The shape of things to come
Over the last two decades we have embraced new technologies with gusto, and our ways of working have gone truly mobile. But the transformation is set to continue. Innovations expert Marie Puybaraud predicts how our working lives may take shape by the year 2030
by Marie Puybaraud
Think back 20 years. Mobile phones were just starting to become popular, and wireless internet access was not part of the working world yet. It was the same office and the same desk, day in and day out. Time away from the office generally meant no calls, certainly no emails and notes were taken on paper. Move forward two decades, and the way of working has gone truly mobile. No longer characterised by a fixed desk location or even an office, the workplace, for many, is wherever they happen to be at any one time — on the road, on the train, or at home. How many of us now glance at our Blackberry while out to dinner without giving it a second thought?
The line between professional life and personal life has never appeared more blurred. It is easier to be away from the office, and while, in many ways, this makes working life more practical, there is the possibility that life outside work is becoming mixed with that of the office.
But where will we be in another 20 years? I imagine a continued transformation and a world that we may not even recognise. The studies I have conducted (in collaboration with The Futures Academy at the Dublin Institute of Technology), examined how and why the global workplace will change in coming decades. We used real people’s ideas to produce three potential scenarios for how we will be working in 20 years’ time.
The concept of futures is encapsulated in the idea of trying to make things happen, rather than guessing what might happen. Individuals are asked to look ahead and imagine the future. They look at the workplace as it is today, consider how things may change in coming years and present possible outcomes. The exercise is built around key workplace concepts, such as political culture, the emerging workforce, governance, success, workplace identity, economy, work-life balance, sustainability and the environment.
The approach produced three plausible scenarios, each painting a unique and fascinating picture of the future.
Possibility number one, The Hive, describes a competitive global village and a networked environment; The Eco Office, depicts a secure, responsible workplace with a focus on work-life balance and a community environment, and the final scenario, Gattaca, is a fragmented, controlling, business-driven world that values profit over employee welfare. From these concepts emerged three initial social models: Jazz, Wise Counsel and Dantesque. Given the huge changes we have seen over past decades, each of these is perfectly feasible.
They all present a complex future, full of pleasant surprises as well as alarming prospects.
The workplace is a network
The Hive: derived from the Jazz scenario — 2030’s global market
This scenario assumes an unprecedented acceleration of economic growth, relentless pressure for short-term gains and quick wins, and fierce global competition — all driven by rapid technological advances and further market integration.
Jazz would be a world where growth accelerates and technology explodes, driving corporate agility. It would mean a world of entrepreneurs in a free market, where the corporate world as we know it today is totally distrusted by the rest of society. The further scenario which came from Jazz is known as The Hive — as major disasters strike our society, homeworking is becoming a welcome refuge, and the corporate office is no longer in existence. With revolutionary technical advances, a new working environment would provide people with the ability to control the workspace using what would be known as a neuro-headset.
The Hive as a workplace would be more agile, almost formed into clubs for highly mobile, remote and virtual workers. Communication would be essential for survival as the workplace would become a hub.
In this scenario, by 2025, climate change will have turned on its heels, and upon the emergence of the networked ‘Hive’ workplace structure, the traditional office becomes a memory. FM becomes the key actor in this environment as all data is stored, controlled and disseminated through the FM support desk. The Hive is the vessel in which working environments are incorporated into people’s daily lives.
While there would be obvious technological benefits to Jazz and The Hive, there are some serious issues being addressed. Workers would lose their sense of belonging — organisations themselves would become more virtual, allowing for less human interaction and team building.
The workplace is a community
The Eco Office: derived from the Wise Counsels scenario — 2030’s secure and sustainable world
This scenario assumes global economic stability and an achievement of environmental and social balance. Improvements worldwide would facilitate sustainable development, and collective, collaborative and consensual action would be favoured.
Wise Counsel depicts a world where the creation and sharing of knowledge drives economic wellbeing, and where there would be a global consensus for change and preservation. Wise Counsel would also mean diversity. The world would operate around a community – and knowledge based society, as opposed to skills based, would drive the economy forward. The workplace would be more community orientated, with ’employee villages’ forming to create workplace communities. Workplaces support shift from hierarchical to self-managed teams, working within a flexible work/life balance. Workplaces increasingly are supported by ICTs, connecting workers with community peers.
Like Jazz, Wise Counsel would see a reliance on technology. Yet, the workplace would be based around social activities, creating common workspaces and focusing on team based working.
A society based on the Wise Counsel model would give rise to the Eco-Office. A new work style would emerge, where employees would be given a greater voice in how to improve business during hard times. In this scenario, the Eco-Office would be the primary workplace and work style across the globe. Sophisticated and innovative information and communication technology (ICT) would appear, enabling employees to be highly agile in their way of working. Eco-Offices, similar to hotels, would be created, that would provide good services to improve quality of life and work — attracting top talent. Eco Offices see a rise of local office communities, the development of employee villages combined with sustainable transport initiatives and biodiversity plans. The emergence of new workplace structures, life-long learning and corporate culture would lead the direction from a knowledge revolution to a wisdom revolution.
The workplace is a fortress
Gattaca: derived from the Dantesque scenario — 2030’s fragmented world
This scenario depicts economic stagnation, cultural indifference and insecurity. The emphasis here would be on distrust, with reaction leading to social unrest, conflict and environmental decline. With a high environmental degradation the ethos of workers becomes: ‘survival of the smartest’.
Dantesque is by far the most negative and the darkest of the three possible outcomes. It would see a high concentration of economic growth in prosperous areas, with mass migration to richer areas bringing new difficulties and growth in illegality and exploitation. Taken in this context, we would see a society with a ghetto mentality — and we could potentially experience a series of major catastrophes, from health issues, to environmental meltdowns, to terrorist attacks.
From Dantesque then comes Gattaca. This scenario would see the corporates becoming a power to be reckoned with, where corporations become feared by society far more than they are today. Businesses and people would start to show characteristics of a ‘swarm’ society, grouping together on the basis of shared interests, both personally and commercially.
By 2020, the corporate world would be established and advertised as a fully integrated, self-managed place. Great importance would be placed on the acquisition, development and management of property, processes and people. The primary focus would be on access and information protection in this scenario, and less on the workplace, resulting in a degradation of work ethics and health and safety procedures.
Balance or turbulence?
The Hive and Gattaca are the more extreme predictions. Both foresee global conditions that will result in turbulent times for businesses and employees, with the focus being on business and profits rather than on people. Neither scenario encourages a healthy work-life balance. The Eco-Office is the most balanced scenario and arguably therefore the most likely. It would bring more structure to the working environment, and the corporate world would be protective of its employees. The home then would be regarded a secure hub from which to work and operate.
Professor John Ratcliffe, chairman of The Futures Academy at the Dublin Institute of Technology, argues that while we are unlocking new possibilities, this could be either a testing time for humanity or the century that sets the world on a new course towards a promising future. He says that on a global scale, there is growing recognition that “grand scale catastrophes” are possible and this move towards considering the forces reshaping our society in the future will transform our working environment.
The future will undoubtedly bring change and there is nothing we can do to stop that. What we can do however is be prepared and attempt to create a future that we want, not a future we are forced into. The scenarios predicted may well be exaggerations of what we can really expect — but we believe elements of each are likely to play a part in our future.
Marie Puybaraud is director of global workplace innovation at Johnson Controls
