AR technology

The AR technology you decide to adopt depends on the outcomes you hope to achieve. If you’re considering using AR to offer product information, you can choose marker-based AR. This method requires scanning markers to display digital content. In contrast, markerless AR identifies real-world surfaces and objects, which is particularly useful for creating virtual try-on opportunities.

Collaborate with AR developers

While the idea of integrating AR into your e-commerce platform is exciting, it is also something that requires expert consultation and effort. Collaborating with AR development experts can ensure a smooth implementation of AR technology into your ecommerce venture. Their expertise can mitigate technical challenges, ensuring optimal user experiences and seamless interactions.

Innovative content creation

Creating innovative and compelling content is the heart of any successful augmented reality campaign. AR’s potential for immersive experiences demands a strategic approach to content creation that resonates with your target audience. So you need to ensure that you create content that targets common difficulties your customers face and provides a prompt solution for them with the help of AR.

Related: Why You Should Use Augmented Reality in Your Business App

Challenges to Overcome When Integrating AR Technology

Integrating AR into your business’ ecommerce strategy is promising but comes with its fair share of challenges.

The problem of assuring a smooth user experience is paramount, and as the AR experience grows more sophisticated, so does the risk of encountering lag or latency. To combat this, it is crucial to strike a balance between real-time interaction and maintaining the fluidity of the technology.

In addition, technical barriers can also hamper your AR efforts. Device compatibility emerges as a prominent concern, as AR experiences need to be accessible across a variety of devices. Moreover, factors like internet speed and bandwidth can also affect the performance of AR applications. Dealing with these technical barriers involves optimizing applications for a range of devices. Moreover, a robust network infrastructure to support AR’s data-intensive demands.

Questions about privacy and data security are of the utmost concern for any user. AR apps often require access to personal data. This can cause concerns about data collection, storage, and potential misuse. Users need assurance that their private spaces and sensitive information remain safeguarded. Thus, robust security measures and transparent data policies need to be in place to establish trust and encourage widespread adoption.

The Future of Augmented Reality in Ecommerce

While AR has already made significant strides in the e-commerce landscape, its potential is far from being fully realized. With the number of online customers increasing. The demand for personalized shopping experiences and immersive technology to bridge the divide between the digital and physical realms.

As technology continues to evolve, customer expectations continue to shift. According to a NielsenIQ survey, 56% of the shoppers they surveyed revealed that AR technology gives them more confidence about the quality of a product and helps them make a buying decision. AR integration is moving towards becoming an irreplaceable feature for many brands.

The future of AR in e-commerce holds exciting possibilities from a convergence with other immersive technologies, such as virtual reality (VR) and mixed reality (MR), to a boost in social commerce through AR-powered features and the integration of AI-driven personalization in shopping experiences.

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

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Is Innovation Dead? Have We Peaked the Innovation Curve? https://readwrite.com/is-innovation-dead-have-we-peaked-the-innovation-curve/ Tue, 13 Jun 2023 15:00:55 +0000 https://readwrite.com/?p=228524 Is Innovation Dead? Have We Peaked the Innovation Curve?

Innovation has long been the driving force behind human progress, leading to groundbreaking discoveries, technological advancements, and societal transformations. History […]

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Is Innovation Dead? Have We Peaked the Innovation Curve?

Innovation has long been the driving force behind human progress, leading to groundbreaking discoveries, technological advancements, and societal transformations. History has bore witness to revolutionary innovations that have transformed the way we live, work, and interact with others. 

In recent years, however, there has been a growing debate about innovation being stagnent. So, let’s delve into the current state of innovation and see if it is on a downward trajectory.

Related: Innovation Outlasts Invention: Assessing the Value of New Tech

The Stagnation of Innovation?

To begin with, we have to acknowledge the incredible strides we have made in innovation over the past century. From the invention of telephones to the development of computers, the internet, and the transition to smartphones. All of these breakthroughs have propelled humanity into a new era of interconnectedness and progress. Technological innovation has successfully transformed and even created a number of industries. From revolutionizing healthcare to the advent of artificial intelligence, the rapid pace of innovation took the world by storm. 

However, some argue that the rate of innovation has slowed down in recent years. A recent study analyzing millions of scientific papers and patents between 1945 and 2010 claims that there is an unrelenting decline in innovation. There is 90% less disruption in almost all fields of science and technology than there was eight years ago.

