One new approach: bringing specific teams into the office for a weeklong stretch, to encourage collaboration among employees’ closest colleagues.ĭuring the Globe interview and on stage at the chamber event, Johnson also discussed Fidelity’s forays into cryptocurrency and efforts to attract younger investors through social media sites such as Reddit and Instagram. A spokeswoman said about a quarter of Fidelity employees participate in voluntary “re-entry programs” today but the company is about to embark on a new phase in which more people will be in the office. But Fidelity is still experimenting with the best ways to blend at-home and in-office work. Johnson said she’s personally in the office “most of the time,” or traveling for work. That was an example of something that really helped us widen the pipeline.” “But our confidence level had really changed. “I’m not sure if we would have had the nerve to do that, pre-pandemic,” Johnson said. Johnson told Datar she found it “kind of surreal” at first to hire someone before actually shaking that person’s hand.Īnother beneficial development: Fidelity could hire many workers who don’t live near the company’s operation hubs, but rather could be largely remote or only near one of Fidelity’s retail branches. Fidelity, like many employers, now regularly brings people on board without any in-person contact first.

The pandemic also spurred new business practices that helped with hiring, including the more widespread acceptance of remote work. “There was a decent amount of hiring to bring in people to replace that.” “A lot of people did take the opportunity to reevaluate and reconsider what they were doing with their lives, and chose to do something else,” said Johnson, who noted that she still considered Fidelity’s retention levels to be strong compared to peer companies. Fidelity also offered a round of voluntary buyouts to eligible US employees in mid-2021.

Another was the subsequent boom in retail trading amid the emergence of so-called “meme stocks” - GameStop, AMC, and the like - in which social-media chatter often drove waves of investor interest.Īnd to some extent, the extra hiring addressed attrition that Fidelity and many other mid-sized and large employers experienced during the pandemic. The market’s volatility early in the pandemic was one driver of activity. “Job number one was to hire more recruiters,” Johnson said. In an interview before the chamber speech, Johnson said most of the new hires fall into one of two camps: employees who provide direct customer service, and technology workers, including those who can build “new products” for the company.

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