By HARIATI AZIZAN
At a time when technological developments and
disruptions are rapidly changing the world of work, many experts are saying
that in order to meet the challenges of the coming New Work Order, what we need
to do is, perhaps, to give up on jobs.
Jobs as we know them, that is.
“We have 125 years of history of work being done in
jobs and what we are seeing in many organisations around the world is the rapid
deconstruction of jobs and their reconstruction into new jobs with artificial
intelligence and robotics being applied to routine and non-routine tasks.
“So, I think we need to think beyond jobs and
challenge the status quo,” said Willis Towers Watson managing director and
global practice leader Ravin Jesuthasan.
Ravin was one of the speakers at a media roundtable
during the recent International Social Security Conference (ISSC) 2017
organised by the Employees Provident Fund with global investments company BNY
Mellon at Aloft Kuala Lumpur Sentral.
Themed “Future of work: Preparing for tomorrow
today”, the annual two-day conference put at the forefront people’s concerns of
what the future brings as industries and workplaces undergo transformation at a
dazzling speed, and how best to prepare for it.
And the future of work is without a doubt a burning
topic among business leaders, policy makers and thinkers, if the dialogue –
which included EPF deputy chief executive officer of strategy division Tunku
Alizakri Alias; 21st century business design global consultancy Tomorrow CEO
Mike Walsh; BNY Mellon chairman (Asia-Pacific) David Cruikshank and
futurologist Magnus Lindkvist – is of any indication.
Pointing out how the traditional ethos of “I learn,
I do and I retire” is becoming passé, Ravin stressed that a mindset change is
key to prepare people for the coming changes in the future global workscape.
“It is easy to focus on the technology aspect, but
the other thing that is changing rapidly is the democratisation of jobs.
“So when you talk about getting people prepared for
the change there is mindset change that is called for.”
BNY Mellon chairman Cruikshank agreed, pointing out
that from the financial services perspective, one of the changes we are seeing
is the continuous digitisation.
“Continued digitisation and use of digital data and
digital mechanism through the organisation is creating change. If you look
historically at large companies and large financial service companies,
development tended to be vertical, so you get business specific solutions from
top to bottom, from clients to the back office.
“In the continued digitisation process, what we see
is a more holistic ability to offer solutions to clients across multiple
business aisles.”
He said this is a very big change in the industry.
“Sitting in a company with over 50,000 people,
looking at holistic solution that brings together everything the company has to
bear, to find solutions for the client, that’s a pretty big change.”
In terms of the new generation, they will need to
retool themselves three to four times over the course of their career, Ravin
highlighted.
“Nine out of the top 10 jobs most in demand in 2015
didn’t exist before. According to a research we did with the World Economic
Forum, 65% of primary school kids today will be in jobs that never existed
before.
“It is challenging many of our long-held beliefs and
willingness of individuals, societies, and governments to reskill on a massive
scale,” he noted.
Concurring, EPF deputy chief executive officer of
strategy division Tunku Alizakri put forward a policy perspective.
“In terms of the government response, looking at
the Malaysian perspective, it is a mental model mindset that needs to be
changed substantially.”
One key area is education, said Tunku Alizakri, who
opined that equipping children with science, technology, engineering and
mathematics (STEM) knowledge alone is not enough to prepare them for the
automated and artificial intelligence future.
“We cannot just focus on STEM, we also have to
focus on the humanities aspect, especially if machines are to take over roles
and tasks that are easily automated.”
To stay ahead, he added, “We have to either become
more human or become robot overlords, which means we have to be better than the
robots. And what is the one thing that the robots cannot do, which is actually
the human aspect of things?
“So our government needs a more holistic
perspective on education, and focus on both humanities and science.”
Tunku Alizakri underscored the need for the country
to act fast to meet the challenges. “Exponentially speaking things are already
moving, we need to be ready for the change yesterday.”
To futurist Walsh, the real problem is the word
“job” itself, the nature of which has changed more than 10 years ago, he said.
