News & Events

How Secure is Your Job in the Future

Automation is entering into white collar work and is becoming more and more noticeable. Manufacturing and agriculture has experienced this for decades with jobs already obsolete.

The benefits to having an automation environment is that robots have 100% attendance, thus making them the perfect employee. With the use of robots, more product is made with higher quality ingredients and less wait time.

There has already been some jobs in law, medicine and investment banking lost due to the progression of technology; technology that is “learning and out thinking” humans now. This is becoming a game changer.   In the 1990’s, ATM’s replace bank teller.  Goldman Saks employed 600 US Cash Equity traders.  Today, just two staff does the work along with 200 computer engineers of those 600.

The race is on to create “intelligent automated” software. Software that allows more and more robots or computers to do the work a human has done for hundreds of years.  Perhaps the smart decision is to get ahead of “it”.  More and more people are going to have to become lifelong learners in order to keep up with the trends.

Master Coding appears to be one way for people in the not too distant future to maintain employment. In a single three month course they already have students ranging from teens to 60 plus years.  Is coding the “Blue Collar” job for everybody in the maybe not too distant future in this world of change?

The good news is there are some jobs that the robot revolution won’t take over or may even create. Help desks for example for banks, software companies, and online stores, for instance, where the human touch can handle all the issues that could come up and put customers more at ease. Ironically even robots need managers.  With the increase in automation in jobs, someone needs to manage the automation.  People who can understand the welding for example in a manufacturing plant; someone who can also calibrate maintain and run the computers that might be doing the automated work.

Media is another place that content stripping robots can cut and assemble a simple story but there will always be a need for writers, editor, and designers. While there are some good programs like WordPress to “automate” how a website gets published, someone needs to input data, design pages, write and edit material so that people will actually want to read it.  Television channels and magazines will also continue to need to employ people for similar reasons: not just to report on stories, but to design graphics, manage editorial and production teams, and so on.

If you work in the health care / human care field that requires a lot of direct interaction with patients where the human touch is preferred there is probably no need to be looking over your shoulder for a machine version of yourself.  People like doctors, nurses, physical therapists, daycares and funeral home employees will be hard to be replaced by robots.  In these situations, where interacting with a machine might be upsetting instead of soothing, humans will not be pushed out.

Lifelong learners will find success in the jobs of the future.   Whether working in an automation environment or a people orientated environment our work place essential skills will continue to have value.