Some researchers believe that this is because the nature of research is changing, arguing that the increasingly complex and interdisciplinary nature of modern scientific research has made it more challenging to make significant breakthroughs. On the other hand, there’s another theory going around, claiming that all the “low-hanging fruit” of science has already been plucked.

It is true that in some areas it has indeed reached a point of diminishing returns. Space exploration is one such field in which critics argue that the overall pace of innovation has slowed. The last manned mission to the Moon occurred in 1972, and there have been no major breakthroughs in propulsion systems or space travel since then. The absence of transformative advancements in space exploration supports the notion of innovation stagnation.

The Evolution of Innovation 

However, it would be premature to conclude that innovation as a whole is dead or has peaked the innovation curve. While certain areas may be experiencing a slowdown, others are experiencing rapid advancements. 

The advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

One of the most prominent technologies and industries that have sprung from rapid growth is artificial intelligence (AI). Grand View Research reported that the global AI market is expected to grow at an annual rate of 37.3% from 2023 to 2030

This is because the advent of these transformative technologies has been a game-changer in the realm of innovation, as they hold the power to revolutionize several industries. 

Through its data analysis capabilities, AI can quickly process and extract valuable insights from vast amounts of information, resulting in better decision-making and problem-solving. Moreover, AI has enhanced personalization and customer experiences by tailoring recommendations and interactions based on individual preferences. 

The great progress in natural language processing has also given rise to conversational interfaces and language-based applications such as; ChatGPT and Bard, transforming communication and information access. 

It is a collaborative endeavor now

Another factor about innovation is that it is no longer confined to the realm of just a few genius inventors or scientists. Innovation has now become a collaborative and inclusive process that thrives on diverse perspectives and interdisciplinary collaboration. The traditional notion that innovation is a solitary pursuit is no longer valid. Instead, it has evolved into a collective endeavor that involves individuals from various backgrounds and areas.

This collaborative and inclusive nature of innovation has been facilitated largely in part due to factors like the open-source movement, collaborative research networks, and the democratization of knowledge through the internet. The drastic shift has led to the emergence of innovative ideas from unexpected sources. By embracing diverse perspectives, interdisciplinary collaboration, and creating a supportive ecosystem, we can tap into the full potential of innovation and address the complex challenges of our time.

Related: How to Keep Innovation a Top Priority at a Tech Company

Shift to systematic innovation 

Furthermore, the nature of innovation itself is evolving.  The focus is shifting from isolated inventions to systemic innovation that addresses complex challenges and societal needs. Collaborations across disciplines like technology, social sciences, design, and entrepreneurship are driving innovation. This approach aims to create solutions that not only solve problems but also consider their broader implications and impact on society.

Innovation is no longer just about finding quick fixes for problems. Systemic innovation takes into account the wider implications and potential impact of new ideas on society and the environment. Innovators are now more aware of ethical considerations, unintended consequences, and long-term sustainability. They strive to create solutions that not only solve immediate problems but also consider their ripple effects and potential trade-offs. This broader perspective allows innovators to develop solutions that have a positive and lasting impact on society as a whole.

Innovation is not dead

Although some argue that innovation is dead or has reached its peak, the truth is more nuanced than that. While innovation in certain areas may be slowing down, it is advancing rapidly in others due to emerging technologies, interdisciplinary collaborations, and incremental improvements. Therefore, innovation is thriving and evolving. To ensure transformative breakthroughs, we must embrace complexity, encourage diverse perspectives, and create supportive ecosystems that foster creativity and experimentation. Hence, innovation is not dead; it is evolving, and its potential for growth and progress is limitless.

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Could ChatGPT Pose a Threat to Google’s Dominance in Search? https://readwrite.com/could-chatgpt-pose-a-threat-to-googles-dominance-in-search/ Mon, 03 Apr 2023 21:00:35 +0000 https://readwrite.com/?p=222549 ChatGPT Threat to Google Search?

Over the decades, Google has made a space in billions of people’s lives worldwide as the go-to search engine to […]

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ChatGPT Threat to Google Search?

Over the decades, Google has made a space in billions of people’s lives worldwide as the go-to search engine to answer their queries. From using it to learn “how to make a pecan pie” to diagnosing illnesses by inputting symptoms, Google, with its infamous and complicated ranking algorithm, is all-knowing.

