The Future of work (a conjecture)

This paper will have a stronger technology focus and its impact that will spill into other areas of employment. It will explore the current technologies driving the workplace and the moonshot projects that could impact us for the decades to follow.

To begin, as a quick breakdown there will be a total of 7 half decades between the present and 2050. 5 year periods are a good way to gauge technology maturity as items move out of R&D and into the mass market. The adoption of the technology will also be tested as they either move into acceptance, niche markets or fade from existence.

Now to 2020:

What we see right now affecting our workplace is the introduction of cloud, mobile, analytics and social. Industries are slowly starting to adopt cloud to reduce total cost of ownership. Industries with sensitive data such as healthcare are now warming to the notion of adopting cloud infrastructure for greater productivity. There will be a drive towards centralized certification for compliance within the half decade as momentum picks up. Right now, cloud certification is based on individual public bodies, industries and countries resulting in a fragmented compliance certification that is wasteful and has a lot of overlap. Over time, it would make sense to centralize the cloud certification to one international body. This will pave the way for greater adoption and the foundations for a new way to handle compliance within companies and countries.

On the mobile front, the adoption of smart phones has reached saturation in developed country and as prices continue to drop, developing countries will ride the wave of adoption as well. This coupled with upgrading of infrastructure for telecommunications will continue to drive the consumption of content. Social will be help to further fine tune the consumption of data. Wearables will pair with mobile and social technologies to give users much better mini moments based on context such as time/ place.

Analytics will be continue to be adopted by companies and governments. Open data movement will gain more traction as decision makers begin to realise the importance of sharing data. Data exchanges are already starting to pop up that facilitate data holders with data seekers. As data becomes more easily available resting on the cloud and consumed over mobile, more insights will be generated. This will help steer companies into new markets.

2020 to 2025:

This era should see the adoption and acceptance of driverless cars. Cognitive computing will no longer be a competitive advantage but a necessity to survive. With cognitive computing software and hardware, pattern recognition will become seamless. This technology will help to enhance the driverless cars that are present right now. governments around the world would be ready to roll out the driverless cars after spending the last 5 years debating the bills and laws surrounding the new technology. The technology will present new found traffic problems, however in general commute will become a lot faster and easier. Employees will be able to enjoy more free time as jams are slowly being eliminated.

The natural language processing of cognitive computing will further enhance employees and equip them with better insights. The internet started the knowledge economy, cognitive computing will help to expand the economy. Employees that are unable to keep up with this technology and how to find insights will be phased out.

Data privacy concerns will still be a concern, however it will just be a footnote. As generation Z enters the workplace and being true digital citizens, they are fully brought up to understand the consequence of sharing information publicly. Tracking data will become accepted as a norm as a small price to pay for convenience.

2025 to 2030:

This era should see the adoption of robots in the workplace. Cleaners and other tasks that require manual labor will be fully replaced by robots. The cognitive computing era of the last half decade has paved the way to enable the robots technology to become fully formed. At present, Amazon already utilizes a 80% automated warehousing solution with Kiva robots. Robotics technology should stabilise by 2025 to 2030 to allow for mass adoption.

2030 to 2035:

Crypto currency and its equivalent may see acceptance only by 2030. At present, there are still too many fears, uncertainties and doubt. Governments would have laid the foundation over the last two decades to pave the way for crypto currency to be used in conjunction with fiat money. Trade would become easier as exchange rates will slowly be eliminated. Current electronic data interchange can also be embedded onto the currency i.e packing documents, inventory list, delivery order. This will reduce fraudulent cases and hopefully reduce trafficking in general.

2035 to 2040:

Hyperloop technology should be fully developed. Tracks for high speed rails should be fully laid across most major cities. This will help to drive more face to face meetings.

2040 to 2045:

Global boundaries will have dissolved over time with borders becoming a namesake. The introduction of high speed transport infrastructure will encourage governments to discuss the possibility of opening borders and fully engage in trade.

2045 to 2050:

This time should see the beginning of Mars colonization is Elon Musk’s SpaceX truly takes off. This will present new challenges in communication after just solving the old ones of connecting people around the world.

The mindset of employers and employees will definitely evolve and move away from the present stigma of hours equating to work done. With information being aggregated, it would be easier to track the productivity of individuals without the need for admin personnel.

The world will become even more connected, not through bits and bytes but through atoms and molecules. The urge for actual interaction will drive technologies to meet our needs. Overall, collaboration will reach its peak before we set forth to a new world.