Did We Predict The Future?

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[00:01:46] Hi there! Welcome to Episode 600, a recruiting feature with me, Matt Alder.

[00:01:54] I launched recruiting feature 9 years ago to attempt to understand the future of talent

[00:02:00] acquisition. Back then, social media was the biggest driver of change and we were starting

[00:02:06] to realise how much new technologies would change the world. Predicting the future is always risky.

[00:02:13] However, if you approach things correctly, you can spot trends that will stick and get a sense

[00:02:20] of what's likely to happen. I'm actually launching a short digital course next month,

[00:02:25] to teach you some tools and techniques to do this. You can join the wait list for Early Access and

[00:02:31] a discount by going to mattolder.me slash course. Back to Episode 600. To celebrate this landmark,

[00:02:41] I invited my longtime collaborator and co-author, Mervindinnen, to a studio in London to explore

[00:02:48] just how accurate some of the predictions we made in a white paper back in 2006 about the

[00:02:54] future of work were. And to discuss what we think is going to happen over the next decade.

[00:03:00] There's also a video version of this podcast episode that you can find by following the link

[00:03:06] in the show notes. So Mervind, welcome back to the podcast. Thank you, Matt. It's a pleasure to

[00:03:13] be here. Episode 600, I thought about who can I have on the show? And I thought it has to be you

[00:03:19] because you've been on the show more times than anyone else. I don't even know how many times you've

[00:03:22] been on Recruiting Future but as ever, it's great to have you on the show. Now for anyone who

[00:03:29] might be listening and also watching because we're doing this one on video. We are. Could you

[00:03:35] introduce yourself and tell us what you do? Okay, my name is Mervindinnen. I co-author books with

[00:03:42] Matt. I co-author research reports with Matt. I'm an analyst, speaker. I have an HR podcast called

[00:03:49] HR Means Business which is part of the HR Happy Hour Network and I speak at events and I'm

[00:03:56] a apparently an influencer. I always say apparently because I know that to certain people I'm not

[00:04:02] an influencer like my family. Now it's tradition at this point whenever we do a video together that I

[00:04:07] make a comment about your excellent tasting shirts. So I'm going to say I love your shirt, well done

[00:04:12] for being a shirt influencer if nothing else. Thank you. Well I did think long and hard this morning

[00:04:19] over which shirts have I worn before when I've been on camera with you. Now obviously I'm very

[00:04:24] used to doing audio and don't do video more often. Looking to do more video moving forward as we

[00:04:30] get into the future episodes of the show. Now when I look back, celebrating 600 episodes of

[00:04:38] the podcast, been running the podcast for nine years now but really I had the idea about 10

[00:04:45] years ago. This is a kind of a 10 year celebration and other than my long-suffering wife who had to

[00:04:54] put up with hours and hours of me choosing theme tunes and talking about graphics and everything I was

[00:05:00] going to do with the podcast. You were the first person I told that I was starting a podcast.

[00:05:08] Do you remember that conversation? I do. It was in Starbucks, in London, in Holman actually for

[00:05:14] those in Holandon. We were talking about writing our first kind of report together and you told

[00:05:21] me that you were starting a podcast and I said what's one of them? And you explained to me

[00:05:28] and I said who's got time to listen to all of that. Well absolutely now I was very lucky that lots of

[00:05:33] people do and I can't really get any further without thanking everyone who has supported and

[00:05:39] listened to the podcast over. The 600 episodes feel very, very grateful and thank you very much for

[00:05:46] carrying on continuing to listen if you didn't listen there wouldn't be there wouldn't be 600 episodes

[00:05:51] but interestingly I mean you've got your own podcast now so that's how fast and things have

[00:05:55] how far things have moved on. Indeed indeed it became apparent to me a couple of years ago that

[00:06:01] this was the medium now when you mentioned it the only podcast I really knew were football fans

[00:06:09] and not very literate football fans who just used to seem to jump on a couple of microphones

[00:06:14] and burble away after a game. But now of course it's everything I mean it's how I find out my

[00:06:21] politics, my sport, what's going on in the world, what's happening in the world of HR,

[00:06:26] what's happening in the world of talent, its music, it's kind of it's the way we consume now.

[00:06:33] So we've been working together for about 10 years as well. In fact that conversation in Starbucks

[00:06:38] we were probably talking about some of the work that we wanted to do together. As you said

[00:06:44] we've written two books, Exceptional Talent and Digital Talent. We've done a lot of research papers

[00:06:50] for various organisations and a lot of speaking as well in various places all around the world so

[00:06:55] it also kind of occurred to me that it would be good to sort of reflect on you know reflect on

[00:07:00] those 10 years and also reflect on how things have changed over that 10 year period because recruiting

[00:07:06] feature is about the future every week I ask people for their for their predictions and I thought

[00:07:12] maybe a bit of accountability let's kind of look back and see what we were talking about 10 years

[00:07:16] ago. And what's come to pass, what hasn't come to pass, what can we learn from that and what might

