Takeaways from MGINYU’s Future of Work

On Friday I got to attend the NYU MGI Digital Future of Work Conference held at NYU Stern. This is a topic that’s very top of mind for me, both in terms of my own personal journey (and how I feel school did nothing to help me prepare for what I’m doing now/want to be doing in the future) and in terms of the disparity between the cutting edge innovation that I’m seeing and reading about as compared to what kids are still being taught in schools and at home.

I got to see some great speakers, panels, and discussions that covered a lot of important topics around what employment will look like in the coming decades. Below I am going to highlight little snippets that I’ll add my own thoughts to. It is important to note, I have not fact checked the stats — I’m taking them at face value, assuming that those who mentioned the stats have done the fact checking. Also, I’ve added a list of recommended reading based on books/reports mentioned during the day.

1.7m workers being added to the global job market per month in developing economies. China, at its growth peak, was adding 1.1m a month (didn’t write which speaker mentioned this)

Despite all of the discussions about the loss of jobs, there are a ton of jobs out there to be filled. Whether or not people are willing to work in certain roles is a different story, but nonetheless, many jobs exist. In the US specifically, we have shortages of truck drivers and nurses, amongst other professions. So it seems as though, at least for the immediate future, we have economic momentum carrying global GDP forward, especially in the parts of the world where economies are developing quickly.

Half of the worlds jobs will be heavily automated, 5% will be entirely automated (Susan Lund, McKinsey Global Institute)

A lot of conversations around jobs center around fear of change. We hear of robots and assume that they’re going to do everything. The reality is much less scary than that. In the coming decades, the current expectation is that 5% of jobs will be entirely automated. Given the rhetoric that’s usually used, I assumed this number would come in higher. The first half of the stat — 50% will be heavily automated — is the more worrying of the two given that many of those roles will need much mess man/woman-power to maintain output. This brought up one of the main questions of the day — what happens to people who are displaced from working. There were discussions of UBI and new types of careers that come up, but for me this really highlighted the point of: if we don’t want to get left behind, we have to work for it. If we want to be masters of our own destiny, we have to take full accountability for our lives. Once we do that, then we might realistically start overcoming some of the educational gaps and challenges that may preclude lots of people from working in the future.

TToday, 25–30% adults are earning money outside of their primary job. 50% of those are doing it as supplemental (Susan Lund, McKinsey Global Institute)

Freelance has been, and still very much is, on the rise. There were some interesting discussions around this, one of which was how many people shift to a freelance lifestyle because they had to, not because they wanted to (got let go, needed work right away kind of scenario). I know for me, despite the fact that I did want to switch to a freelance lifestyle, it took my role getting eliminated to finally make the jump. The rise of freelancers also plays into the trend of access vs ownership — the idea of why bother owning things when we can just have access to them when we need them. Same goes for running a business — why add the financial burden of full-time hires when you can contract for specialized skills as needed. The idea of being a generalist in the future is going to be more challenging in many industries given the breadth of work to be done, so the idea of have the ability to bring on specialized consultants or freelancers makes sense. The big concern is for the people who aren’t highly specialized or their roles get automated.

4.3m jobs in NYC, highest ever. 4.0% unemployment (Alicia Glen, Deputy Mayor NYC)

NYC has the highest amount of jobs ever and that comes in with unemployment that’s lower than the national average. Yea NYC! I want to dig into this more to get a sense of where these jobs are coming from (I’m guessing tech and… healthcare?).

Half of world jobs can be automated using existing tech (Alicia Glen, Deputy Mayor NYC)

This was one that ended up getting mentioned a number of times throughout the day. Today, it’s already possible for to automate just about half of the roles away. This isn’t factoring in future states of AI and IoT — this where we stand today. That’s pretty crazy. It brings up the point of fear again — we fear the future even though we deal with the same issues now, just in a form that we’re more used it.

