In The Future of Work, Jacob Morgan introduces 5 trends which will be shaping the

future of work
1. New behaviors- shaped by social media
2. Technology- Emergence of Cloud, IOT , Big Data and Collaborative technologies
3. Millennials-Characterized by new attitude, expectations and innovative way of
working
4. Mobility- Flexibility in work life driven by work anytime, anywhere and on any
device
5. Globalization- Boundaries being removed
New Behaviors: There is a major shift in the behavior of the employees as social
technologies like WordPress, LinkedIn, Blogging made their way. The behavior is
changing from being isolated and insular to being comfortable leading a public,
collaborative and connected life. The workforce entering into the organizations with
this new behavior is revolutionizing the way organizations operate by the entry of
social and collaborative platforms. Organizations have to adapt to the new
behaviors and expectations of the workforce to make it a win-win situation for both
employees and organization.
Technology: The world of technology is fast evolving with which the way we work
will drastically change. There is shift from on premise implementations of software
to Cloud benefitted by cost savings from no installation of servers and
infrastructure. Shift to Cloud has also helped in reducing the time deploy
technologies and eliminated the delay of upgrades. It has empowered the
employees as now technology decisions can be taken by anyone within an
organization, not depend on only the IT department or the management. One more
important technology shift is the emergence of Collaborative platforms like Jive,
Yammer, Mango Apps, tibbr, Citrix, Clarizen,Bunchball, SAP Jam, Connections,
Chatte. These have enabled employees to work effectively and efficiently. Even
these platforms has helped the organizations to find solutions for their complex
problems, get new product ideas, platform for finding the write candidates with
specific skills and created active engagement among the employees. The key thing
with these new types of technologies is that for the first time employees are able to
control the technologies rather than the other way around. These has also helped in
staying connected even in virtual teams. Hence these technologies helps
organizations to connect and engage
anywhere, anytime, and on any device. One more technology make rounds is Big
Data we are now producing data which is increasing at an exponential rate, In 2011
close to 2 zettabytes of data was produced. The combination of employees stored in
HR systems, CRM applications and collaboration platforms alongwith public data on
twitter, facebook, LikedIn gives you a lot of information about a person but with
organizations doing nothing on this data which can be used for understanding tasks
or projects employees might be adept at, predicting burnout or when an employee
might quit or what motivates the employee. Decisions on workforce selection is
changing from subjective choice to more data driven for example companies like
Knack makes games that help identify human potential, it figures out a lot about a
person based on the gameplay by analyzing a lot of factors like risk taking ability ,
focus levels etc. Royal Dutch Shell is using knacks helps in predicting which ideas
from which people would be more successful. Bain & Company, is using Knack to
facilitate in their recruitment process and find top talent. Another emerging

technology IOT has been playing a significant role in many industries, it refers to
connection between the network and devices which facilitates seemless sharing of
information wirelessly. It helps in tracking and analyzing anything and everything we
wanted. Major players like GE, Whirlpool, Schneider Electric launching IOT devices
like smarter appliances, homes, workplaces has made life easier. Even in
workplace , IOT devices will help in understanding the employees better based on
collection of data of employees day to day activities on how productive are they or
how they work helps in recognizing patterns.
MILLENNIAL WORKFORCE: 2020 millennials are expected to make up just over
half of
the entire U.S. workforce. These are people who grew up with social and
collaborative technologies , who are attached to their smartphones and connected
with each other. Millennials dont know how it was to work in a cube from 9 to 6 on
old technologies. This new workforce brings about new attitude and expectations
about work hence organizations has to adapt to their expectations to retain the top
talent and make investments in building a competivetive millennial workforce. But
as the experienced workforce move out of the company the information and
knowledge developed along the years also moves out of the company.
Mobility: Smartphones and tablets have become more powerful than the
computers were a few years ago and the trend is fast catching up. More people are
working on the go . Nowadays many companies have satellite offices and have
employees working at co-working spots or home offices . With virtual teams the
importance of connectivity anywhere, anyhow and on any device has become
important this is helped by new technologies and collaborative platforms which are
discussed earlier helps in staying connected and working on the go hence adapting
to the expectations of the millennial workforce.
Globalisation: With connectivity and colloborative platforms the geographical
boundaries are becoming insignificant.Organizations can sell their products and
services anywhere in the world and transportion , distance is no longer hindering
connectivity with technology being the enabler for connectivity. Many organizations
have international teams and offices which bring about new opportunities and
perspectives.
There are three reasons why the changes seen today are different:
1. Rapid speed of change, which makes a late adopter of the change practically out
of business
2, Connectivity the world
3. Everything is being disrupted which is giving rise to new business models, new
products, new companies, new behaviors and making people adapt and change to
be relevant eg: Uber, Netflix
The Organizational workflow is being completely reversed with new generation
employees
bringing new approaches, expectations, attitudes and ways of working into
organizations, this is making managers to adapt to employees new way of
working by transforming the way they lead, which in turn forces the organization as
a whole to adapt to the way employees and managers are working.
The 7 principals of Future employee:
Flexible work environment :.the main components of flexible work environment
is work anytime , work anywhere and focusing on outputs not inputs. The

