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There seems to be a glut of them but William
Bridges isn’t your average American management
guru. The usual management clichés
like ‘excellence’, Vision’, ‘mission’ and
‘customer focus’ never pass his eloquent lips.
"Ducunt fata volentem, nolentem trahunt",
he writes at the end ‘c of his new book ‘Jobshift’.
"The Fate guide those who go willingly; those
who do not they drag ."
His thesis is that we are moving (or being
dragged) towards a future in which the job
as we know it won’t exist and we’ll all he
glorified temps and freelances. ‘The job’,
he says, is a surprisingly recent cultural
construct, spawned by the needs of the Industrial
Revolution bur now outmoded. Before the revolution
people did jobs – particular tasks or undertakings
– but they didn’t have jobs (a role or position
in an organisation). Nor did they define themselves
in terms of the job.
Now, as a result of the information technology
revolution and other pressures, we’re experiencing
another paradigm shift. The classic ‘job’
is disappearing, so is the conventional career.
Companies are moving towards new, much more
fluid arrangements to get work done. They
contract out more of their work, have fewer
direct employees, more temps and what Dr Bridges
describes as ‘contingent’ workers.
"The real bottom line," he says "is that
jobs are going away. That won’t happen all
at once, but every day more work is being
done outside the boundaries of the job-box
and by people who aren’t even employees. And
what are we doing? We’re scrambling after
jobs as though they were where the action
is. That’s fighting over deck chairs on the
Titanic."
The danger is that we won’t recognise the
truth of all this until it’s too late. We
should all, he says, heed the story of Balmung,
the magic sword that belonged to Siegfried,
the mythical German prince who got hold of
the Nibelungs’ treasure by slaying the dragon
that guarded it.
Balmung was so sharp that it could slice
an armoured warrior in two, from the top of
his helmet to the soles of his iron boots.
But the cut was so fine that the wounded man
could not even feel it. Until he moved. And
then he tell into two pieces."
The moral of the story us that those who
have jobs now may not spot that the ground
is moving under their feet. Like the warrior
they may feel that nothing has happened.
"But just wait until they leave their jobs!"
Is Bridges’ theory just immaculately-packaged
hot air, or something more serious? The consensus
seems to be that this particular guru has
got a substantial point.
"I think he’s on to something" says Colin
Ions, Human resources Director for the brewers
Courage. "I suspect he’s right that jobs as
we now know them will change fairly dramatically."
over the next few years, as people network
outside more, as people who are not permanently
based within the business bring more skills
ill. It’s all about the pace of change and
competing in a worldwide market. If we look
at the challenges from Korea and China, in
the terms of global economy, I think the UK
and Europe will have to change fairly radically
the way they organise work. "
Wendy Hirsh, Associate Director of Tile Institute
for Employment Studies, thinks that Bridges
has seen the future ...and it doesn’t work,
or at least not without a great deal of pain
and diffi- culty. Many companies may be aware
of the sort of issues Bridges is raising,
says Hirsh, but they haven’t really come to
terms with the implications of it all for
their own organisations.
"This is because structure in employment
– knowing what department you work in, what
job you do – is not just safe for the employee.
It feels very safe for senior management.
They feel they have more control in a traditional
structure and it’s the loss of control with
new ways of working that they find very frightening.
The threat to the senior mind-set is much
greater, it’s a threat to their feeling that
they have control over the organisation."
Cary Cooper, Professor of Organisational
Behaviour at UMIST (the University of Manchester
Institute of Science and Technology), an authority
on stress, worries that de-jobbing may be
a real threat to our well-being. People think
that the feel-bad’ factor that’s still around
despite Europe’s emergence from recession
is to do with job insecurity.
"But I think it’s deeper than that," says
Cooper. "It’s a fear that the nature of work
itself is so dramatically changing that if
people lose their job they’re going into a
freelance, contract culture...and they’re
frightened to death of it."
The ‘contract culture’ favours those with
an entrepreneurial mind. The survivors will
be the people who have marketable skills and
can sell themselves. It’s Social Darwinism’
of the highest order, says Cooper.
"The people who are entrepreneurial will
survive. The others, who may be extremely
talented and very skilled at their job but
who don’t network and are maybe less extroverted,
are the ones who’re unlikely to survive. As
an occupational psychologist I’m extremely
concerned for the wellbeing of those who have
to live in a contract, freelance culture.
I’m not worried about the entrepreneurial
types because they’re going to survive. But
how many of them are there, and what about
all the others who’re not, and how much talent
are we losing there?"
Bridges himself has no easy answers. "If
the coming of the Industrial Revolution is
any guide," he says, "we’re going to lose
a generation in the shift. And I don’t say
that in some tough-minded ‘We’ve got to knuckle
down and not be sentimental’ mood. In fact
I think one of the challenging questions for
the government and for corporations in their
social responsibilities and for all of us
is this: what do you do when the direction
that things are headed is producing enormous
casualties? We’re in a social movement which
is going to produce enormous casualties and
I think we’d be mistaken to pretend otherwise."
Jobshift, by William Bridges, Nicholas Brealey
Publishing, £16.99.
Be prepared. Assume your industry will
be the first, ." not the last, to be de-jobbed.
That way you won’t be caught unawares.
Read the runes. Constantly watch the
way your industry and its technology is
changing. IT in particular has been a
driver behind de-jobbing and will continue
to be a de-stabiliser.
Be businesslike. literally. Think of
yourself as if you’re in business for
yourself, even if you are still an employee.
Being a traditional loyal employee and,
in return, expecting a job for life are
no longer synonymous.
Get tough. Learn to live with high levels
of uncertainty. Find your security from
within rather than from outside.
learn to say "no". Contract workers and
freelances find it difficult to turn work
down, but you must set limits.
Be disciplined with money. When it’s
you rather than a company that’s looking
after things like tax and pensions it’s
easy (and dangerous) to let things slip.
"America has entered the age of the contingent
or temporary worker, of the consultant and
subcontractor. of the just-in-time workforce
– fluid, flexible, disposable. This is the
future. Its message is this: You are on
your own. For good (sometime>) and ill (often),
the workers of the future will constantly
have to sell their skills, invent new relationships
with employers who must, themselves, change
and adapt constantly in order to survive
in a ruthless global market." (Lance Morrow,
‘The Temping of America’. Time, 1993).
"I know that for every door that closes,
another door opens But, man! These hallways
are a bitch.’" (T-shirt motto).
The number of employees in the fortune
500 companies has halved in the last 20
years
of the 25.5 million UK people unemployed
in one way or another only 14.5 million
(57 per cent) are still in traditional
employment, working full time for n employer.
More than 6.6 million are part-timers,
another 3.3 million are self-employed
and 14 million are contract and casual
workers.
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