[00:07:22] the next 10 years look like. Now what's helped us a lot in this is we were talking in a pub last night

[00:07:29] which is where we do most of our most of our most of our planning. And you remembered that we wrote

[00:07:35] a white paper about eight or nine years ago for a better name the organisation. For whatever reason

[00:07:43] they decided not to publish it. Now I think it was to do with a direct change in direction of

[00:07:47] their content strategy rather than quality of what we wrote. It was definitely that, it was definitely

[00:07:52] that. I've checked back today on emails and it was all going swimmingly but then there was an

[00:07:58] email saying about kind of a change of direction. Yeah, they paid us for it so they must have

[00:08:05] they must have thought it was okay. But it was all about the future of work. So basically in this

[00:08:10] white paper we predicted what the future of work would look like in 2026. Now it's 2024 so logic

[00:08:18] would dictate that we should be fairly far along with these predictions. So I thought it would be

[00:08:26] good to reflect on that and pick out a few other things that we talked about in the white paper.

[00:08:32] So I found it this morning and I sent it to you. I think you read it while you were doing

[00:08:36] well, you've been at a conference. What did you think when you reread what we wrote eight years ago

[00:08:43] about what would be happening kind of right now and over the next two years? My initial sort

[00:08:51] was that we could have written this a few weeks ago if somebody had said can you write us a white

[00:08:56] paper summing up kind of where we are at the moment and how things have changed over the last few

[00:09:02] years. I was surprised how in some respects spot on we were and that's not I don't mean to

[00:09:10] to kind of make a sound to visionary or anything but yeah, I think we because we did we spent a long

[00:09:17] time talking to each other bouncing ideas off each other what the future might be and like

[00:09:22] challenging each other like well if that's going to be the future how do we get there and what do

[00:09:26] we need and yeah, I mean I know the paper the draft went down well and it yeah, I'm not having

[00:09:33] thought about it for a good few years. I was surprised reading it earlier today that it's kind of

[00:09:40] some of the conversations we're having now and that I've been having as you said I've been an

[00:09:43] event this afternoon where we're looking at kind of in some respects how the last 10 years

[00:09:50] recruitment tonnit acquisitions evolved over the last 10 years and you know

[00:09:55] we were predicting some of that stuff. Yeah, I was quite shocked to be honest I was like this is

[00:10:02] um this is some of this is quite uncanny some of it's a bit way off and all well it's only fair

[00:10:06] that we draw attention to some of these things as well because they may happen still in the future.

[00:10:10] Well we've got two years left that's the that's the ultimate get out jail with this. I think

[00:10:15] I think there's something interesting there about trends and how you predict the future which

[00:10:19] I will kind of come back to later in the conversation but before before we get there let's actually

[00:10:25] talk about some of the things that we talked about in the you know in the white paper so just

[00:10:30] just kind of looking at my notes. The first big one which was the first kind of the first section

[00:10:34] was it was all about jobs and all about how people would do work and really it was about

[00:10:42] focusing on tasks, not jobs. So people using their skills um you know to do various parts of

[00:10:48] you know parts of roles not necessarily um you know focusing on job descriptions or those kind

[00:10:53] of things anymore. We also talked about the the death of the degree that degrees would become

[00:10:59] you know more and more unfashionable when it came to deciding who was fit to do a job

[00:11:04] apart from obviously very um you know very specific vocational qualifications and we talked

[00:11:11] about continuous learning. Now reading it it sounded like a bit that you wrote so tell us

[00:11:19] what what were you thinking then what do you think now what's happened in between?

[00:11:24] Well at the time I was I was say trying to forecast the future and it it became I suppose some

[00:11:32] of the conversations I was having at the time uh breaking it down to the first bits that tasks

[00:11:37] which I believe that nowadays the word is fractional um I wouldn't have I wouldn't have thought

[00:11:42] that word ten years ago um but that um in terms of projects in terms of even a basic a basic thing

[00:11:50] like creating a report um it wouldn't necessarily be the one or two people creating a project there

[00:11:56] would be lots of input from people you would get specialists in who um you know maybe we're specialist

[00:12:02] in certain areas that uh you might not have the right level skill at so it'd be a lot more collaborative

[00:12:10] um a lot more people probably inputting into projects and people would um there was this kind

[00:12:16] of not no magic but I was I was involved in our simulation last year uh with with an organization

[00:12:23] that was trying to look at future work patterns and some of that was around the future workforce

[00:12:28] and working from anywhere and not not doing projects but just inputting bits of things you know

[00:12:35] that I'll do that I'll do I'll I'll research that bit for for you and uh there are people you know

[00:12:42] who are making a career out of this now um yeah this is my specialization you know you're the go to

[00:12:49] person on x um and you know x yeah inside out um and people will go to you because they want to hear

[00:12:57] about x but the fact you might not know that much about y and z doesn't matter that much because

[00:13:02] they can speak to somebody who knows that much about why yeah I think it's interesting and certainly

