Australian operational leaders expect global recession in the next six months, but 95% are yet to begin preparing

ActiveOps’ latest research, Are you recession ready? How to do more with less, indicates that Australian operations leaders in the financial and banking sector are unprepared for a recession.

Melbourne, Australia – October 24, 2022 – More than 95% of Australian operations teams are yet to begin preparations for a possible recession, according to new research from ActiveOps, a leading management process automation company. The report, Are you recession ready? How to do more with less, analysed the current state of play in financial organisations, and surveyed 1,000 employees within operations teams across Australia, the UK and North America; reveals that three out of five employees across Australia believe businesses are not properly equipped to deliver organisational objectives in the event of a global recession. 

Preparedness in the face of economic crisis is a significant theme in the report, which provides insight into whether operations employees are anticipating a recession, how employees feel their organisations are preparing for it, and what the likely impacts of those preparations are.  

Key findings of the report include:

• Australian operational leaders are less expectant of a recession when compared to the UK and USA, but 77% believe a global recession is likely to hit in the next 6-12 months.
• In Australia, 35% of respondents said that the recession will most likely bring about an increase in outsourcing, 27% foresee budget reductions and 29% believe there will be mandatory redundancies. 
• Over half (52.5%) of Australian respondents believe workloads will increase in their operations in the event of a recession, while just 50% in the UK respondents and 45% of US respondents say the same.
• 35% of Australian operations leaders believe that in the event of a global recession, the biggest negative impact to operational teams will be an increase in outsourcing.
• To tackle a recession, should it arrive in Australia, 36% of respondents said that their focus will be on increasing the use of automation and digital transformation and 33% said they that they will look to absorb increased workloads with fixed staffing levels.

Commenting on the findings, Jane Lambert, Managing Director APAC at ActiveOps said: “Although recession will be a new challenge for many, Australian business leaders are not new to economic turbulence and the challenges that it might present. Australia hasn’t seen a recession since 1991, but the economies are slowing, and businesses across the world need to be prepared for challenging times ahead.” 

Lambert continued: “Operations teams within the banking and financial sectors are already struggling to manage hybrid working, driven by the aftereffects of the pandemic. Attrition is high and organisations are finding it difficult to retain staff. Add to this challenge, the accelerated change in the digital demands of consumers and you have significant hurdles businesses need to overcome if a recession does bite. History tells us that the quality of service provided to customers will suffer, and employees that aren’t lost to redundancy may leave rather than struggle with low morale and being overworked. To combat these affects, operational leaders need to act now and look to do more with the resources they have.” 

To read the full report, Are you recession ready? How to do more with less, click here.