The nature of jobs has already changed, many by
automation, in the last 10 years, said Walsh.
“Even now we are talking about saving jobs, what a
good job is, whether there is job security but actually the idea of jobs has
already changed 10 years ago; we just haven’t accepted it.
“The idea of a profession where you are protected
by a guild and your knowledge, and where you are guaranteed with a certain kind
of middleclass living, has already been decimated in the last 10 years.”
Walsh also believes the problem in the future is
that it is dangerous to demonetise robots and androids.
We scream “they will be coming, and going to sit in
our cars, and going after our children!” he said, because we forget that the
world is already divided into tasks and people who will be able to create value
alongside algorithm, create design and have superior judgment.
“There are people today who think that because the
smartphone allocates you a task, whether it’s to deliver a parcel or pick up
someone’s laundry or drive a car, these kind of gig economy jobs are cool.
“But this is going to go away very quickly when
people realise that you cannot get insurance, there is no support network and
you are being managed by an algorithm. This is going to be a source of
incredible inequality, frustration, anger, and possibly violence as you will
have a two-tier society.”
Industrial robots stack buckets of paint on pallets
at an Akzo Nobel India Ltd. paint factory in Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh, India, on
Thursday, June 1, 2017. Akzo Nobel NV rejected PPG Industries Inc.s third
takeover bid May 8, defying pressure from shareholders to negotiate. Photo:
Bloomberg
To be prepared for the future, he stressed it is
important to make sure we have enough people “who have the intellectual ability
and experience to design algorithms and to be able to call them out when they
are not working properly. It is not an acceptable outcome to be people who are
just task driven without any security working for an algorithm.”
Professing to be sceptical about the hyperbole of
the uncertain future, futurologist Lindkvist, meanwhile thinks we should focus
on things to that don’t change and try to do them better.
“If the world, as you say, is changing faster, it
is probably a good idea to focus on things that don’t.
“Not everything changes faster. For example, I am a
parent of two nine-year-old boys, last year they were eight, and they will be
10 only next year. This is the same as when I was growing up.
“So I’m a little bit sceptical about the hyperbole
of the future that I see everywhere today: the technology world, geopolitical
shift and the Trump presidency,” said Lindkvist, who believes that we need some
healthy scepticism as an antidote to the gloom and doom of the talk about the
rapidly changing future.
Lindkvist believes long-term planning is crucial to
meet the challenges of the rapidly changing world.
“History has proven that revolutions often fail,
while evolution often succeeds.
“If you want to make things work and be
sustainable, I think we just need to plan for things to unfold over a longer
period of time. That goes for technology and implementing certain societal
changes.”
He recounted Sweden’s experience in the face of an
economic crisis in the early 90s.
“For a couple of years we had the same post-Lehman
gloom and doom in the news every day, this country is doomed and the young of
this country will fail.
“Then 10 years later we were on the cover of Newsweek as
the new technological mecca of the world.
Some are working to bring automation to the
pizzeria. Photo: TNS
“To emphasise, when we take a short-term
perspective, we will see mainly conflict, drama and turbulence. We will not see
anything useful to build businesses from or make investments on top of. So, we
need to make a 28-year-plan. Or be inspired by Softbank (a Japanese
multinational telecommunications and Internet corporation) which has a 300-year
vision.”
Tunku Alizakri questioned if this is possible in
the current fast moving world, arguing that things change so rapidly with
technology. “Look at Airbnb, which became bigger than Hilton only after four
years.”
To which Lindkvist said it is the result of market
capitalisation, which he described as “a bit like fame.”
“German poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote in 1902 that
‘Fame is after all only the sum of all the misunderstandings that gather around
a new name,’” he quoted. “Market cap is only misunderstandings that gather
around a new name.”
Lindkvist compared exponential technology to
flying.
“When people talk about the exponential development
of technology, I always think about taking off on a plane. When it is time for
takeoff, you always get caught in the wonder of the invention but 30 minutes
later you start complaining about why they are not serving you a drink or meal.