[00:13:08] um as you say with things like you know fractional hiring and some of the innovation that's going on

[00:13:14] in you know what we would previously have called contract recruitment that's certainly the case

[00:13:20] do you think this is happening in there because I think one of the things about this white paper is

[00:13:24] we're very broad brush about it we sort of come up with these predictions and seem to imply that

[00:13:28] everyone will be everyone will be doing this and I think that um you know eight years on we

[00:13:34] would always be much more nuanced about how um the these kind of changes would would kind of spread

[00:13:40] through the the working population and things like that so we're kind of very much this is what

[00:13:44] everyone's going to be gonna be doing how much do you think that that has changed in you know

[00:13:52] in full-time work in the sort of the the employers that you that you speak to how are they looking at

[00:13:57] skills and tasks and and those kind of things I think that skills and have been kind of top of mind

[00:14:07] I would say over the last year or two we talk about the skills agenda we talk about skills based

[00:14:14] um we look at people developing skills skills based assessments and I think that the the

[00:14:23] the emerging generation in the workforce they understand that their roles are going to be

[00:14:28] chopping and changing they have lived through a number of changes and they know that they have

[00:14:35] to be top of mind with specific I think specific skills specific areas of of of knowledge

[00:14:42] but the thing is that they want the information so you know they want access to the knowledge

[00:14:47] and information as in when they need it um and I think that this is we would have looked at

[00:14:53] I suppose learning as opposed to training as something slightly more I suppose you know a global

[00:15:02] I don't mean in terms of region but in for you know you learn all about a topic whereas I think

[00:15:08] what we're seeing are people who are very specialist in certain areas and their knowledge is very

[00:15:12] deep in certain areas within a topic but might not be that strong in other areas I suppose a bit

[00:15:19] like some of it's the medical profession I mean you've got people who specialize in very specific

[00:15:23] areas of medicine um who probably know enough to tell you look you've got a headache because of

[00:15:28] this and this is what you take but ultimately you know they're the people you go to for very specific

[00:15:34] problems um and those there are as a specialization and I think in terms of what we do now in

[00:15:41] terms of the world of work and how it changes we are developing people who are very specialist

[00:15:48] in certain areas of knowledge certain capabilities when it comes to AI, when it comes to

[00:15:55] programming the tech or whatever so yeah I mean I we possibly didn't predict that but we saw

[00:16:01] something like that coming reading it again today yeah I think that's interesting and there's

[00:16:06] a few things I'm actually doing a research project into where employers are with skills based

[00:16:12] thinking at the moment and I talk about that a little bit more when we talk about the the the future

[00:16:17] but what is interesting and what's very apparent at the moment is you know we talk about skill shortages

[00:16:24] but what we're also seeing is the shortening of skills so um you know I've had various conversations

[00:16:30] with um chief people officers and heads of learning development heads of capability

[00:16:35] to a leaders in the last few weeks and what really comes across is this this very short shelf life

[00:16:41] of skills and how that affects everything from you know learning development to teleacquisition

[00:16:46] I asked people to actually put a time on it in some cases we're coming back as six months

[00:16:50] it's like we have skills that are only valid for six months before they they go out of date and I think

[00:16:55] what's interesting and what we did say in the white paper was it's about recruiting people based on

[00:17:01] their ability to learn and their ability to um you know have that self-directed learning and learn

[00:17:06] those um learn those new skills and I think that's that's very much what what we're seeing right now

[00:17:12] I mean in the white paper for some reason we talk about we're talking about new skills that people

[00:17:15] might lead and there's a whole bit about zumba yoga in there which is it yoga I don't even know

[00:17:20] what it is is that even still a thing I'm not sure yoga is a thing is a fact is a

[00:17:26] possibly possibly yes in fact the conference I've been at today had sessions of desk yoga

[00:17:33] for people to uh learn practice for when they're sitting at desks we had a neck massage

[00:17:42] in a chair um so these things are very I mean the whole well-being um that's probably something

[00:17:49] we didn't um for see ten years ago but the rise of I think well-being and you know the need

[00:17:56] for organizations to support the well-being and the mental health of their people I mean that's

[00:18:02] been a big yeah I know it's another area but that's obviously been a big growth thing particularly

[00:18:06] over the last four to five years absolutely you know was circled back to that in a minute because

[00:18:11] I think that that could be really relevant to the conversation about the future moving on to

[00:18:16] the the next topic which was called where people will work and you know this feels like

[00:18:22] the big slam dunk because um you know we talk about remote work and people not being in the office

[00:18:28] and working from home or working from anywhere and all those kind of things now in fairness that was

[00:18:35] not us being amazing sooth sayers because it was very much based on a trend that we were seeing

[00:18:41] at the time both of us work flexibly in work from home so it wasn't a stunning prediction

[00:18:48] but obviously the pandemic has sort of accelerated that beyond the place that I think we could have

[00:18:53] reasonably thought that it would get to yes back in 2014 I gave a presentation at a conference