See also: ChatGPT: Everything You Need to Know and Timeline of Events

But with innovation in artificial intelligence (AI) and the launch of OpenAI’s language generation model ChatGPT, things have changed. The world has been thrown into chaos, and Google’s monopoly among search engines may finally be wavering.

Introduction to ChatGPT and Google’s search engine

The Google Search Engine is now three decades old. The speed, simplicity, and quality of results make Google the most-used search engine on the internet. It uses a search algorithm known as PageRank, which combines technical factors, such as the relevance and popularity of web pages, to rank the results returned for a given query.

The search algorithm takes many factors into account when determining the relevance of a web page. This includes the text, the links, and the relevance of the words in the query.

The algorithm’s intent is to help users find the most useful and informative web pages for their queries. The trustworthiness and relevance of these results, however, are questionable.

ChatGPT, on the other hand, is a natural language generation model by OpenAI. It can be used for various natural language processing tasks. From generating text, answering questions, generating responses to prompts, language translation, and even text summarization, ChatGPT is multifaceted.

ChatGPT and Search
Image Credit: Photo by the PhotoMIX Company; Pexels; Thank you! ChatGPT and Search

A comparison of ChatGPT and Google’s search engine capabilities

Search is a complex task. Google search involves not just understanding natural language queries — but also ranking and organizing the billions of web pages and documents that are indexed on Google. This requires sophisticated algorithms and a deep understanding of the structure of the web, which Google has done through years of research and development.

Let’s go over some of the wide range of tasks that the Google search engine is capable of:

  1. Web Search: The primary function of Google Search is to help users find information on the web. Users can type in keywords or phrases, and the search engine will return a list of relevant web pages and documents.
  2. Image Search: This feature allows users to search for images on the internet by keywords.
  3. News Search: Google Search includes a feature that allows users to find news articles about a specific topic.
  4. Video Search: It also allows users to search for videos on the internet by keywords.
  5. Maps and Local Search: This feature enables users to search for businesses, places, and other points of interest and view them on a map.
  6. Advanced Search: Google Search includes advanced search operators such as ‘site:,’ ‘filetype:,’ ‘intext:’ and many more to help users refine their search results and find the information they need.

ChatGPT, on the other hand, is not explicitly designed for use in search. But even in its primary stage, it has shown tremendous potential in assisting with search. While it can generate text similar to human writing, it is not currently as sophisticated as Google’s search algorithm, which has been developed and refined over many years.

How ChatGPT can improve the Search Experience

It’s currently missing many of the components that make Google’s search so powerful, such as a vast array of data, years of research and development, and a wide range of integrated products and services.

It is worth mentioning that ChatGPT, when used in conjunction with a search engine like Google, can assist in providing more sophisticated results as well as a more interpretable understanding of queried information.

Let’s look at some ways ChatGPT can be of aid when it comes to search.

  1. Query Understanding: ChatGPT can understand the intent of a user’s query by analyzing the query and generating a summary of what the user is looking for.
  2. Query Expansion: It can also expand a user’s query by generating similar or related queries.
  3. Language Translation: Can be fine-tune on a specific language task, allowing it to generate text in a different language than the one it was trained on, providing a more accurate and human-like translation.
  4. Answer Generation: It can generate answers to natural language questions.
  5. Text Summarization: ChatGPT can generate summaries of lengthy articles or documents, making it easier for users to find the information they are looking for.
  6. Text Completion: It can also complete a text based on a given prompt or context.
  7. Rich Snippet: ChatGPT can generate rich snippets, giving a better visual representation of the result.
  8. Responding to Voice Queries: ChatGPT can be integrated with voice-enabled devices, allowing it to respond to natural language voice queries and generate spoken responses.

These are just a few examples of how ChatGPT can enhance search. The model can be fine-tune for specific use cases, and its capabilities can extend through integration with other technologies.

Potential uses of ChatGPT in various industries and sectors

ChatGPT and other language models have great potential in many other fields, such as customer support, content creation, summarization, and search. Because of its efficiency, scalability, cost-effectiveness, coherence, and fluency, ChatGPT use cases expand to every major industry.

