By Vin Bittencourt | MBA Bites S1 Episode 4
The overall notion among most academics, publishers and commentators in business and social sciences is that machines and intelligent systems are coming for most jobs in the 21st century. With the rise of mobile, big data and cloud, the race humans vs. machines has drastically intensified in the last few years, with many voices predicting a bleak future for the average worker, including those who are part of a highly trained, well-educated corporate class. If that’s the case, how do you protect yourself with bulletproof skills and competencies that’ll keep you relevant in a world post digital divide? To answer these questions, this article and its corresponding MBA Bites episode share five career strategies to stay ahead of the curve and beat automation.
Although extremely important, higher education and training have severe limitations
Every year in U.S., more than 100,000 people graduate with MBA Degrees. The typical elite university updates its curriculum every six years while the world’s leading transformations are happening every day. Standardized education systems produce professionals with identical technical skills.
But degrees are mostly a gateway to the job market. For long-term growth and job security though, you need a vision that connects with your inner strengths and passions. This is definitely the age where you must find inspiring work that you love, but also the age where empowerment, meaning and self-determination are particularly rewarded. You must build a personal roadmap to effectively transition into the digital economy with relevant career skills, either by leveraging existing professional formative experiences you already have, or competing for new ones.
Historical Perspective
Before the digital-divide and the age of networks, economies sort of went in seven-year cycles of boom and bust, with rising living standards and security for skilled workers. People with a four-year degree pretty much had a job guaranteed.
Until recently, most corporate jobs followed basic principles of the industrial age, routinized, repetitive, standardized tasks. Now, with artificial intelligence, machine learning and data analytics, many business processes can be broken down in smaller chunks, codified, packaged and slapped onto software. As a result, globalization and big data completely disrupted the traditional economy for jobs. Robots can now manage core processes more efficiently and cheaper than human workers. In fact, experts believe machines can make better decisions than 90% of the people in operational roles.
Something that started with industry, labor intense positions, it’s now finally catching up with knowledge work. So if the job that you have does not tap into your personal strengths, personality, character and creativity, it’s time to look for something else. First, because it’s probably boring and unfulfilling anyways, but mostly, because machines are probably coming for it.
Career competencies to develop for the digital age
Like most professionals, you were probably trained to perform uninspiring, routinized, process oriented, predictable work. The digital divide, however, demands you create new things, come up with unique insights and connect/empathize with people at a more human, emotional level. As a result, the organizations of the future will rely more and more on independent thinkers, self-managed professionals, who display personality, authenticity and character.
Some competencies to develop: emotional intelligence, innovative thinking, leadership, empathy, people and political skills. Those are in fact the future attributes of digital age professionals, mostly because they are human-centric, and bullet proof to automation and standardization. Additionally, the working class post-digital divide is prone to be outspoken, impatient and risk-taking, people who are easily bored and who will change jobs frequently. Among their core qualities are technical depth, business savviness and conceptual thinking.
The Five Strategies
Storytelling. Context. Narrative. Synthesis. Emotional Connection. In common, these items are skills/competencies where humans remain far superior than the average machine, creating a sort of stronghold against automation. So based on what makes humans more human and establishes their competitive advantage, there are essentially five strategies to beat automation and survive in the digital divide. They are:
1 - Step Up: You perform knowledge work beyond the grasp of machines. You rely on abstract thinking and storytelling to stand out. You’re a highly specialized consultant, thought leader or sales professional. You bring insights and techniques that cannot be easily replicated or transferred. For instance, everybody in money and finance knows Warren Buffet’s method of picking and investing in companies. The core principles of his investment company, Berkshire Hathaway, and how it operates, are practically public knowledge. Yet, no one can replicate his results in the stock market. Why? Because of tacit knowledge. All high caliber professionals have something in common, they bring intuition, wisdom and a personal style of doing things. A secret sauce that’s unique to them. The kind of stuff you can’t teach or just put into a formula or a checklist that only comes with years of experience and learning. Harder and longer the process to build the expertise, bigger the buffer it offers against automation.
2 - Step Aside: You perform human-centric activities that require human touch, communication and empathy. It may include artistic abilities, singing, performing, acting, but mostly developing creative works in general, advertising, interior designing, high-level servicing. Step aside also includes services jobs, retail, leisure, hospitality, gastronomy or any sort of in person, real-time servicing. Although we’re living under unique circumstances where the traditional holders of such jobs are probably suffering the most, service jobs are almost impossible to automate. However, there’s a caveat, while some retail and customer facing jobs protect from automation, they can also lead to very limiting career growth and independence over time, especially in fast shrinking industries. A few questions to ask yourself, “is there really opportunity for learning and growth on this activity?" "If I become a top performer on this, what else can I do with those learned skills and what would be the next steps in a potential career trajectory?"
3 - Step In: Control, manage and troubleshoot the work of machines. In essence, you’re the expert who will tweak the robots. Potential roles include, network administrator, cyber security analyst, data scientist, business analyst, systems engineer. Whether in technology or not, any work that supports or promotes the work of automated systems can be considered a stepping in strategy. Those typically include stable entry to mid-level positions in reputable companies that can be leverage for higher growth, especially as part of a subsequent step forward strategy (see below).
4 - Step Narrowly: Spot an ultra-niche that’s too small to automate yet profitable enough to find stability, growth and fulfillment. I once read an article about a consultant of Dunking Donuts franchises that made north of a million dollars a year advising people. Again, not McDonalds, Burger King or any other franchise consultancy in general, just Dunking Donuts. But this gentleman became the go-to-guy for his expertise launching such franchises in his home state. Also, think of a museum curator that’s specialized in Ancient Egypt, or a winemaker whose career training is focused primarily in producing sophisticated vintage blends. As part of a step narrowly strategy, you find rewarding careers that connect deep down with who you are, your talents and passions. Sometimes being a big fish in a little pond brings more joy and opportunities than being a big fish in a big pound.
5 - Step Forward: Here you work on the next generation of machines. Skills in robotics, machine learning, NLP (natural language processing), bioengineering, computer science, just to name a few, are roles that demand not only deep technical knowledge and human touch, but also conceptual, big picture thinking, in order to create superior customer experiences and user interfaces. If your goal is to find a career at the forefront of innovation and evolution in technology or any other transformative field, stepping forward is definitely the strategy for you.
Final Thoughts
In summary, the real question it’s not whether machines and systems will wipe out all of the jobs, but what kind of jobs they’ll create in the process. As powerful and efficient as computer and systems have become, humans still hold a monopoly on flexibility, judgment and common sense. You’re main challenge as a career professional of the digital age, therefore, is to bring human traits - personality, creativity, communication and people skills to operate side by side with big data and intelligent systems. If you do so, you’ll be in a favorable position to compete for the most rewarding and fulfilling jobs of the future. And rest assured, there won’t be a shortage of them, as long as you define who you are, the contributions you’ll want to make and how you’re going to get the training, the education and the career experiences you need to succeed.
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