[00:19:01] funny enough the the same conference I've been at today but it was the version ten years ago

[00:19:08] and in it I showed pictures of a webinar that you and I did for an HR magazine

[00:19:15] which you were sitting at your home in Scotland the magazine were sitting in their offices

[00:19:20] and I was sitting on the terrace of a hotel in Mexico I did the entire webinar with you

[00:19:29] um and nobody knew I was in Mexico at the very end I said actually I've been doing this from

[00:19:37] Mexico and it was like you know there's some comments online like shock but I mean it was yeah

[00:19:44] and so it's again it's not it's not something that's brand new but I think that

[00:19:51] it's something that's obviously been crystallized and it's something that's a bit of a

[00:19:56] there's almost it's it's it's a child's version of culture wars about the you know work from home

[00:20:04] where the remote hybrid flexible asynchronous working but you know what we could see that then

[00:20:12] certainly I've been working from home for 10 11 years effectively working from home as have you

[00:20:21] I think what's interesting is we also did some research in 2017 18 where we we surveyed 14,000

[00:20:29] job seekers if you remember across 10 European countries and one of the areas we asked in questions

[00:20:36] in was about remote working we actually wrote a report on it which didn't get published

[00:20:42] but I still have as a theme there's a fear well no I think it might have been published

[00:20:47] yeah we're called is the future of work at home when we wrote that in 2018 so the I mean that

[00:20:56] I take stats out of that when I'm speaking now and say you know the pandemic didn't create this

[00:21:01] all it did was accelerate trends are already there and actually put it much clear up the agenda

[00:21:07] for discussion but there's still you know I mean this debate will go on and on

[00:21:13] yeah and I think there's two there's two parts of that I mean I think that the debate about

[00:21:21] our returning to the office are we working from home you know all this kind of things as you say

[00:21:26] HR's version of the of the culture wars and you know we're starting to see some figures around

[00:21:33] productivity and those kind of things employees pushing back against returned office mandates so

[00:21:40] you know this is going to run and run and run I think the the the emotive part of this

[00:21:47] is the use of the word home because it implies some kind of reward it implies that you're taking

[00:21:54] the day off that you're sitting in front of TV working and if everyone knows that's not that's not

[00:21:59] the case and I think if we talked instead about people working from the best play they're working in

[00:22:06] the best environment for them to do the work they've got to do I think that might shift the debate

[00:22:12] slightly because it might take that kind of emotion out of it the other point really comes down

[00:22:18] to what we said in the report which was we talk about virtual working that's that's the phrase

[00:22:23] that we use and there's a line in there saying that it will need a different skill set from workers

[00:22:30] and from managers in terms of you know how they work together how they collaborate but also

[00:22:38] how they maintain their culture how they train new people and I think what's interesting because

[00:22:43] we took such a big shift with the pandemic that bit we're still rushing to catch up with that bit

[00:22:49] and I think that's still part of the big unanswered questions about how this how this pans out

[00:22:55] because we haven't had time to develop those skills or think about some of solving some of those

[00:23:00] problems and the shortcut that lots of people use is let's get everyone back in the office because

[00:23:05] everything was great when people were back in the office and you know that's not the case so

[00:23:10] it's kind of interesting from from from that perspective it was I mean it was everything was great

[00:23:14] when people were back in the office for certain people probably for managers and leaders

[00:23:20] but I'm sure there are plenty of workers 10 years ago thinking yeah I could sit at home and do

[00:23:26] this I don't need to do the commute and I think that there is a big I always point to the to do

[00:23:34] a connection and certainly people who are newer into the workforce they learn a lot from interaction

[00:23:40] from being with people from connection just being able to ask somebody who's more experienced

[00:23:45] also you've got the question which never gets spoken about a dedicated space so you know you

[00:23:52] I we work from home we've got a room we can shut the door nobody disturbs us you go into

[00:24:00] our home where there maybe I keep saying younger not younger but but flat chairs or working

[00:24:06] from home and they're they're the group that spend the day working in their bedroom the night sleeping

[00:24:12] in their office effectively so it's a very different thing and we it's I think how we bring the

[00:24:19] collaboration in and it isn't always Zoom calls so there is a need to I think collaborate and get

[00:24:25] together socially as well as overwork so there's still a lot to iron out but yeah I mean

[00:24:34] we did foresee that people who are doing primarily and have to say they're obviously for the majority

[00:24:41] something like 62 63% of the workforce in the UK certainly you know working from home is not an

[00:24:47] option they have very location based working but for those the noisy minority who can have

[00:24:56] location or flexibility about their work yeah it's obviously something which is very top of mind

[00:25:02] and it's almost like a right that they've won through the pandemic that they don't want to give up

[00:25:07] yeah exactly it's like you know once you kind of let this out of the box you know you can't

[00:25:12] bit the box but whatever it is you can't put it back in and it's interesting you say that as well

[00:25:17] because one of the things that we talked about was this whole idea I mean at the time social

[00:25:22] networking was the was the knee big thing it was all you know we're all social recruiting social

