We show that over the past 40 years, structural change within the labor market has revealed itself during downturns and recoveries. The arrival of robotics, computing, and information technology has allowed for a large-scale automation of routine tasks. This has meant that the elimination of middle-wage jobs during recessions has not been accompanied by the return of such jobs afterward. This is true of both blue-collar jobs, like those in production occupations, and white-collar jobs in office and administrative support occupations. Thus, the disappearance of job opportunities in routine occupations is leading to jobless recoveries. – Third Way: Jobless recoveries
Harold Jarche
digital transformation skills
Oscar Berg has further developed his digital collaboration canvas that describes nine capabilities required for collaborative knowledge work. He includes a handy CC-licensed worksheet to go with it. Oscar’s original work on this subject was part of my inspiration while working on a way to describe the required facets on an enterprise social network (ESN). I described how I developed the framework, based on the work of Oscar and others, in a presentation at the Learning Technologies conference in 2014. A recording of my presentation is available as well.
hold space for complex problems
Professor Lynda Gratton at the London Business School outlines five forces in The Shift: The Future of Work is Already Here, that will shape the future patterns of work.
“Technology (think 5 billion people, digitized knowledge, ubiquitous cloud).
Globalisation (think continued bubbles and crashes, a regional underclass, the world becoming urban, frugal innovation).
Longevity and demography (think Gen Y, increasing longevity, aging boomers growing old poor, global migration).
Society (think growing distrust of institutions, the decline of happiness, rearranged families)
Energy resources (think rising energy prices, environmental catastrophes displacing people, a culture of sustainability emerging).”
sense-making friday
[Almost] Every fortnight I collate some of the observations and insights that were shared on social media. I call these Friday’s Finds.
Manage your time like Google invests its resources: 70/20/10 via @reuvengorsht
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Designers: 70% on the visual specs for upcoming features, 20% exploring new features, and 10% on wireframes for entirely new concepts/styles.
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Engineers: 70% building features and fixing bugs, 20% on prototyping fledgling ideas or exploratory data analysis, and 10% on speculative initiatives like a 10x performance improvement.
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Sales: 70% on closing deals, 20% on bigger I/Os for the next quarter, and 10% on long-term relationships with agencies and big advertisers.
cooperation makes us human
Automation of procedural work is accelerating. What was considered knowledge work yesterday will be routine tomorrow, and workers will be replaced by software and machines. At the same time, access to real-time data is making individuals more powerful, and managers obsolete.
open source workers
Openness enables knowledge-sharing, which fosters innovation through a diversity of ideas. Trust emerges in networks that are open and transparent. This is how open source software is developed. There are lessons to learn for open source work.
nobody pays attention
“Do you remember that document I sent you and briefed you about?” … “No, I didn’t think so.”
“proper citation will make you a star”
I recently had one of my images used in article that was posted to LinkedIn and Academia.edu (one of the articles has since been removed) without giving proper attribution. What is ‘proper’ attribution? On the bottom of each page of this website is my Creative Commons license: BY-NC-SA (attribution / non-commercial / share alike). The license is simple and has stood the test of courts in many countries.
marketing-oriented learning
Jane Hart sees modern day learning and development (L&D) professionals as agents of change, who are not “order takers” but “trusted advisers”. Therefore the challenge is to become a trusted adviser. Trust is not gained by being an expert, but by doing something of value for others. People trust those who help make useful connections, or initiate change for the better.
holding the space
There is an aspect of leadership that gets little attention in the popular management press. It is about holding space. Holding space means protecting the boundaries so that people can work. Nations hold their space through laws, treaties, and armed forces. Organizational leaders need to hold their space so that people can work. I do not mean controlling place, just holding it.