What Do The Emerging Trends Mean To Today’s Managers?

According to a white paper launched jointly by commercial real estate services and investment firm CBRE and Genesis, a leading real estate innovator, we are facing a revolution in the workplace.

The paper—Fast Forward 2030: The Future of Work and the Workplace—is based on interviews with experts, business leaders and people from Asia Pacific, Europe and North America, and covers a broad range of topics including how workplaces will change and how employees themselves are changing.

I detail below just a few of their findings and then discuss what it could mean to us as managers and team leaders.

The key findings of the report were as follows:

1) Artificial intelligence will transform businesses and the work that people do

• Process work, customer work and vast swathes of middle management will simply disappear: 50% of occupations today will no longer exist in 2025
• New jobs will require creative intelligence, social and emotional intelligence and the ability to leverage artificial intelligence. Those jobs will be immensely more fulfilling than today’s jobs
• Workspaces with row of desks as we know them today will be completely redundant. Not because they are not fit for purpose, but simply because that purpose no longer exists.

2) For employees, purpose is more important than financial success

• There is a significant and global trend amongst all people, but particularly the youth, towards happiness, purpose and meaning being as or more important than financial success
• Corporations will not only need to be lean and agile they must be authentic to attract talent: authentic in their values and in making a real contribution to the social good
• As the nature of work changes we expect to see more social entrepreneurship

The paper covers a wide spectrum of industries and cultures, but these to concepts listed above help us to see the main essence of the findings.

What does this mean for us as managers?

1) We need to be more valuable than ever to the marketplace

If half the occupations today will no longer exist is a few years’ time, how do we increase our value to our companies and the marketplace?

By being aware of what skills will be valuable to industry in the future

This means keeping ahead of the game, analysing what is necessary for advancements to be made and how we can build our skills to adapt to the market demands.

We simply can’t afford to let our companies dictate our growth needs by deciding what courses we can attend.

We need to take absolute personal responsibility for the development of our skills, to allow us to create our own futures and be someone who is visible to the future market place.

2) We need to ensure the purpose and meaning for our teams is clear concise and inspiring

People will still need to earn a salary that they are happy with and that gives them the lifestyle they desire.

But what else, after their physiological needs are satisfied?

Managers need to determine how they wish their teams to be set up.

Teams of the future will demand purpose and meaning in their projects.

Talent will only be attracted to companies who can offer them prospects and opportunities beyond just earning money.

Skillsets need to be developed in areas that will fill niche requirements in the future.

Success to social entrepreneurs means that they have improved the world, however they define that.

It appears that the millennial mindset of the future will be revolving around how we can contribute to the success of all, not just the chosen few.

The whitepaper gives us reasons to be contemplating how we work with the future, rather than trying to resist the changes that will inevitably be brought upon work and all it stands for.

If we are to thrive in the future world of work, we need to be aware of what it’s looking for from us, and embrace it as the new way of working.

Thanks again

Sean

Sean McPheat

Managing Director

MTD Training