organization shouldnt question on the input effort spend as long as the employee is
able to deliver the required output. There also should be flexibility in choosing the
working timings and place by which employee would be comfortable to deliver the
desired output. Many employees waste their precious time in commuting which can
be utilized productively. Unless the need of flexibility is catered it is difficult to retain
the top talent. Coworking locations are used to meet the flexible work environment
needs. Even many organizations like Google ,Microsoft are providing flexible work
environment for its employees.
Customize your work:
The whole idea behind customized work is to allow employees to choose career
paths which they prefer by putting the control in their hands, the future employee
expect the provision of customization of work, there are three categories for
customization. Customization Based on Voice which is notion of having a voice
through internal social networks and collaboration platforms which helps employees
to participate in conversations and discussions in which they are interested and
build connections. Customization based on Self-Organization which is allowing
employees to actually self-organize and give them autonomy to select the project
they want to work on. Customization based on Choice which gives autonomy in
changing the work preference like hours of working, where you want to work given
by companies like Delloite. Organizations should provide opportunity for skill
developments for its employees as employee turnover is attributed to stagnant
learnings.
Share information:
Sharing Information facilitates engagement and empowerment of the future
employee knowing that there ideas are appreciated, critiqued and explored. It
creates a sense of ownership and opens up newer lines of communication and
collaboration. For the Organization perspective it makes the workplace engaging
and a hub for innovation where the employees are given a collaborative platform to
voice their ideas and through which organizations find innovative solutions to its
complex problems.
Have the opportunity to become leaders : Social channels like Facebook, Blogs,
Youtube has been instrumental in building thought leadership. Many entrepreneurs
grow their business by interacting across the social platform. In an Organization
employees who are active across collaborative platforms sharing ideas and
content , are more recognizable by others and garner respect from the peers for the
valuable information shared thereby providing them an opportunity to become a
leaders within their organizations.
Collaborate and communicate in new ways : already discussed in the above
analysis
Shift from being knowledge workers to learning workers :
knowledge is available on internet and can be consumed through every
Internetconnected device, what you know matters far less than what you can do
with what you know. The capacity to innovate, be analytical, to communicate and
the ability to find creative solutions for critical problems is far more important than
the academic knowledge as with free availability of knowledge it can be gained
easily but the skills to use it to make a difference is specific to the individual and the
skills developed by him. Hence there is declining value of colleges students are

preferring to enro in more courses which help them to gain required skills than to go
through a whole curriculum which is irrelevant.
Learn and teach at-will : Collaborative platforms has helped in seamless
integration of learning and teaching happening at will eg coursera, Lynda etc.As
everything is changing at a rapid pace it is important to learn new skills to not
become obsolete.
Management mindset needs to change facilitate the future employee
Freelance Economy:
Future employee will be preferring to earn more by using their skills and work as per
their convenience than being bound by any organizations. There are many
platforms which are marketplace for people to find freelance jobs at their
convenience. Even Organisations it is an opportunity to get their work done without
being committed in hiring a full time emply therby reducing its costs. Many
employees are using freelancing option to earn extra apart from their normal
earnings. All the key work can be outsourced to a freelancer and it gives opportunity
to access the global talent pool as connectivity is not an issue. What is realistic
scenario for the future of work is that organizations will adapt to the freelancer
model not just by hiring freelancers but by building own environments focused on
tasks and rather than long-term careers. Future employees will be picking projects
to work from multiple organizations rather than a career or single organization