[00:25:28] recruiting Facebook Twitter as was you know that was that that was the kind of the main topic of

[00:25:33] conference conversation and in this white paper we talked about the the face-to-face social network

[00:25:41] that need for connection and it's interesting we kind of cite we work at the time as somewhere

[00:25:47] where people could some of our people could gather and you know build that kind of face-to-face

[00:25:52] connection in a in a kind of a meaningful and thoughtful sort of way and I suppose it's really

[00:26:00] interesting to me in terms of how that sort of pans out over the next few years with companies I

[00:26:05] think we're seeing some some interesting things companies having set days in the office remodeling

[00:26:10] their offices to give people the space to do what it is they come into the office to do and yeah

[00:26:18] I think it's something that it will be interesting to see how how that how that develops

[00:26:24] maybe not the kind of a third point I want to pick up from the white paper before we before we

[00:26:29] talk about the future and that was about recruitment it was about how people would be how people

[00:26:35] would be recruited so looking at my notes there's a few things a few things that we said we were talking

[00:26:40] obviously a lot about skills we were very much of the opinion that people would win digital badges

[00:26:47] for their skills they would be rated by their peers and we talk about the the recruitment market being

[00:26:55] tinder that people would swipe left or swipe right and make instant decisions about about people so

[00:27:03] that's interesting I don't see recruitment tinder popping up you know popping up in quite

[00:27:11] that way no but I will say that historically and tinder was obviously relatively new and it

[00:27:19] obviously had certain connotations because of how it was used but if I think back and I've been

[00:27:25] in and around the recruitment sector for most of my working life you know I mean you would get

[00:27:32] somebody be in an agency or a hiring manager in a business with a part of CVs is no no no you know

[00:27:40] so they weren't swiping but they would look at no it hasn't got the right experience from just reading

[00:27:44] a few lines on a CV so that's that's kind of always been there yeah but it's yeah I mean the tinderisation

[00:27:53] of recruitment in the popular use of the word tinder obviously hasn't happened thankfully

[00:28:04] it's interesting it's probably the bit that we're we're still at t is left and we'll talk about

[00:28:09] we'll talk about the future in a in a second but it's probably the area that that bit is

[00:28:13] probably where we were kind of most off in terms of what was what was going to go on um we also

[00:28:20] I talk about the bit that we might have got right in that in a second but we also talk about the

[00:28:24] the death of the CV now I first wrote a blog post called the death of the CV in about 2003

[00:28:32] and um here we are it's still it still lives on and you know looking to the future again we'll talk

[00:28:40] about this in a second I think we might have finally reached the point where we're getting towards

[00:28:44] that but but to the point today where um you know CVs are still used we've got all kinds of great

[00:28:51] assessment tools and new ways of thinking about um you know talent and recruiting that are kind

[00:28:55] of knocking on the door and may well um you know revolutionize um things in the next 10 years

[00:29:01] why do you think we're still stuck with the CV and you know why do you think some of the

[00:29:06] fundamentals of recruiting haven't changed even though everyone complains about them

[00:29:11] predicts their imminent death and agrees that they're not as efficient they're they're not

[00:29:16] necessarily the best way of selecting people I think it's because historically the way we begin

[00:29:25] to assess or to shortlist or whatever when a role comes up is by it's a bit of a like a child's

[00:29:34] blanket really a comfort blanket um this is a list of what people say they can do uh obviously it

[00:29:42] can be where they've worked it can be that you know the the achievements they say that they've done

[00:29:47] or the skills they specifically have um but it we are some way although having said that um

[00:29:56] uh we're we're we're having this discussion at a time when AI is the only thing you can talk about

[00:30:03] and how it's going to change the word and recruiteless recruiting humanless HR and all of that

[00:30:09] the CV still remains I suppose the the skills portfolio not for everybody there'll be lots of

[00:30:16] people working in lots of creative sectors who will have a portfolio as opposed to a list of

[00:30:22] skills achievements and things that they've done um but the the it's still unfortunately the

[00:30:30] the way of hiring uh still comes back to that and the way you apply you tend to have to fill in

[00:30:39] either places you've worked or things you've done or skills you've got or projects you've worked on

[00:30:44] um and at the moment there's no uh there's no way maybe AI will just read all our phones or something

[00:30:51] and and and at some stage they'll say finally somebody who lives within 50 miles of of here um

[00:30:59] who's done all these things at work and there'll be some piece of code that will go to everybody's

[00:31:04] phones can see all our emails because see all our WhatsApp messages and say now you don't

[00:31:08] want to speak to this lot because they they say they've done it but I haven't because I've seen

[00:31:12] all their messages and I've seen their daily conversations and stuff these people are doing it

[00:31:16] so I did it could be it could be something dystopian future where where

[00:31:21] something like that happened well you more more on that in a minute as we make our predictions

[00:31:26] for the for the next 10 years the one thing in the recruitment section that did really ring true

