Written by Liselotte Lyngsø, Partner at Supertrends Institute
Are you ready to become a Body Language Coach for online meetings? Or a Bubble Buster? Jobs that no one saw coming when they graduated will shortly be knocking on our door. Baseline: We have to prepare to be rookies over and over again during our lives. These 10 jobs are likely to be invented from scratch as new technologies and new principles for the working place gather momentum.
From Leadership to Artmanship
During the corona crisis, companies and their employers have discovered that you don’t have to be physically present at the office in order to do your work. That tendency will continue to accelerate.
Studies from countries around the world show that young people don’t wish to spend their entire life working. Their career plan is not about titles and income. It’s about purpose and balance. They want to decide for themselves when, how and where they work. They don’t want to become time slaves. At the same time, they long for a caring community that provides them with proper feedback and attention. They are “socially organised individualists”. This is a gamechanger.
The winner companies will be those that manage to string together these seemingly opposing desires, while at the same time, maintaining their brand, culture, security, onboarding and innovation muscles. For sure, it’s going to demand completely new leadership approaches:
Leaders have to find the exact right combination of tasks, personalities, conditions and personal circumstances. It all has to come together.
Machines won’t master the skill of being you!
The expanding use of machines will automate and take over a lot of today’s jobs. This, however, will not exile or outsource humans from the labour market – rather the opposite. We will be extremely busy doing stuff that has not been invented yet.
Although machines will make many work tasks easier, there is a limit as to what they will be able to help us with. They won’t be capable of providing human skills such as empathy, curiosity, vision, ethics, laziness and humanity. It will be our job to be as talented as being human as possible while collaborating with the insights and support which the machines will provide.
The jobs of tomorrow will mirror the challenges facing humanity. Climate change, anxiety specifically amongst young people, integration of foreigners, taking care of the elderly, democratizing and improving education, fixing tele-medication etc. The endless challenges of everyday life combined with an ever-increasing level of expectations will offer us brand new occupations. We will look back at the 2020s and think gosh! We were so primitive back then.
Traditional professions will morph into new forms of value creation. What does this mean in real life? Accountants will we be replaced by algorithms and pattern recognition. Instead, their job will be to guide us to build our life and business as a good investment combining sound advice, clever money, motivation and insights from smart data. They’ll guide you away from stupid loans and poor decisions in the short run. And help you to invest in long term assets. Furthermore, they will ensure that the data is ethical, valid and understandable.
Cashiers of the future will be hired to create a nice atmosphere in the supermarkets, advise customers on what to cook for their next meal, spot trends from watching the customers and ensure that it’s always preferable and far more fun to go grocery shopping in the physical world as opposed to merely being online.
Even more important: New jobs will be invented. Today they seem just as farfetched and sci-fi like as being a Facebook moderator or a professional Youtuber did 20 years ago. But they all correspond to a world in flux demanding new skills.
1. Body Language Tuner
Trains you to give a rememberable impression online so that your customers remember you forever. Your way of expressing yourself has to be exaggerated at much as possible in order for it to travel through all the layers of a screen.
2. Personal Cleaner
Designs your SOME posts and appearance online so employers will love you. Sorts out all dirt, unfortunate pictures and bad publicity. Our digital footprint is gradually becoming more valuable than our material goods. It will become our ticket to everything we desire in the future.
3. Culture Fluffer
Ensures that everyone, including co-workers that are not physically present, feels valuable in the company. Takeaway, Friday bar, morning meeting coffee-kit, employee quizzes, playlists, photo albums, storytelling, mentoring and special mascots will be a part of developing the goal towards including everyone in the bigger picture.
4. I-tour-guide
As we travel less in the physical world, we will begin to travel much more into virtual simulations and games with our loved ones. The I-Tour guide ensures that the elements of the journey are adapted specifically to each individuals’ need for horror and excitement without compromising the participants’ desire to try new experiences together.
5. Virtual Background Designer
An authentic background tells the story about the person we meet. A picture says more than a thousand words right?
6. Bubble Buster
Surprises you with amazing insight and experiences that your own algorithms would never have found. Joy comes from the unexpected. From the things you didn’t see coming. The bubble buster gets you out of your comfort zone and gives your life a new boost.
7. Intimacy Coach
After all the distancing, masks, and latex gloves, it’ll be crucial to do something about skin hunger and zapper-mentality. An intimacy coach will train you to hug and be present without it feeling awkward. Giving feedback and talking about taboos in a place of trust, where it’s all about listening louder!
8. Food Dj
In a short while we’ll be able to taste through our phones. Tastes will be created in the exact right combination of salty, sweet, umami etc. A food DJ will make sure that this new potential reaches the takeaway industry, and that cooking will get to a whole new level. Maybe we’ll be able to create a tinder meetup – with a tasting function…?
9. Ethical Archaeologist
Digs through data to make sure that Al is behaving fairly or if it’s affected by biases of the past. Technically, everything is possible. An algorithm can suggest co-driving even though we hate it. Ethical archaeologists will help us set boundaries and lead the way in a world where everything is possible.
10. Chat Artist
We’ll move from keyboard searching to having chatbots that listen to us, gives us advice and orders what we need. A chat artist creates conversations that make people want to stay and talk about what they’re really searching for. It will democratize internet searching, so that we won’t have to speak or write foreign languages. Lastly, it will be a crucial weapon against Amazon, who’s about to take over the whole voice industry.
First published on the website of Future Navigator
Now we want to hear from you:
What jobs of the future can you imagine and more importantly: HOW can we prepare for these ‘future’ jobs today?
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