The top people risks in Canada are increasing health and benefits costs, according to a new report from MercerMarsh Benefits.
“People can be an organization’s most important strength, but they can also bring significant risk to a business if they’re not properly managed,” the People Risk 2024 report states. “People Risks are business risks generated by your workforce and how you manage, equip and motivate this critical asset.”
The top 10 people risks in Canada
The top 10 people risks in Canada are:
- Increasing health and benefit costs
- Tech skills shortages
- Suboptimal HR technology
- Inadequate personal catastrophe coverage
- Pandemics
- Poor management of benefit exposure
- Improper rewards decision-making
- Absence of HR in decision-making
- Labour shortages
- Changing legislation and scrutiny
Compare that to the United States, where “ineffective leadership” takes the top spot, followed by improper rewards decision-making and increasing health and benefit costs.
Globally, the top three risks were increasing health and benefits costs; labour shortages; and disparities in executive/worker rewards.
Use of generative AI at work
Canadians were less likely to use generative AI in their work — with 26% using it at least once a a week and 9% using it daily.
Benefit cost increases
The top risk was health and benefit costs, something MercerMarsh called “little surprise: given that — outside the U.S. — an 11.7% increase is forecast for 2024, “continuing a trend of double-digit increases every year since 2021.”
The increases in Canada, though, are comparatively low when compared to the rest of the world.
To see the full report, visit https://www.mercer.com/en-ca/insights/people-strategy/people-risks-and-business-resilience/people-risk-management/