Two Steps Forward, One Step Back: What is the net effect of new collaboration technology?

This is part one of two in a series on the future of work, exploring first the net effect of collaboration technology, followed by a broader landscape view of the technology trends defining how we will work in the coming years. Read part two here. I originally wrote this at the end of 2015 and just decided to publish it now, as it’s truer than ever and became especially relevant with the recently popular article “Slack: I’m breaking up with you.” that also questions the net effect of the most popular collaboration software out there right now.

Slack. Quip. Do. Asana. Box. The list goes on. BYOD, mobile, consumerization of the enterprise opened up the field for a new generation of collaboration software. But what is the net effect of all of this new collaboration technology? Are we making the world a better place and improving how people work, or are we replacing incumbent software from IBM, SAP, Microsoft, and others, with shiny new apps that don’t actually improve our work but just replace the status quo — even though they have new features and support emojis? We may solve some problems, but do we simply create new ones? We explored the net effect of collaboration technology with leaders from these companies at a recent event in San Francisco hosted by Wired and SherpaFoundry, and the conversation led us to some important questions for us all to answer together as we define the future of work.

Faster progress, but towards what?

Slack lets you message people quickly and easily. Combined with a mobile document editor like Quip and a meeting management platform like Do, you might finish a project in half the time. With email and calendar productivity apps like Outlook for iPhone and iPad or Sunrise, you can schedule meetings faster without switching apps. But did you even work on the right project in the first place? Should that meeting you scheduled even happen? Collaboration and productivity tools are accelerating our rate of work, but it remains unknown whether we are doing the right work in the first place. According to VP and Principal Analyst of Constellation Research, Alan Lepofsky, who covers the collaboration landscape, “The key to successful collaboration is neither tools nor culture, it’s purpose. Without a clear goal and measurable outcomes, trying to get people working together is like driving on ice… everyone is just spinning and gaining no traction. The newest generation of communication and collaboration tools solve some great technical challenges, but they also create new ones. For example, social networks may be better for collaboration than email, but fragmentation across multiple networks can make it frustrating to find the right people and content.”

AI and machine learning in products like SalesforceIQ promise some gains here by suggesting work items for us, but time will tell how good AI can be at solving these problems for us as opposed to just creating more work.

Dehumanization, more anxiety, and the cyclical return of “fake work”

What are the consequences — on employee psyche and company culture — of the digitization and transparency inherent in new collaboration technologies?

Collaboration software, while full of benefits, can also dehumanize our work. We send Slack messages instead of warmly talking to each other sometimes. Completed tasks get marked off automatically, without granting us the satisfaction of sharing the accomplishment with the team ourselves. Less rapport, less satisfaction in our work. All in the name of “efficiency.” Of course, such technology, be it through emojis or seeing what everyone got done, provides new benefits of intimacy and ambient awareness. Ellen Chisa of Blade, and formerly Kickstarter, adds “New tools should help you do your best work, and have your best life. That doesn’t mean trying to do both (badly) at the same time. Answering emails during happy hour isn’t fun and most of them won’t matter by tomorrow.“

Chisa added, “Now that I’m at a travel company, the balance is even more delicate. We emphasize flexible schedules and remote work to allow for travel. The new tools mean that I’ve done some of my best work at my parent’s kitchen table while they read the newspaper. It’s just my responsibility to remember to close my laptop when they’re done reading.”

Increased transparency into the work we all are doing may not good for everyone. On one hand, yes, knowing what’s going on in the rest of the company and reducing silos is great. But there are always tradeoffs. Maybe someone doesn’t share an idea because it’s public by default in that company and they fear “looking stupid”. Maybe people feel pressure to be talking about their work because everyone else is and they don’t want to look like a slacker, so we resurrect the talk of how busy we all are with all of our emails and meetings a la The Busy Trap from the famous 2012 New York Times article. Transparency, which rich in benefits, is not without its costs.

Less work hours, more leisure time?

The more work that our collaboration does for us — posting status updates on our behalf, making information easier to find via searchable conversations, providing intelligent recommendations for what to do next with services like SalesforceIQ — the less work we have to do to in order to accomplish the very same outcome as before. For example, in a different domain of work, to maintain a household now takes 5–10 hours a week, when it took 65 hours in 1930 due to advances in technology and productivity. That time becomes freed up and reallocated.

Does this mean we will work less hours in the future? Perhaps. But famed economist JM Keynes made such predictions in 1930, that we would end up with a 15-hour work week given the rapid pace of technical invention in the early 20th century — and that work-week future hasn’t happened yet!

“Meaningful work is an incredibly important part of people’s personal happiness,” according to Matt Wallaert, behavioral scientist at Microsoft Ventures. “For example, Satya Nadella talks about Microsoft as a do-more company. That isn’t people working less, it is technology making meaningless tasks easier or automating them entirely so that people can focus on meaningful work. It is at the heart of productivity.”

Wallaert added, “Scifi writers know this. Look at Star Trek: the writers posit we solve the scarcity problem and do we stop working? Nope — we go exploring! We build new technology to do even better things.”

So while the past cannot be used to deterministically predict the future, perhaps we will just work more and accomplish more. Indeed, anyone who has been with a spouse who answered emails during dinner can attest to this and suggest a redefinition of “work hours” that would refute we’re working less.

“Think about spell check or many of the other Microsoft Office features. Do they make people work less? No. They let people concentrate on the important, meaningful part of their work. That’s productivity. Uber lets us think about where we are going by letting us think less about how we get there. Netflix lets us think less about getting access to movies so we can spend more time watching them” adds Wallaert.

Final Thoughts: The Future of Work holds promise but not without us shepherding it to ensure a real positive net effect

Collaboration technology is shaping the future of work with plenty of pros and cons. While we all indulge in the excitement over new benefits like work being more fun and open, we must also be responsible and consider the drawbacks of the technology we are developing. Companies, employees, and society at large must think deeply about the tradeoffs of working faster and more openly, be it about ensuring that the work we do is the right work or that we are not marginalizing certain populations in the workplace with these new tools.

If we can harness the positives of new collaboration technology while identifying and addressing the negative consequences, the future of work is indeed a bright one, where we do more of what matters and accomplish increasingly great things in the world.