60% of grads of ivy leagues live in 13 zip codes (Tom Siebel, CEO C3IoT)

No shortage of stats that show income inequality, but this was one I hadn’t heard before. Look at the concentration of it! Inequality is a massive issue that our society is facing right now. I’m not saying that just because I personally believe that the bands between the richest and the poorest should be tighter — I’m saying it because if we don’t think this through as sprint into the digital future, the people who are most disadvantaged now will only be more so in the future. I’m a big believer that tech can (and in certain instances, is) a social equalizer, but that’s predicated on the idea that everyone has access to and education on tech. That simply isn’t the case. Digital literacy is quickly becoming as important as literacy itself, and knowledge of the hard sciences are making a resurgence too, which doesn’t mix well with a lazy society that hates math (just thinking back on my math classes in public city in NYC and NJ).

People don’t take seriously for how long these technologies need in terms of time from development to adoption

8–28 years, roughly, from development to adoption. Most of these jobs will be automated away by 2055. Fast in macro, slow in micro (Michael Chui, McKinsey Global Institute)

There are two sides to this coin. On the one hand, how long have we been hearing about AI-powered robots and flying cars? How many have you seen in the course of your daily life so far? On the other hand, read some articles of what’s going on in research labs at universities or some tech giants and we see that the future isn’t all that far away, it’s just being refined by some mad scientists somewhere. Even the more aggressive projections I’ve seen in terms of when automated vehicles will really affect workers in that industry, it still seems to be at least 7–10 years away (that is, to be on a major scale, not pockets of instances). That number could easily be 15–20 years when we factor in how people will react or the fact that people will need a while to get accustomed to or the fact that whoever is going to lose money thanks to this will lobby against autonomous vehicles or one of a million other things that can come up between now and then.

Yes, the idea of an autonomous, AI-powered machines taking our jobs isn’t a nice one necessarily, but we can’t disregard that all of this complexity is what leads to the majority of convenience in our own lives. We may not spend much time thinking about how our TVs or cell phones work, but they’re complicated as hell. We just don’t care cause they’re easy to use. Every generation has its early adopters and its Luddites — social media and constant advertising are making it much more apparent.

What alarms me is the refusal to admit that the digital revolution is as profound as the industrial and agrarian revolutions that preceded them. (Albert Wenger, Union Square Ventures)

This is an idea that I 100% agree with. It seems that because we’ve had technology gradually creep into our lives or that we were already technologically spoiled prior to the digital revolution with planes, trains, and automobiles, most people aren’t recognizing just how massive of a shift society is going through right now. Then again, I can’t imagine that people who were around during the Agricultural or the Industrial Revolutions were caught up in thinking what the changes they were witnessing meant for humanity. Just like us, they were probably preoccupied with what these things meant for them in the immediate context of their lives. We do one have a major difference that works in our favor though — the internet. We have access to more information than any previous generation, and yet advertising and consumerism are having their way with our attention spans. We have to take a step back and realize the scope of what’s happening so that we can plan for a more inclusive and equal future. Otherwise, the same mistakes will happen — those yielding the most power and wealth, not humanity as a whole, will drive how the future gets developed.

Potential interesting ways to make money in the future — caring for other humans, emotional skills. (Albert Wenger, Union Square Ventures)

This was one I haven’t thought of. I’m big on the idea that content/entertainment and experience/services will still be dominated by humans, but caring for others definitely makes sense as well. Yes, a robot can bring the perfect amount of medicine catered for a specific individual, but they can’t care for a someone the way a different person can. Well, yet at least. The current shortage of nurses is quite indicative of what might be coming. Hopefully, the addition of more online education options will make these jobs more accessible those who are unable to attend traditional, in-person programs due to responsibilities. I think these types of online programs are particularly helpful for single mothers and parents in general. The more we can use tech to create access to jobs, the better.

In the US, freelancers earn about a trillion dollars a year. They find their new gig within days not weeks or months. (Stephane Kasriel, Upwork)

I want to look into these numbers, but one thing that stuck out to me is how much harder is it going to be when it comes to getting new skills on the job. If a lot of the increase in freelance is around basic services or specialized skills, where can people turn for professional development? One of the overarching topics of the day was the importance of analytical thinking and continuous education. If more of us are going to be creating our own roles and finding work, and then hired to do very specific tasks, where do we get to learn more? Going back to the previous point, the growth in online education should help there. I also think that schools are going to (or at least should) become centers of community learning. Yes, during the day they may focus on working with kids, but at night schools will be open to offer continuing education and professional development, made possible by partnering with colleges, nonprofits, and corporations. We’re a ways away from this being the norm, but I strongly believe it will be commonplace in a decade.