  1. Education: ChatGPT can be fine-tune on educational data and knowledge to generate text for exam questions, summaries, and explanations.
  2. Healthcare: ChatGPT has the ability to use medical data and knowledge to develop medical reports and summaries or answer patients’ questions.
  3. Legal: Inputting legal data and knowledge in ChatGPT allows it to assist with legal documents, summaries, and contract reviews.
  4. E-commerce: Can effectively generate product descriptions and customer reviews. It can also power chatbots to help customers find the products they are looking for and make purchase decisions.
  5. Customer Service: ChatGPT can facilitate chatbot or virtual assistants that can answer customer questions, providing quick and accurate responses 24/7.

Potential threats Google may face with the development of AI Models

Language generation is a rapidly evolving field, and ChatGPT comes with certain unique abilities. These may cause problems for Google. Let’s find out how this works.

  • Automation of content creation: One of the key benefits of ChatGPT is its ability to generate human-like text. This could lead to the automation of certain content creation tasks.  News articles, product descriptions, and customer reviews — can all be AI-generated, making it difficult for Google to discern between them. The lack of being able to actually tell the difference between real and AI throws the Google ranking algorithm into chaos.
  • Personalization: ChatGPT can be fine-tuned on specific tasks and can generate customizable text for a particular context. While Google search is more general and not tailored to specific use cases.
  • Competition in the advertising industry: Google generates a significant portion of its revenue through advertising. ChatGPT, however, can generate ad copy, potentially leading to increased competition in the advertising industry.
  • Quality of results: Google’s search results rank by relevance. However, ChatGPT can provide results that humans prefer as they are in a conversational tone. This makes ChatGPT more efficient for Google’s search results.
  • Reducing the need for Google search: ChatGPT can be fine-tuned on specific tasks and generate human-like text. This reduces the need for users to rely on Google Search for certain types of information.

The current state and future potential of ChatGPT and Google’s search engine

Google has created its own transformation-based language model, LaMDA. However, Google has been very cautious about making it available to the masses. OpenAI, on the other hand, has readily made ChatGPT available as a research preview, with the program gaining 1 million users in just five days.

ChatGPT has done a brilliant job of highlighting the capabilities of current AI. Head of Google’s AI, Jeff Dean, said the company has much more “reputational risk” in providing wrong information and thus is moving “more conservatively than a small startup.”

They went on to say that they had similar capabilities but much more to lose because people have to trust the answers they get from Google, which is not always the case with ChatGPT, as OpenAI has explicitly stated that ChatGPT “sometimes writes plausible-sounding but incorrect or nonsensical answers.”

It is also important to note that ChatGPT, like any other machine learning model, is not a silver bullet. This means that its performance depends on the data it’s trained on and the specific task it’s used for.

A search engine like Google needs to understand the intent of a user’s query and then provide relevant results. However, ChatGPT can generate text similar to human writing but is not fully able to carry out the former.

Additionally, GPT-3 and its variants are only open for some to use, as it requires API access which is not available for free. Thus there are limitations to its ability. Only large enterprises can afford it right now. Which also limits its potential to pose a real threat to Google in search.

Conclusion: Is ChatGPT a viable threat to Google’s dominance in search?

Google is now live for more than 30 years, which has advanced its algorithms and capabilities. Additionally, Google has a vast array of data at its disposal. This allows it to continuously improve its search algorithms and provide more accurate and relevant results.

Google also has a wide range of other products and services. Google Maps, Images, and YouTube play a vital role in the search experience. This integration of Google products provides a comprehensive search experience to its users.

ChatGPT is not currently a direct threat to Google’s dominance, but it can be a potential tool to assist the future search experience. Research is done in this area, but there is much more to search for. It’s not an easy task, but it’s a possible one.

With further innovations, ChatGPT could be major competition to the decades of monopoly Google has been enjoying over search engines. The release and potential success or failure of LaMDA also play a crucial role in determining whether Google will be able to continue asserting this dominance as ChatGPT and other natural-language generation models are wreaking havoc in the digital sphere.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Oleksandr Pidvalnyi; Pexels; Thank you!

