What does the future of work mean for us? Some of the news headlines are scary. Robots taking over the world. Up to half of existing jobs disappearing. Lifetime employment a thing of the past. Gig work as the norm. It’s enough to keep you up at night!

Today’s post looks at the trends behind these changes. Plus, 5 things we can expect and what they could mean for your future.

This post was originally published in August 2020 and updated in June 2023.

What are the big trends?

There are two big trends converging to impact the future of work—demographics and technology. Let’s have a closer look at each one.

Demographics

Longer lifespans, more people working past the traditional retirement age, and large numbers of Generation Z in the workforce, mean the lines between education, work and retirement will be blurred.

It’s no secret that people are living longer. There’s a good chance that someone entering the workforce today will live to be 100. In their book The 100-Year Life, Lynda Gratton and Andrew Scott discuss the three-stage life. This is the model that my generation has generally accepted as the norm.

In the three-stage life, stage one is education, taking up about the first 22-25 years. After that, stage two is work, typically the next 40 or so years. Finally stage 3 is the traditional retirement starting at age 65.

With people living longer and the accelerating pace of change in the workplace, this linear path of education-work-retirement no longer makes sense. In The New Map of Life, The Stanford Center on Longevity reports 60-year careers will be the way of the future—with different paths alternating between education, work and sabbaticals. Businesses, academic institutions and workers will need to adapt to this new reality to survive.

Technology and automation

Most of the low-skilled, repetitive tasks we do at work can be automated. The emergence of artificial intelligence and tools like ChatGPT means some jobs will disappear. The idea of robots taking over the world is always met with fear, but it’s not all doom and gloom. According to a report from McKinsey, only about 5% of occupations can be fully automated, but about 30% of activities in 60% of occupations could be automated. So, even if automation doesn’t eliminate your job, you can be sure the work won’t be the same as it is today. Technology will change how we work, and we’ll likely see a scenario where people work alongside machines.

As some work disappears, new work will emerge. The challenge will be finding ways to re-skill workers to take on those new tasks. This is a societal problem that can only be solved by business, academic institutions, and governments working together.

One of the concerns with technology is the pace of change. We can expect it to continue to accelerate which will make it difficult for workers and business to keep up.

But there is good news in all this. There are skills that can’t be automated. Workers with those skills will be positioned for success as the world continues to change and evolve. I’ll come back to these skills a little later.

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How will work change?

Keeping the trends in mind, we can start to see how work is already evolving.

Increasing importance of gig work

Gig work falls under the umbrella of non-traditional work, which is basically anything other than the full-time permanent job that previous generations saw as the norm. Because gig work takes different forms, it’s not easy to get accurate numbers of how many of us are currently depending on gig work to make a living. The numbers I have seen from several North American studies are generally in the 30% range. The one thing we do know is gig work is likely to play an ever-increasing role in the economy.

What this could mean for you

There are good and bad things about the rise of gig work. On the positive side, non-traditional work offers more flexibility and freedom in how, when and where we work. On the downside, there is less job security, although I would argue that the traditional “permanent” job provided no better than a false sense of security.

Good financial management will be essential to smoothing out the ups and downs of income from gig work. Having a financial safety net will become even more important.

The ability to learn and adapt will also be critical. Each gig could require new skills and gig workers will need to stay on top of their game to remain relevant in the competition for work.

Work can be done anywhere

Thanks to the pandemic, the future of work is here and now. If we’ve learned one thing over the last couple of years, it’s that a workplace is no longer about a physical location made of bricks and mortar. The pandemic reinforced the value and importance of working from home.

Despite the efforts of some senior business leaders, I don’t think we’ll be able to put the genie back in the bottle, nor do I think we should. We can expect to see a continued acceptance of remote work as workers demand more flexibility.

What this could mean for you

The ability to work remotely will open up new opportunities. Workers will no longer be constrained by geography. If your dream job is in another province, state, or even country, location will not be a barrier. For businesses, this will increase the pool of available candidates to recruit from.

Remote work comes with many advantages, but it takes discipline to be successful. Check out Tips to make working from home work for you for more on this topic.

In addition to discipline, you’ll need strong technical and collaboration skills to succeed in a remote working environment.

Shift from hard skills to soft skills

As low-skilled work disappears because of automation, there will be a shift in the skills needed for success. We’ll see an increased focus on skills that can’t be automated. Things like problem-solving, innovation, creativity, communication and relationship building will replace the hard skills and knowledge employers have recruited for in the past.

This is a fundamental shift for academic institutions. They need to future proof their grads by teaching them how to learn and equipping them with transferrable skills that they’ll take with them from job to job.

We’re already seeing changes in this area. More and more, recruiters are valuing transferrable skills over education. Once viewed as table stakes, many large companies no longer require new hires to have a traditional four-year degree.

And we’re seeing skills shortages in some key areas. More than half of Canadian businesses report having employees who were not fully proficient to be able to perform their job at the required level. The biggest areas of concern: technical, practical and job-specific skills, followed by problem-solving skills. (Source: StatsCan)

What this could mean for you

Education will continue to be important, but your degree may not be the thing that gets you hired. You’ll need to supplement formal education with extra-curricular activities and volunteer work to develop transferrable skills that will differentiate you in the recruiting process.

You’ll also need to regularly assess and upgrade your skills to ensure they align with what the market is looking for.

Non-linear career paths will be the norm

In It’s okay to change direction, I spoke about the value of a career change and why the traditional linear path doesn’t make sense in today’s world.

If the linear three-stage life of Education-Work-Retirement no longer makes sense, what will the career path of the future look like? And, we can expect to see people taking breaks from work to retrain or just recharge. We can also expect to see continued movement between jobs and career paths.

Simply put, the frequent job changes or gaps in resumes that used to be a red flag for recruiters will be expected and even encouraged.

What this could mean for you

It’s unlikely that the job or field you start out in will be your lifetime career. Be open to new opportunities that offer growth and learning, even if they mean a lateral move, a step back, or a complete change in direction.

You’ll need to embrace every opportunity to learn something new. In Lifelong learning – Your future depends on it, I discussed how learning takes different forms and doesn’t always involve sitting in a classroom. Continuous learning will be key to success in the future of work.

Traditional retirement will be a thing of the past

With longer lifespans, the amount of money you’d need to save to fund a retirement that will last as many years as your working life is out of the reach of a generation struggling with high levels of student debt and high housing costs. Even most Gen X and Baby Boomers haven’t saved enough to fund 25 to 30 years of retirement.

Money aside, people are living healthier, more active lives well into their 80s. Many don’t want to retire at 65 and spend the next couple of decades sitting on the sidelines.

What this could mean for you

The non-linear career path will likely continue well beyond the traditional retirement age. Work, in some form, will play an important role in our later years, for both financial and non-financial reasons.

See Is retirement dead? A look at the future of retirement for a closer look at the changing nature of retirement.

The bottom line

There’s a lot of overlap in the different areas but some common threads emerge. Workers of the future will need to:

• Focus on building transferrable skills that can’t be automated.
• Embrace lifelong learning, in a variety of forms.
• Be flexible and adaptable. Change will be constant.

I will leave you with this quote from Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau:

The pace of change has never been this fast, yet it will never be this slow again.

Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada

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Are you ready for the future of work? What other changes do you expect? Tell us below.