Career Conversations

Chapter 2 Reimagining careers

‘Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.'

Mark Twain

Technology, artificial intelligence (AI) and automation are changing the nature of work so profoundly that the transformation could eclipse that brought on by the industrial revolution of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. We already see many signs of this. Robots are increasingly eliminating manufacturing jobs, and computer software is doing the job of thousands of office workers.

The introduction of automatic teller machines (ATMs) around the world wiped out countless banking jobs when they came into widespread use in the eighties. Today, some experts are forecasting that if your job can be automated, then it likely won't exist in five years' time. I think their five years might be optimistic and could reduce to three years or even less. What is certain is that there's a veritable, unstoppable tsunami of change coming at us!

The changing world of work

Developments in computer technology, big data, automation and AI suggest employers of the future may not need employees of the traditional kind but rather people with ‘portfolio careers' who fulfil specific tasks or jobs as free agents. The online firm Airtasker is just one startup that is already servicing this need.

One might argue that given the rate of change that's expected to affect nearly every job, one way or another, talking about ‘jobs' at all might be redundant, or of limited usefulness. We can catch glimpses ...