You don’t continue to be amazed at how high and fast you are flying,” he mused.
It is only in the short term that we have an
exponential development, he reiterated.
“I think it is a necessity to have a multi-century
vision, especially given the fact that we are going to live longer in the
future.”
Bouncing off Lindkvist’s revolution versus
evolution point, Cruikshank shared it is an issue that he has been ruminating
on.
“I’ve always wondered – are the industry changes
corporate-centred or consumer-centred?
“It is also not clear to me if
technology is driving these changes so that we need to immediately react to
them to position ourselves properly or if technology is facilitating the
changes taking place, therefore creating faster changes than otherwise would
happen.”
He noted that the world has gone through various
phases of transformation before.
“If we think of where people in general had their
security drive their income and protect their family, it has been a migration
from governmental feudal systems to corporate systems. And now we talk about a
gig economy which is really being facilitated by social networks and technology
which is being provided by online platforms.
“When you look at that within a corporate sense
today in the world, I think it is the same thing happening. We are creating
digital platforms that allow clients to operate differently.…
“Our job is to create a digital platform so that we
can work together so that our clients can have better solutions overall.
“So, I look at technology as a facilitator rather
than driving something that we immediately need to react to,” said Cruikshank.
Jobs redefined
WITH the changing world of work comes changing
retirement.
This is a concern of the Employees Provident Fund,
said its deputy chief executive officer of strategy division Tunku Alizakri
Alias. “From an EPF perspective, how do we provide social security and protect
those who fall out of the formal employment sector like those in the gig
economy or do things in areas that are not traditionally boxed as jobs?”
There is a need to look at Malaysia’s policies in
this regard, including redefining the meaning of “job” in the future, he added.
“This is something that the Government need to
think about: what is a job, how do you define it?
“The definition of job from a policy perspective is
that you enter into something with a contract and get rewarded for the work
that you put in. Maybe in the future we need to redefine what a job is – should
it be about being able to contribute and being productive, and not so much
about receiving a tangible reward?”
While there will be a range of “new jobs” created
by the technological developments and disruptions on the work sector, Tunku
Alizakri believes attention also needs to be given to traditionally unpaid work
like homemaking.
“We need to look at the traditional work that were
never seen as valuable like that of homemakers’. Why are we not putting a value
on it? Why can’t we compensate the homemakers? How can we protect the workers
who are doing this job?”
Tunku Alizakri also cited Malaysia’s attitude
towards ageing as a concern for Malaysia’s preparedness for the future.
“In Malaysia our average life expectancy is 75
years old, and we keep on thinking that people aged 60 and above are already
old and useless and should be put out to pasture.
“But if we continue like that, can you imagine how
someone who is retired at 60, living right up to 75 on a government
infrastructure that does not have enough funds, sustain their quality of life?
“At the same time we lose out on the productive
years that they will still be able to offer; at 60 to 65, people are usually
still productive and if we don’t tap into their productivity, the government
will lose out.
“But our government infrastructure at this time
does not take into account the new business models and the already arising
longevity issues,” he said, underlining the importance of the Government acting
fast to meet the challenges.
Another issue is whether the grey society can
adjust and adapt to the rapidly changing world.
“As the world gets older, how can society adapt to
the technological changes that we are seeing today?,” posed The Star’s
Features Editor, Business, Jagdev Singh Sidhu at The EPF-The Star Roundtable on
“The Future of work: Preparing for tomorrow today”, that he was moderating.
Willis Towers Watson managing director and global
practice leader Ravin Jesuthasan said we should learn from the golden
generation of the United States who have enthusiastically embraced technology.
“The rate at which retirees there have embraced
talent platforms have made them one of the top ten groups on the platform.
“Their willingness to move on and take on the gig
economy is interesting, particularly when we still have communities that are
calibrated to jobs until the fixed retirement age.”
Now that we are living longer, the productive use
of human capital, whether at individual or country level, has huge implications
on retirement, Ravin added, “And it will help us look at how we can sustain the
older generation, especially in ageing societies and mature economies.”
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