Remember back in the day when you thought that if you had a “good job” with a “good company” that your job was safe and secure?
I think we all know that those days are long gone. From my own experience, I can confirm that “secure” jobs are a thing of the past. I’ve been in top positions, told that I’m doing well only to have the rug pulled out from under me with little to no notice.
Technology continues to advance at lightning speed, getting faster and better at what it does every day. There are even computer programs that can write articles that seem to be written by a human. (I can assure you that a human wrote this one.)
Because of this, the skills that have traditionally been rewarded in the job world (math, engineering, and sciences) are becoming less valuable because computers can do them faster, cheaper and easier. What’s a person to do?
Focus on developing our most essential human abilities and teach our kids to value not just technology but also the richness of interpersonal experience.
There are many studies that show that increased levels of online connections (especially through platforms like Facebook or texting) actually make people unhappy. The ironic flip-side of advancing technology is that as we spend more time with our digital devices, research shows that it’s making us less empathetic, more narcissistic, less adept at social interaction and less able to bond with others.
At just the moment when technology is demanding more of our deepest human abilities, it’s also causing those abilities to wither. Growing demand, shrinking supply – that’s the formula for high value.
I just finished reading Humans Are Underrated: What High Achievers Know That Brilliant Machines Never Will by Geoff Colvin which pulls together stories and studies on how technology is affecting us as humans and what we can do about it.
The Myth of the Good Job
I receive many comments and emails from readers who come out of college or are in a mid-life transition and try to follow the story we’ve all been fed: go to school, get a “good job” where your employer will take care of you, find your mate and live happily ever after.
This fairy tale doesn’t exist anymore. The “systems” (schools, employers, etc.) won’t take care of you. It’s up to you to take responsibility for your life. If you don’t, someone will do it for you, and you probably won’t like the result.
Humans Are Underrated gives you ideas for ways to approach this brave, new world.
“The most valuable people will not be just knowledge workers, but simultaneously “relationship workers” who create the kind of social value that people will always desire from their fellow humans. While many of us regard these abilities as innate traits, it turns out that they can all be taught and developed.”
I can attest to that last point. As a die-hard introvert, I’ve had to learn how to be an extrovert to expand my comfort zone and create more of the life I want which includes new connections, more opportunities and more fulfillment.
What unique skills does a “relationship worker” have?
- Empathy: It means discerning what another person is thinking and feeling and responding appropriately. Key for organizations today looking to create complete and meaningful experiences for clients and customers.
What companies do you enjoy working with? Why those over all the others out there? It’s probably because your interactions with the people there reflect that they care about you and can empathize with issues.
- Storytelling: We humans aren’t moved by a story unless we can evaluate the teller, decide whether he or she is trustworthy and gauge the true passion that he or she brings to it. We won’t make that connection with a robot.
Which ads capture your attention? The ones that simply describe what a company’s product or service can do (the features)? Or the ones that tell a story that you can relate to on a human level (the benefit to you)?
- Collaboration: The world is doing ever more of its work in teams. We form, exchange, improve, accept and reject ideas, and we improve our collective performance through deeply human interpersonal processes that may happen even without our knowing it.
It’s infinitely more difficult to accomplish anything alone that with the help of others. Everyone has their limited (yet growing) set of knowledge dictated by interests, environment, circumstances, etc. It’s much easier to learn from other people’s stories and advice than to have to take the time to have the same experiences. That’s why we have teachers, coaches, and mentors. Often, these people learn as much from their students as the students learn from them.
- Creativity: No matter how capable computers become, humans are still in charge of which problems need to get solved. Humans in real life are constantly revising their ideas of what their problems and goals really are. Success requires group creativity and innovation.
Back to the points on collaboration above, we’re more creative when we work with other people. Someone else’s ideas may spark new ideas for us and our collective knowledge and creativity can exponentially expand what we’re capable of.
