The changing shape of jobs: Work the shift

These are exciting times. There are forces at work that, over the next decade, will fundamentally shift much of what we take for granted about employees, work and organisations. We live at a time when the schism with the past is of the same magnitude as that last seen in the Industrial Revolution of the late 18th century: a schism of such magnitude that work — what we do, where we do it, how we work and with whom — will change, possibly unrecognisably, in our lifetimes. In the late 18th century, the drivers of change were the development of coal and steam power. This time it is not the result of a single force, but rather the subtle combination of five forces that will fundamentally transform much of what we take for granted about work: the needs of a low-carbon economy, rapid advances in technology, increasing globalisation, profound changes in longevity and demography, and deep societal changes.