A Compound of Alchymie

Jobs in 2016

Fast Company magazine recently took a tongue-in-cheek look at what jobs might be in demand in 2016. Here is my list:

Danger - Plan your exit strategy:

Web Designers - The new tools will be so cool anyone will be able to build a web site
Trainers - All learning will be online
Checkout People - We don't need anyone to talk to when putting our shopping into bags
Financial Advisors - Apart from my friend Martin who is always up for a coffee and a chat
Airline Pilots - The thrill of flying 'Intel Inside' is just too good to miss

Looking Good - Try these new career options:

Home Computer Troubleshooters - All that converging technology is going to mean that an IT support person will be much more valuable than an au-pair in 2016
Personal Online Shopper - Let someone else take the eye strain
Escort - Powered by the Internet, the oldest profession goes from strength to strength
Pastor/Vicar/Priest - Because God's work is never done...

Workflow

While searching for some stuff on knowledge work and knowledge workers for a workshop I am doing at the KCC Fringe with Piers Young I re-discovered Jay Cross' Internet Time Blog.  The article I stumbled across (I love stumbling on the web - you come across some amazing stuff) was on workflow. Here is an extract:

"Workflow is the convergence of work+flow to achieve an optimal balance of work results and individual fulfillment. Business culture is breaking free of the industrial-age mindset that bottom-line results and worker happiness are natural enemies. Work can be among life’s greatest joys; flow drives a loyal, over-achieving workforce. Workflow research investigates how work and flow can converge to replace an unproductive either/or situation with a mutually beneficial worldview of both/and[sic]."

Up until now I have regarded workflow as structured processes applied to moving information (primarily in the form of documents) around organisations. Most of the serious DM/KM tools have workflow features built-in but in my experience with clients these features are rarely used. But of  course this is an entirely different kind of workflow.

Further investigation reveals a business model, The Workflow Institute, based around the concept of workflow learning. Jay Cross is MD and the 'staff' includes Gloria Gery - one of the first people to bring us the exciting new field of Electronic Performance Support (EPS) which was the next big thing way back in the early nineties when I was running a business developing online help systems. EPS never really took off - at least not in Europe - and has largely been overtaken by the e-learning bandwagon. I think that e-learning people call it 'on demand learning' (sounds like an ad for IBM). 

Anyway, it's interesting to think about flow and specifically workflow in relation to knowledge work. More thoughts when my brain has made some more connections!

 

Tom Davenport on Knowledge Work

Picked up this link in David Gurteen's newsletter today to an interview with Tom Davenport by CIO Insight magazine.

"They [knowledge workers] don't like to be told what to do. They enjoy more autonomy than other workers. Much of their work is invisible and hard to measure, because it goes on inside their heads or outside the office." Tom Davenport

Seems to tie in quite well with some of my recent entries on knowledge work. Why the focus on knowledge work from Tom? Because he has written a new book on the subject, "Thinking for a Living: How to Get Better Performance and Results from Knowledge Workers" (Harvard Business School Press, July 2005).

"In my latest book, Thinking for a Living, I developed a unique classification system for segmenting knowledge workers into four major categories—transaction, integration, expert, and collaborative—and prioritizing which group or groups a company should target for intervention. I also outlined five customizable approaches for intervening in and improving knowledge work. " Tom Davenport

Sounds like Tom has cracked it - must get onto Amazon right away...and get on with my own book.

Measuring Knowledge Work

Couldn't resist posting this strip from Dilbert. It picks up nicely on my earlier article regarding measuring the outputs from knowledge work not the activities.

To get a Dilbert cartoon in your mail every day sign-up at Dilbert.com. If you're a knowledge worker it's a must!

Timeline: Enland won the ashes. Hurricane Rita is threatning Texas. Britain is struggling to maintain security in Basra in Iraq. Summer is over!

Dilbert is a Knowledge Worker

Couldn't resist posting this brilliant cartoon from Scott Adams' Dilbert collection. Dilbert is the ultimate frustrated and powerless knowledge worker - that's why the cartoons strike such a chord with knowlege workers everywhere - but specifically in our Western work culture. For more see www.dilbert.com. Click on it to magically make it bigger (and readable)!