Five near-future trends changing the way you work
(This is from Edition 56 of The Upleveler, our weekly smartletter)
The way we work is continuously evolving...
Look back at the last five to ten years: hasn't the way you work changed significantly? (If not, you are either in a timeless profession or a stagnant one - take your pick.)
One cause, apart from the obvious ones such as digitisation, is increasing cross-pollination: the willingness to apply ideas from other fields. So we have concepts like "design thinking", "A/B testing", "lean methods", "the gig economy" etc. that are now part of the mainstream. Another cause is the shrinking of the gap between action and outcome.
We have been studying such work trends, and even applying many of them in-house. Here are five of them.
1. Shorter Budgeting time frames: Businesses are becoming averse to plan budgets for very long gestation projects. Customers, stakeholders, employees, founders – everyone will be hard-pressed to set aside time and money for a long time before seeing any tangible results. This means wider adoption of ideas like design thinking, prototyping, lean thinking etc.
2. Film-style Projects: Film crews come together for a project and disband on completion. Ever since the studio system crumbled, there have been very few salaried roles for filmwallahs. Similar trends are happening inside mainstream industries. A downside is the lack of continuity and potential loss of learning from past projects. This is an opportunity for synthesizers (like a film director), recruiters (like a casting director), and coaches (like an accent/diction teacher).
3. Alternative Workers: Several alternatives to traditional roles have cropped up, driven by better documentation and standardisation. This could be a freelancer, an off-campus worker, or could even a bot. The choice is driven by what skills are required, the level of complexity, and unit economics.
4. More "Cold Start" Learning: Projects are becoming shorter. In contrast, average life, and thus, available career spans of workers are becoming longer. You may need a primary career at 21, a secondary at 45, and a tertiary career at 65. All this calls for frequent learning of new ideas, starting from level zero.
5. Robot Co-workers: It's estimated that there will be several million 'robot workers' by 2030. While many are in manufacturing and warehouse floors, some come in purely digital flavours. For instance, some hedge funds have a bot as one of the decision-makers along with other seasoned experts. How should 'human workers' work alongside them?
What can you take away from these shifts?
Honestly, the impact of these shifts is too complex for anyone to predict and guide with any certainty. That said, consider the following ideas to keep yourself relevant for a wide variety of outcomes:
1. Take Charge: Realise that no one, especially your current organisation, really knows what's good for you and what you should learn and how you should evolve. You had better take charge.
2. Create a Personal Brand: Make your portfolio, build social capital across networks, be known for something.
3. Practice Deliberate Curiosity in an Age of Abundance: It's easy to surrender your curiosity to whatever is easy to consume. Instead, seek perspective and knowledge in conscious ways.
4. Learn How You Like to Learn: We all have our preferred ways of teaching ourselves new things. Your strategies and tactics will change depending on what level you want to reach – learn enough to be dangerous or become a serious practitioner.
5. What's Replaceable about You: A leader recently told us about a question he asks his staff: "What are you still doing which could be done by someone five years younger?" (For 'five years younger', substitute all the options we listed under 'Alternative workers'.) Use that to guide your shift.
The overall message? Get used to dancing with change. If you are smart about it, it can result in beautiful choreography!
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