Work and Education in a post-pandemic era
The year 2020 and 2021 will be one of those times we will look back on and acknowledge how so many things changed in such a short period of time. The Covid-19 Pandemic by virtue of being a pandemic has been affecting each of us across the planet.
Here are some of the things I see changing and accelerating over the next few months. This is by no means an exhaustive list, especially because there are just two changes I’m addressing today.
Work from Home
I believe that ‘Work from Home’ will become more common than we would have predicted. When the internet came around, the concept of working from home seemed closer than ever before. As computers got cheaper and their distribution more widespread, we assumed that the day when everyone worked from home would have come and gone a long time ago. However, as reality would have it, that did not happen.
Today however, companies around the globe are left with no choice but to make concessions for people to work from home. Think about it, ever since many of us started working from home during this current coronavirus pandemic, no new technology has had to be invented to facilitate this process. The technology has been around for more than a decade and all that was missing was us taking the plunge and sitting on the couch and working.
The next year is going to be incredible when it comes to ‘Work from Home’ technology because we are experiencing the highest rate of ‘field-testing’ of the concept across industries. This will most definitely lead to more thought being put into fixing key issues that are coming up resulting in rapid development and higher rates of adoption and acceptance.
Education
The Coronavirus will most definitely transform education. Between 1850 and 2020 very little changed when it come to the way children’s education functioned. With the pandemic in place, distance education has become a necessity. Once again, if you look back in time to when the internet was born, we assumed that massive change would be seen in this field. That however did not happen.
Just like ‘Work from Home’ technology, we did not need to invent anything new to get kids to sit at home and study. The tools were readily available but used on a very limited scale in comparison to right now.
The widespread ‘field-testing’ of remote learning will no doubt bring to light some of the incredible challenges that come about as a result of this different approach. The great thing about shining light on problems is that when you do so, it is easier to fix them. I look forward to revolutionary thinking and innovation in this space that can greatly reduce cost of education, create global classrooms and bring our education system out of the 19th century.
When I talk about ‘Work from Home’ and ‘Remote Learning’, I’m not saying that this is the right or wrong approach, all I am saying is that these are two spaces where we will see more innovation in the next 12 months than we have seen this past decade. After our global recovery, when we look back, we will be able to see a clear wall dividing the pre and post pandemic era.
Watch out…opportunity is standing at the door…for now though, social distancing might just prevent us opening the door to let her in.
#ImpactPandemic