How does all this relate to you? How can this help you get a job, a raise, promotion or a better job? How can this help you to make your business better?
Click HERE to take a quiz to see how you rate in these four areas and gauge if you’re more valuable than a robot.
Rather than simply showing up and doing what was in your job description (those are only the basics that might keep you from getting fired), think about how you can set yourself apart by expressing the skills above in your own unique way.
Stop thinking of yourself as an employee who gets a paycheck. It’s the people with that mentality that get cut first.
Whether you’re employed by another company or run your own business, think of yourself as your own personal company and brand who provides value to others. In order to succeed (however you define success for yourself) today and tomorrow, you need to set yourself apart. When you think about it, that part is easy because there’s only one of you. Everyone is unique.
How can you add value to your company and your customers (if you’re an employee, your customers may be the company’s customers or other employees) by expressing yourself through empathy, storytelling, collaboration, and creativity?
How can you use those skills in your own unique way to connect with the people you come into contact with every day?
By focusing on those ideas a little bit each day, you’ll be surprised at the opportunities that open up for you.
Geoff Colvin is Fortune magazine’s Senior Editor-at-Large and one of America’s most respected journalists. He lectures widely on significant trends in business – the infotech revolution, leadership, globalization, wealth creation – and is the regular lead moderator for the Fortune Global Forum. He appears daily on the CBS Radio Network, reaching over seven million listeners each week.
His previous book, Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers From Everybody Else, was a national bestseller and has been translated into a dozen languages.
Born and raised in Vermillion, South Dakota, Colvin is an honors graduate of Harvard University with a degree in Economics and has an MBA from New York University.
Create the life you want: Combine the law of attraction with mindfulness
The law of attraction suggests that our positive or negative thoughts bring about positive or negative experiences. My latest book, The Mindful Guide to Law of Attraction, pairs that belief with the powerful practices of mindfulness. Through intentional breathing, writing, and engaging, you’ll hone a method for manifesting health, wealth, and love―the elements of happiness.
Let the law of attraction work for you by adopting its basic steps of identifying and visualizing the things you desire. Then use 45 practical meditation techniques included in the book to achieve awareness. By concentrating your positive energy on obtaining your wants, you’ll give yourself permission to receive them.
To your happiness! ~Paige
You can find this book at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, and Indigo.
The Mindful Living Guide
Really loved this book and enjoyed reading your blog. I have always been a big believer in a leadership style education. We currently raise our son without all of that technology so he can become better at face to face interactions. My wife and I also work hard on educating ourselves in these areas of leadership or soft skills. I like the point in the book where he mentions that now in the information age we can have robots do what they were looking for in the start of the industrial age, while now in the information age humans will start to do what we were designed to do all along….. think and create, using our mind.
Yes, the Industrial Age has damaged so many aspects of our humanistic lives. The whole premise was to turn people into little cogs of a machine. I’m happy to see the cracks in that way of thinking and the movement to re-humanize work.
This book not only gives people ideas for becoming more valuable but also gives us a better direction to lead our children. I’ve recommended the book to a number of friends with kids when they’ve speculated about what the world will be like when their little ones get older.
Thanks so much Brandon!
I grew up in a GM home and was raised with the Industrial Age thinking to a T. What I love about the Information Age is that it’s bringing back our creative minds and also more business ownership. We are seeing a huge rise in small business and even home based business which is allowing people to create their own way instead of depending on someone else to create their way.
Sure we’ll all be replaced by computers or that’s what they said 20 years ago, but it still hasn’t happened.
As you say Empathy is still our golden egg. Loose that and it’s possible to be replaced by ‘ones and zero’s’
We are close to a tipping point where people start to value relationships over ‘things’ or at least I hope we are.
It’s interesting how the book points out that the more we utilize technology to communicate, instead of face-to-face interactions, the more we lose our empathy.
But the growth of things like Meetup.com that encourage face-to-face interactions with like-minded people keep me hopeful too.
Thanks Drew!