[00:31:31] though is we talked about talent marketplaces we talked about marketplaces for skills and

[00:31:35] marketplaces for for for for talent and that's certainly something that we have seen you know whether

[00:31:41] that's the the gig market play the the gig marketplaces or you know marketplaces for for

[00:31:46] fractional talent marketplace thinking when it comes to talent skills I mean that is definitely

[00:31:51] um definitely a trend that is you know growing stronger you know growing stronger at the moment

[00:31:58] yes yeah it it it is because the the I suppose most most roles now I wouldn't say boils down to

[00:32:07] but I mean what what what people you know when there's a new role or they need to bring somebody in

[00:32:14] they I think more organizations are now thinking about we you know it used to be we need someone who's

[00:32:20] done this this this in an organization like ours and now a lot a lot more conversations are we

[00:32:27] need someone these skills and it's going to be about how we assess those skills or how how we

[00:32:33] determine how strong those skills are absolutely so let's talk about let's talk about the future

[00:32:41] so let's talk about the the next 10 years and you know so we're looking forward to 2034 so

[00:32:48] in 10 years time if there's such a thing as podcast still we can you know sit sit sit in another

[00:32:54] studio and look back on the things that we that we that we talked about I think it's really

[00:32:59] interesting because I think we are at such an interesting moment I think to me 2024 is the the start

[00:33:05] of a cost of some significant much quicker trip much quicker change um you know the acceleration of

[00:33:11] some of the trends that we've already spoken about um we mentioned AI once in the report kind of in

[00:33:17] in in passing um all in the same we mentioned it in the same sentence where we said that um when

[00:33:22] we were talking about remote work all our meetings would be in virtual reality which um you know

[00:33:27] despite Mark Zuckerberg's best efforts and billions of pounds we're not we're not quite we're not

[00:33:31] quite there yet yeah um so we mentioned AI once but AI is obviously this this massive kind of

[00:33:36] force accelerator and I think the reason that I think 2024 is the cost of some some very very

[00:33:44] fast change particularly in talac position I think there's four there's four reasons for it

[00:33:49] obviously the first one is the technology um you know in the last 12 months we've seen

[00:33:54] with generative AI and everything that's happened just how quickly things are moving forward

[00:33:59] and how much it's reset our expectations about what's possible um the sheer amount of money

[00:34:06] that's now being invested into the AI space from um you know from from the big tech companies

[00:34:12] from new startups from governments you know it's inevitable that we're going to see some massive

[00:34:18] technology leaks forward that um we can't even guess or anticipate anticipate at um right now so

[00:34:24] that's that's kind of one of the forces I think the other force is talent as um I kind of said

[00:34:30] earlier in the conversation this kind of not just skills shortages but there's shortening of skills

[00:34:35] and that's only going to get more acute and I think that makes employers pause and think about

[00:34:42] the talent in their organizations and what does talent actually mean and how do we get those skills

[00:34:47] that we that we need so that's the second one um I think the third one is productivity and

[00:34:54] I've noticed that this has become a very big theme it's becoming a bigger theme this year

[00:35:00] with lots of organizations you've got people like McKinsey's writing about it um you know

[00:35:04] it's kind of cropping up all over the place that we're at such a kind of a difficult economic time

[00:35:10] but we've got this huge revolution in AI lots of organizations are looking at increasing productivity

[00:35:19] as a way of growing and the part of that is is fry things like automation and rethinking jobs

[00:35:26] and skills that's that's another force I think the fourth force is the job seekers themselves um

[00:35:32] you know we're seeing lots of very annoyed people talking about just how bad the recruitment

[00:35:36] processes and you know there was something on the um I noticed something on the on the social media

[00:35:42] today about someone you know going on TV and saying it was the right thing to ghost interviews not

[00:35:47] turn up because employers don't treat um candidates properly so why should you turn up to their

[00:35:51] interview which seems a little bit kind of self-defeating but it's interesting that that's a mainstream

[00:35:56] that's a mainstream conversation but the critical thing is AI is for everyone and if you're looking

[00:36:02] for a job there are already AI tools on the market that will allow you to bulk apply in a very

[00:36:08] very targeted way and there's scenarios that that breaks recruitment systems in terms of you know

[00:36:14] things like um being able to select on CVs and things like that so lots and lots of change um coming up

[00:36:21] in those um in those sort of four four forces so you know let's make some predictions where do we

[00:36:28] think we're kind of going in in in in those ten years so I suppose starting with that

[00:36:32] starting with that skills bit and the way companies think about skills and talent what are your

[00:36:36] what are your thoughts on that um it will evolve I mean everything involves at the moment

[00:36:45] there's a trillion dollar tech industry that that thrives on everything evolving and changing

[00:36:51] and iterating um so I mean it will you know I did the it it it won't go back I mean I sometimes joked

[00:37:01] with a couple of people I know um who just had enough of all this world so you know you want to

[00:37:06] wake up one more and you find it's all over there are no smartphones there are no there is no internet

