Job Search & Career Blog

Interesting times- 21st century job skills thrills and spills

November 4th, 2008

Times are tough right now, but they aren’t going to get dull. In coming years, the workplace, training, job skills, and the whole idea of work will change.

The cost-based, user-pays, approach has created so many extra overheads in business that wages for old style jobs are an issue. That was the excuse for the original movement of manufacturing and outsourcing. It’s utterly impractical, and utterly inefficient.

It’s also obsolete. That whole methodology, the one track minded career job, and the antiquated office jobs and executive hierarchy, are on their way out.

In its place is coming the High Road, massive contracting to people running their own businesses, and a big cut in overheads.

It’s all productivity based. Old style jobs can’t compete.

They actually restrict productivity.

The time usage, the job design, and the bureaucracy of the workplace has become counterproductive. Some would also say that these are also useless additions to a complex, rapidly changing workplace, social and career environment.

Workplace changes

Economics and reality have finally caught up with the 21st century workplace. Technology has completely changed the needs of employers and employees. The economic meltdown, ironically, if it does no other sort of good, will increase the speed of changes across the entire socioeconomic spectrum.

There’s no room left on the balance sheets for unnecessary expenses. Staggeringly overcomplicated bureaucratic processes, and arguably ever more ridiculous salary gaps just aren’t paying for themselves, or reflecting work values.

Business culture has been changed forever, in terms of hiring rationales. Why should anybody, employer or employee, restrict their options? Employers can pay less for more work, and employees can be paid more for less work.

Employees are much more likely to find contract work a lot more trustworthy than the old style workplace. Job security is long gone, and the work itself has changed. Even the idea of wage earning has changed.

The old job model confines workers to a whole regime of work which confines them to One Job, One Wage. That’s no longer anyone’s idea of a good deal. That means dependency on one wage, when jobs can vanish overnight.

So employees are far more likely to prefer a range of income sources, and a designer career, based on a much more advanced, lifetime-long combination of education, work and training than ever envisaged in the old workplace.

Employers aren’t likely to object. Contract workers are now working on specific tasks, and being paid accordingly. Nobody wastes time on the ancient corporate workplace structure if they can help it.

Contract workers can work at home, at their own offices or their own specialized workplace environments, or on a needs basis on locations where required. That fact alone saves the average office worker about 10% of their wages per year, just in the costs of time going to work, commuting costs, and the rest of the very expensive daily routine.

Telecommuting is the obvious new workplace. It’s far more cost effective for all parties, and it’s far more manageable. So much data is produced lately that employing gigantic workforces in a single location like in the old days is out of the question.

Working online, and doing business online is obliterating the old business culture. Points of sale are now mainly in cyberspace, and nobody’s restricted to buying or selling in one country or another. There’s no need for the old retail or wholesale models, either.

Cost benefits of the new workplace

If employers have to pay for infrastructure in the form of plant, equipment, IT, HR, layers of management, and other old style costs of employment, it’s extremely expensive. Given the opportunities to save money presented by the new economy, it’s also pretty absurd.

If, however, they can minimize their infrastructure costs, and just pay on a known dollar value basis for work done, with no overheads, they are actually making money. They can control costs much more effectively.

They can actually budget, and contract employees are arguably a lot better off. If an employee only has to work six hours to earn the same amount of payment, not adding another four hours for commuting, shopping, and domestic gymnastics trying to fit in with an office job, the savings are huge.

Wages can be bigger, too. Those savings for employers are literally in the millions, in larger businesses. It’s really a matter of What You Get For What You Pay.

Big online sites are providing contractors for just about every known profession and trade. Even now, contractors are shopping for work value all over the world. For the price of an internet form, they can pick and choose from global talent.

The talent can also pick up multiple contracts. That’s very big money, at top level, and it’s also a way of generating a huge personal profile in your industry.

Contract law is a lot safer than employment law, for everybody.

It’s clear, it gives inalienable rights to parties, and it’s a workable legal proposition, unlike generic workplace law which is a minefield of litigation situations. Contracts are merit-based, by definition. Depending on the job, employers and employees get a lot more real security with a reasonable contract than with a legal principle that has to be tested with every incident.

Social changes

The middle class is now much better educated, and more receptive to career and job opportunities. The middle class demographic no longer sees the office job as its aspiration. After all, why would it? The range of opportunities is much wider, and careers can be made from scratch.

Lower income groups, inflicted with the Working Poor motif, and dismal wage scales, aren’t impressed with a culture which on the one hand promotes massive affluence, and on the other pays peanuts. They have no reason to stick to the social script.

Why should they? If all they need is an email address and a net profile to get real jobs, not the miserly, poverty guaranteeing, work they’ve been doing for generations, what do they have to lose?

The world won’t hang around waiting for businesses to catch up. Employees aren’t waiting for the opportunities.

The employment industry has been shooting itself in the foot, trying to uphold a life and career model which has nothing to do with the real world.

Get with the program, employers, you’re riding a dinosaur.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 4th, 2008 at 9:35 pm and is filed under Future. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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