40% of world’s employers can’t find the people they need with the skills they need. More and more young people saying ‘my education was not helpful in terms of finding a job’. (Mona Mourshed, McKinsey)

New jobs emerging, tech is obvious. Care is going to need different education. Disrupted jobs require adult education/professional development. We also have to think about the lifespan of skills, in the next three years (2020), 30% of any skill set is going to be totally different than it is today. (Saadia Zahidi, World Economic Forum)

Succeeding in the business world, especially on a global scale, is challenging. There is such intense competition and so much change in our environment and society that organizations need to be nimbler than ever before. That’s leading to trends such as the rise of microservices, more compartmentalization, and smaller and more focused teams that generally lead to individuals having more autonomy and having roles that are more honed in on very specific tasks or business processes. If companies have to be more fluid, that means so do we. It’s going to be impossible to stay competitive if we’re not willing to push ourselves to learn more and teach ourselves new skills. We have to get better at going with the flow of things as more fluid structures mean an increased necessity of adaptability.

Large amounts of data, try to predict outcomes. 4-year degree and success as engineer — no correlation. 50,000 people to hire 1100 engineers. Found: there’s no good x. success in one area doesn’t predict success elsewhere. (Mike Rosenbaum, Arena)

One of the biggest predictors they did end up finding was how much could someone deliver in first vs second vs third two-week periods working on a new task/project. This showed how quickly they learned and how well they adapted to new environments. Something to consider when bringing on new team members in roles that require agility.

Online purchasing vs local purchasing. Our GDP is 70% is personal consumption. E-commerce is growing 11–20%. How do we grow local commerce? (Diana Farrell, JPM Institute)

I’m a big believer of the idea that tech is going to enable global, localized communities. That is to say, we are going to be able to engage with local producers in our neighborhoods digitally and we also going to be able to purchase from local producers halfway across the world. I think that the only real competition that can arise to Amazon in terms of e-commerce is if someone builds a global supply chain network that empowers local producers as opposed to focusing on driving down costs as the top priority. I’m not saying ignore costs, but make the support of local business just as important as cost. This will inevitably make the costs go up, especially in the beginning, but with enough shared infrastructures in terms of production and shipping, the costs will come down again in the long term.

I think that some of the ignored factors of the digital revolution are that it’s going to completely reshape how employees are incentivized, as well as what priorities companies work towards. Assuming we don’t blow each other up, socially responsible companies that show how investing in the right communities not only makes a net positive contribution to society but can also be profitable and build a stronger brand identity will help define new standards of business operations. B Corps are a step in the right direction, but we’re nowhere close to that yet. Especially until investors learn to truly value this as much as they value ROI (or bake it into ROI), these factors will be slow to start.

Importance of signaling between employment and education (Allen Blue, LinkedIn)

One of the big problems in our current system is the delay in signaling between employment and education. For example, in the last ten years, there has been a huge need for web and app developers. Universities responded more quickly, but many public schools in the US are just now (if at all) adjusting to offer computer science in an engaging way to prepare students for it. By the time that ramps up, we’re probably going to need more VR or blockchain developers. That delay is what I’m talking about — that’s a huge issue. I hope that private companies will jump in and fill this gap for now, but we still need a lot of experimentation in this area to see what works best.

Reading recommendations from the day

Two McKinsey Global Institute Reports:

- A Future that works: automation, employment, and productivity

- Independent work: choice, necessity, and the gig economy

The Sharing Economy: The End of Employment and the Rise of Crowd-Based Capitalism — Arun Sundararajan

The Fuzzy and the Techie: Why the Liberal Arts Will Rule the Digital World by Scott Hartley

The Master Algorithm: How the Quest for the Ultimate Learning Machine Will Remake Our World by Pedro Domingos

Coming Apart by Charles Murray

Makers and Takers: The Rise of Finance and the Fall of American Business — Rana Foroohar