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Alternatives to Layoffs in Tech: Maintaining a Stable Workforce https://readwrite.com/alternatives-to-layoffs-in-tech-maintaining-a-stable-workforce/ Tue, 21 Mar 2023 18:00:56 +0000 https://readwrite.com/?p=223066 Alternatives to Layoffs

The tech industry is volatile and subject to the whims of the market. With the recession that’s predicted to hit […]

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Alternatives to Layoffs

The tech industry is volatile and subject to the whims of the market. With the recession that’s predicted to hit the global economy in late 2023, companies everywhere, from small startups to major enterprises, are already taking countermeasures to combat it. Ironically, the most commonly employed countermeasure is large-scale layoffs.

Just recently, Microsoft announced 10,000 job cuts, impacting nearly 5% of its global workforce, as part of “workforce reduction” measures the company is taking. This was soon followed by a similar announcement from Google’s parent company, Alphabet. CEO Sundar Pichai commented on the downsizing, saying the company had “hired for a different economic reality” than what it’s up against today.

During times of economic hardship, it is important for companies to maintain a stable, employed workforce. This is why many businesses are searching for alternatives to layoffs as a method to get through these challenging times. Let’s explore what some of these potential alternatives could be.

Reducing Hiring

A substitute for layoffs is to recruit fewer people each month in the first place. Companies might limit the pace of new recruits and concentrate on keeping their present employees. This is one of the factors that they can adapt to rather than reduce their current staff.

During the height of the pandemic, companies like Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft hired and grew their employee base significantly. In contrast, Apple hired at a more modest rate compared to its peers, adding only 17,000 new recruits between 2020 and 2022. Now that uncertain times are ahead, and we see the consequences of overhiring in the form of mass layoffs. On the other hand, Apple has avoided using layoffs as a tool to deal with these dire circumstances.

Hiring Freeze

The implementation of a hiring freeze is an additional alternative to laying off present employees. This entails putting a temporary stop to all new hiring until the business’s financial situation improves. By doing so, companies can cut expenditures while maintaining the current staff.

Another reason why Apple is not laying off its employees like its counterparts — is that it implemented a hiring freeze in November 2022 to prepare for the turbulent times that are ahead. There’s no news on when the freeze will be lifted, with sources even saying that it could go on until September 2023.

Reducing Working Hours

Reducing the number of hours a worker works each week is one such option that can prove to be beneficial. This enables businesses to maintain their personnel while also cutting expenditures. Employees who are able to keep their jobs but with fewer hours worked may also benefit from it, freeing up more time for other activities.

Reducing hours, not workers, is the right for forward-looking business leaders to institute today. 73 companies in the UK ran an experiment with a four-day workweek. The results showed that managers and employees generally described being more or equally productive in a shortened week. A shorter work week gives employees more time to spend with their friends and family and also focuses on any hobbies or part-time ventures that they wish to cultivate.

Voluntary Separation or Leave

Offering voluntary unpaid leave is another substitute for permanently laying off workers. Although this reduces the number of employees, it also gives them the option to return to their positions later. This is advantageous for the employer and employee because it lets workers take a short break while businesses save money.

Alternatively, companies can also implement a voluntary separation program. This enables employees to willingly leave the organization in exchange for severance compensation. This may be a successful strategy for reducing the workforce while still treating the impacted workers with fairness and compassion. Coca-Cola offered voluntary separation packages to 4000 employees in North America, and it included some major incentives like at least a year’s pay plus a 20% bump.

Focusing on Employee Retention

The most optimal way to avoid layoffs is to reduce employee turnover. High turnover can lead to a constant need to fill available positions, which can be costly and time-consuming. Businesses can decrease the number of unfilled positions and the need to hire and train new employees by putting more emphasis on employee retention and taking measures to improve it. Employers can concentrate on keeping their present staff members by offering them competitive wage packages, flexible work schedules, and opportunities for career advancement.

When to layoff employees?

It’s crucial to remember that laying off employees should only be used as a last resort. Additionally, when layoffs are unavoidable, the business should manage the situation with transparency and empathy. It’s vital to avoid doing bad layoffs or for the wrong reasons. The recent Twitter layoffs are a prime example of a bad layoff, with employees either being informed by email that they have been laid off or finding out after discovering that they have been locked out of their work laptops or communication channels.

Layoffs are not always the best option and can often be detrimental to the organization as a whole. Companies can keep a steady workforce while still controlling expenses and adapting to market changes by thinking about possible alternatives to layoffs. Employers should be aware of their options and carefully consider them while putting the interests of their staff first.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Christina Morillo; Pexels; Thank you!

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