Work It Out

Technology may take away some jobs, but will create a whole new suite as well

- Kathakali Chanda

Each paradigmatic shift in the workspace has always been accompanied with a restive period in human history. In the early 19th century, as the first Industrial Revolution took root in the UK, and mechanisation came to replace the predominantly agrarian economy, a group of workers took to violent protests smashing machines that deprived them of their livelihood. Called the ‘Luddites’, they gave anti-mechanisation an identity that transcended centuries and came to be associated even with the likes of Ted Kaczynski, a Harvard math prodigy who parcelled 16 bombs to universities and airlines to halt the relentless march of technology in the 1970s and ’80s.

The second Industrial Revolution, in the late 19th century and early 20th century, ushered in an era of major breakthroughs like the assembly line and improved communication on one hand and unfettered capitalism, labour union strikes and rising unemployment, on the other. Its Janus-faced nature gave it the sobriquet The Gilded Age, after a novel by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner. The third phase that began in the 1950s was less violent but no less disruptive: It reduced manual labour, digitised manufacturing and, fuelled by rapid advances in computing power, changed ways in which information was generated, processed and shared.

Now, Industrial Revolution 4.0, propelled by artificial intelligence (AI), is upon us. AI will not just change traditional blue-collar jobs through new modes of manufacturing, but almost all professions, from law to insurance. “The change is paradigmatic because of its ubiquity, because it will require people to learn entire new skills and think about their working life in new ways, making lifelong learning and adaptability in a workplace crucial to success,” says Anne Lise Kjaer, futurist and the founder of Kjaer Global, a London based trend management company.