Stretch

A RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Our research mission was to discover how changes in the global economy and shifting demographics would impact the employment and talent marketplace, from both the employer and employee perspectives. By understanding both views, we would be able to offer advice to both companies and employees on how to prepare to meet each other’s expectations for the future. In 2014, we collaborated with SuccessFactors, an SAP company, and Oxford Economics to conduct twin studies of executives and employees across 27 countries to find out what the future workforce wants.

Altogether we polled 2,800 employees and polled or interviewed 2,700 executives, with even distribution across countries. Employees were working professionals in white-collar jobs, and executives were largely senior executives in a direct-reporting relationship to a CEO or company president. The respondents came from across many thousands of companies, encompassing industries such as retail, public sector, finance, healthcare, consumer goods, and others. An independent polling firm selected all respondents. Since our focus was on the future, half of our employee respondents were Millennials–people born after 1979. Countries in which we surveyed are shown in Figure A.1.

FIG A.1 Countries Surveyed

Legend: Lighter shaded areas indicate surveyed countries.

Source: SAP

A little more than 53 percent of the ...