‘I will take it as a given that for most people, somewhere between 6 and 7 billion of them, the perfect job is the one which takes the least time.’
Tim Ferriss, The 4-Hour Work Week (2007)
The introduction of the Internet and email to the workplace in the mid-1990s heralded a new era of global communications that fundamentally changed the way we work. Distances became smaller, barriers to entry grew lower, and everything became faster. But future changes to the workplace are set to become even more disruptive.
While both of those developments greatly improved efficiency and speed, the developments of the near future will lead to a total restructuring of work and the workplace as we know it. We’re already seeing emerging innovations that change not only the ways in which we can work but also our expectations, ethos and appreciation of what work and a workplace should be.
Our current understanding of the impact artificial intelligence (AI) will have on society is still up for debate, but its effect on the workforce is already being felt. Many repetitive, data-driven, non-social tasks are already being automated, and it is estimated that 50 per cent of today’s jobs across the globe will be replaced by AI by 2050. Roles that require lateral, creative thinking, empathy or social sensitivity are likely to be the last to be automated, but even here AI will still lead to significant time savings. How this will affect the specific day-to-day life and routine of an individual worker will vary greatly depending on their profession, but one likely outcome is that we will begin to see a diversification of job roles in the future. Time saved by new technologies will be filled with new tasks, many of which will be drawn from outside our traditional understanding of what that job should entail.
This diversification is already happening on a small scale, adding some welcome variation into the working day. Tattoo artists in Brazil are being trained to spot skin cancer and Finland’s postal workers are now mowing lawns. Innovations such as 3D printing and consumer CNC (computer numeric control) devices have also led to the introduction of small-scale maker spaces in the workplace, meaning that research and development may soon become the responsibility of the entire workforce. MakerNurse empowers frontline nurses to prototype innovations that directly address the immediate issues they face on a daily basis. All these innovations require staff to learn entirely new skills and, for the most part, employees are more than happy to embrace this upskilling, which adds some welcome variety into their working day. (Note that many of the innovations in the chapters on the sharing economy and education also discuss an increased willingness to learn long after formal education.)
The popularity of small-scale maker spaces also signposts a change in where employees of the future will be working. Just as trips to the workshop are now less necessary, to an extent so, too, are trips to the office. The Bring Your Own Device movement, alongside VPNs (virtual private networks), means that working from home or in remote hubs such as Hoffice is an increasingly common option given to employees. Today, 45 per cent of the US population is working from home or as virtual employees, and there are more examples of remote-working practices within this chapter. This movement suggests that innovations for the home environment, such as the Internet of Things, will be just as relevant to the future office as they are to domestic life.
As employees gain more choice over where they work, they are also becoming increasingly selective about who they work for, and why. Employers have come to represent more than just a pay cheque, and employees are keen for the company they work for to reflect their own values. Equality and fair treatment in the workplace are already important issues, and innovations such as InHerSight, which lets jobseekers assess a company’s treatment of female staff, are only going to drive these issues further up the agenda.
More broadly, companies should realize that tacked-on corporate social responsibility (CSR) programmes are no longer sufficient. Rather, to attract top talent they must move to deeply integrate those CSR values into the company’s raison d’être – much as outdoor brand Patagonia places sustainability at the very heart of all its operations. In the words of Yvon Chouinard, Patagonia’s founder: ‘My company, Patagonia Inc., is an experiment. It exists to put into action those recommendations that all the doomsday books on the health of our home planet say we must do immediately to avoid the certain destruction of nature and collapse of our civilization […] Patagonia exists to challenge the conventional wisdom and present a new style of responsible business.’ For Chouinard, then, sustainability is not an afterthought for a CSR programme. Patagonia might be a success as a retailer of outdoor clothing and equipment, but the health of the planet is the reason the company ‘exists’ in the way it does. Successful companies must look to emulate this ethos through increased transparency and fidelity to a purpose beyond the bottom line.
Both the workplace and the workforce of the future will look very different from those of today, but the ten innovations in this chapter are a real indication of the changes to come, and of the direction successful companies should be moving in to ensure that they are not left behind.