Despite its benefits, automation is disrupting the workplace.
As technological advances like artificial intelligence and automation make their way into more and more workplaces, leaders have begun taking steps to prepare for the future of work. The Association for Talent Development’s research report The Future of Work: Technology, Predictions, and Preparing the Workforce examines how talent development leaders are readying their organizations for impending change in the next five years. Advances in technology or transformations in the workplace may be causing these changes.
Respondents are fairly split as to how they expect their organizations to perform in five years. Nearly half (46 percent) say their organizations will fare better than most competitors, and equally as many say their organizations will perform about the same as most competitors. Respondents have less confidence in their workforce’s skill levels, though. Just 24 percent say their workforce will be well prepared (in terms of the skills that are needed) in five years.
To identify practices associated with future preparedness, the report compared future-ready organizations’ practices to those of all other organizations. Future-ready enterprises are defined as those whose respondents both predicted their companies would perform better than most competitors in five years and who felt their workforces would be well prepared in five years.
Analyses found that leaders from future-ready organizations are twice as likely to be actively preparing for the future of work than leaders from all other organizations. Future-ready leaders are also significantly more likely to encourage discussion and knowledge sharing around the future of work.
Regardless of whether their businesses are future-ready, however, 11 percent of respondents from both groups report that leadership finds information about the future of work to be overwhelming or changes too fast. Evidently, even leaders whose organizations are well prepared may find it overwhelming, which is all the more reason to start preparing now.
According to the report, one way leaders have started preparing for the future of work is by discussing it. The vast majority of organizations (92 percent) have already started having these conversations, whether informally (57 percent) or formally (55 percent). Just 8 percent of respondents say their organizations have not had any formal or informal discussions about the future of work.
The most common formal practice organizations have undertaken is having leaders or managers speak about the future of work at meetings, followed by having meetings to discuss the future of work. Formal preparation practices significantly correlated with future-readiness include developing working groups to discuss or plan for the future of work and having internal or external experts talk about the future of work at meetings or events. Future-ready organizations are also significantly more likely to pay for outside conferences or classes on the subject.
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