In his latest book, Rethinking Work, Rishad Tobaccowala acknowledges that the rapid transformation of how we work will affect “every individual whether one is a CEO, a team leader, a middle manager, or a new employee of any type and size of company in any country or industry.” No exceptions.
He attributes this to five interrelated forces:
Generational Shifts — Soon there could be four or five generations working simultaneously with vastly different “mindsets, expectations and worldviews” impacting how, where, why and who they work for.
Technology — The majority of the workforce in high-income countries are “knowledge workers,” and as we enter an “AI-infused age when the cost of knowledge may soon be zero,” everything has to change.
Marketplaces — Both talent (Upwork, Fiverr) and customers (Etsy, Shopify) are accessible to individuals no matter where they live, and the advent of cloud services and apps makes what once was very expensive technology widely available. There is no limit to where and how business happens.
New Ways of Working — Side hustles, gig workers, fractional executives. These are just a few of the ways people do work and procure talent, enhanced by the aforementioned “seismic changes” in demographics, technology and the marketplace.
The Long-Term Impact of COVID — This last one is more psychological than anything else. People changed their way of thinking about “the role of work” in their lives after living through a global pandemic. Working from home showed many the benefits of work-life balance, and they do not want to go back.
Reimagining how we work changed dramatically during COVID when necessity demanded companies think out of the proverbial box — mostly because no one was allowed to be in there together.
Interestingly, the definition of fractionalized employees cited in the book is one where full benefits are paid while time at work is decreased. This path certainly has a lot of potential in the future, but at this moment we are seeing more energy among both companies and talent around hiring seasoned executives on a fractional (vs full-time) basis — providing the flexibility, expertise and cost savings many organizations seek.
Mr. Tobaccowala’s book takes an overarching view of the traditional ideas of work and culls it down into easily digestible chunks for the time-challenged of us. It is definitely worth the calories.