[00:37:11] and kind of it it and somebody said oh that would be great but um you know I mean for the majority

[00:37:18] of people on the planet this is the way of life and for probably two if not three generations it's

[00:37:25] all they've known um it's all they've known from adolescence um so I think this isn't going to change

[00:37:33] whether or not at some stage there is some settling down where where all of all of the knowledge all

[00:37:40] of the stuff we can do um is done and it's a way of how we integrate it into our daily lives

[00:37:48] um I don't know but at the moment yes there is always a rush for the next thing you know what's

[00:37:55] going to come next and we need somebody that's we need someone that's future facing or someone

[00:37:59] that understands this somebody can develop with us some you know there will always be the need

[00:38:03] for that if I think back to uh earlier days in my career as I started life as an accountant as I

[00:38:09] say in some interviews that was a bit of a mismatched career for me but um uh no I mean I did okay

[00:38:17] but I mean I was bored um but I mean yeah I mean you had people who were very happy just doing that

[00:38:24] and built a whole lives out of just doing bookkeeping and stuff um but the the I think now it's there is

[00:38:31] a bit of a you know we're more restless you know I think the the there was in this simulation I

[00:38:39] did last year where we're looking at Gen Z or the the alpha gen or whatever they're going to be called

[00:38:43] it was like rootless and stateless it was kind of they have no you know they come up from anywhere

[00:38:48] in the world on anything that have no particular loyalty to a place to an organization to a

[00:38:54] specialism it's their loyalty to their skills if you like and their knowledge and and kind of how

[00:38:59] they want to live their lives and so I think there will be an element of of people who are doing part

[00:39:05] of a project but you don't you don't meet them you don't know where they are you don't they're just

[00:39:09] filing it in choice say in the old journalist vernacular I think it's quite an exciting time because so

[00:39:15] much is changing all the time but I think at the moment we're talking about AI and what it can do

[00:39:21] all the time but this is almost like the first or second iteration of it you know we we don't know

[00:39:27] what it's going to be doing you know in five years time yeah I think that's the that that's

[00:39:31] thing I'd listen to a really interesting podcast interview between Bill Gates and Sam Orman

[00:39:38] talking about AI and Sam Orman says something about you know the next five to ten years we're

[00:39:43] going to see this rapid development in AI and what it can do so if you've got more than five

[00:39:49] years left in your career this is this is going to this is going to affect you which I think is an

[00:39:53] interesting interesting way of thinking about it in our book digital talent we wrote about something

[00:40:00] that we called total talent thinking which was which was kind of the the next sort of thought

[00:40:06] process along from this thinking about skills and work and jobs and things like that and tell

[00:40:12] talent thinking is all about how all of the disparate silos of HR you know come together to think

[00:40:19] about talent and skills holistically within the organization there's no delineation between

[00:40:26] full-time workers gig workers fractional workers there's a sense that all this not all the skills

[00:40:31] will be provided by humans and actually HR talent acquisition look look kind of very different in

[00:40:40] that in that model do you think that's something that we're going to see accelerating the next few

[00:40:46] years without doubt I mean total talent thinking we wrote about as you say in a book two years ago now

[00:40:54] as at the time of this conversation but it's kind of now it's kind of it's to me it's the main

[00:41:04] it is the main thing to talk about I mean I was talking about it today every time I speak about whether

[00:41:10] it's an event or on a webinar I bring it in because it's very much of the moment it's very much

[00:41:16] of bringing it as you say that the almost the disparate parts of skills knowledge capability

[00:41:22] together whether it's it's you know full-time part-time you know whether it's it's AI whether it's

[00:41:31] it's about output it's about how we how we get the skills together to create the output we need

[00:41:38] and I suppose the historical employment structures don't really fit it.

[00:41:47] Now we're we're starting to enjoy our time because if we don't stop seeing this interview we'll

[00:41:51] go on for 10 years and then we can see what we predicted at the beginning and whether it's come

[00:41:56] through at the end there's just one more thing I want to touch on before I kind of ask you

[00:42:00] a final question and ask myself a final a final question being human you know you talked about

[00:42:06] well-being earlier you know we've talked about AI we talked about automation we've talked about

[00:42:11] you know people becoming disestablished from companies and cultures how do we how do we

[00:42:18] where's humanity in all of this where's humanity in work in the in the future how do we be

[00:42:24] human and how what role can employers play in that. Interesting because I had a podcast conversation

[00:42:31] in America a few months ago and we were talking about this kind of you know if we've got

[00:42:35] recruitalist recruiting we'll have humanless HR and I said that the HR's role was to put the

[00:42:41] humanity back into it and it you know we're still people and yes it might be people we might

[00:42:50] be collaborating on a project with people will never meet never see but there's still you know each

[00:42:57] person yeah we are living breathing beings humanity is important we aren't machines we aren't bits of

[00:43:05] code and I think that's for most organizations moving forward that's going to be a very defining factor

[00:43:14] in if people want to work with them and it's not even down to how much people learn from it how much

[00:43:20] you're going to pay me to do this project or anything it's it's you know and it's how how am I going to

[00:43:26] feel you know are you an organization that I feel like I'm associated with I feel I want to give my

[00:43:33] time to there's a lot of stuff you've seen in a presentation we both gave in the US last year

[00:43:38] I was talking about moral burnout and that the emerging generation in particular don't want to work

[00:43:44] for organizations who they feel I don't conduct themselves in the right way who don't stand for

[00:43:51] the things they believe it and so there will be I think a lot more of the you know for HR

[00:43:57] it's the humanity it's the I can only explain it as that it's always not bringing the human

[00:44:06] into it but understanding people you know and that is recognition that is supporting well-being

[00:44:13] that is doing things like mental health that is just knowing that productivity is key it's key

[00:44:21] and productivity underlines all of that because if some of the other areas aren't right then productivity

[00:44:25] isn't and it's almost freeing people of the shackles of some of the day to day not structures but

[00:44:34] some of the day to day things they do around work almost freeing them from that to be able to

[00:44:40] do their own work feel that sense of achievement and not feel under pressure

[00:44:47] yeah I think that's interesting and going back to the white paper from eight years ago we talk

[00:44:53] about humans being this this concierge this this kind of gargine of the experience the you know

[00:45:00] the role that they will play and that obviously you know feeds very much into what you're what

[00:45:05] you're saying there so final question sort of topic it's quite easy to sit here and talk about

[00:45:13] what things will be like in ten years time because first of all we've got ten years for it to happen

[00:45:19] and then as we've done today you can kind of look back and you know post-rationalize everything

[00:45:24] and all those kind of things what's very difficult is to predict exactly what's going to happen

[00:45:30] in a years time or over the next year now in about 12 months episode 700 of the podcast will drop

[00:45:39] unless I get up to three episodes a week or five episodes a week then it might be and might

[00:45:43] be a bit quicker but but let's work on let's work on 12 months how far do you and I'll answer this

[00:45:49] question as well because that's only fair but you can go first because it's my podcast how far do

[00:45:55] you think we'll have come on this journey in the next 12 months honestly and obviously I've

[00:46:04] got to look back at this in 12 months time further than we think but not as far as we or

[00:46:12] further than we we hope and but not as far as we think we could go because I think there are

[00:46:19] still there are factors that hold us back than a cultural yeah I think that we have

[00:46:30] it's an interesting time because we have people staying in the workforce for longer

[00:46:37] and choosing to stay in the workforce for longer which is something that we probably you know

[00:46:43] have not had before I mean you know historically certainly our parents and more recent cohorts it's

[00:46:51] you know you work hard do as safe as much as you can however you do it to get to that point where

[00:46:57] it's oh every time now I can I've got times mine but most people are not interested in retiring

[00:47:04] most people and there was suffering in the FT like last week about this about how people are

[00:47:10] choosing to work on and some who have particularly in the pandemic some who who took the opportunity

[00:47:16] to say you know what I can pull out now are now going back to work not not 95 in an office obviously

[00:47:23] because we now have these fractional ways of working but can lend their knowledge lend their insight

[00:47:28] lend their skills and actually enjoy it so I think that it will be a a fractured workplace in that

[00:47:36] respect is there will be lots of different you know the skills the knowledge the actual way that

[00:47:43] work is done will come from different people working under different arrangements all getting

[00:47:50] something different from it so I think it will take time but as I said it's kind of

[00:47:57] further than we think but not as far as we hope that's a that's a great sitting on a friend's answer

[00:48:04] yeah I mean well I suppose I you know I'll obviously you know I'll obviously second that

[00:48:10] I think there's a couple of things I'd say though so I'm actually writing a kind of a mini

[00:48:14] white paper at the moment about you know 10 ways that AI might change talent acquisition and I

[00:48:20] think it will probably be available by the time by the time this this podcast comes out and with each

[00:48:26] one of them you know big revolution you can see how it's going to happen the technologies either

[00:48:31] there or we'll be there soon but each one comes with a complication you know each one comes with

[00:48:36] a complication there are there's legislation coming in around AI and what it can do in recruitment

[00:48:41] in fact if you live in New York state there is already they're already laws about transparency in AI

[00:48:48] and I think every single change comes with complicating factors and it's difficult to

[00:48:54] predict how they will pan out and perhaps slow some of the things that we think will happen

[00:49:00] down somewhat or even in some cases speed them up what I think that we can be clear about though

[00:49:07] I think in 12 months time there will be a much bigger sense of urgency about

[00:49:14] TAHR and the effect that AI is having on it because I think that you know as every week pass passes

[00:49:22] there will be new innovations you know new directions from companies that will really sharpen

[00:49:30] people's focus on this because you know this isn't this is not going to go away this is going to

[00:49:36] change everything the speed of change is going to get quicker there are complications I remember when

[00:49:43] Gen AI sort of first came into public consciousness about 18 months ago there were you know well respected

[00:49:51] technology commentators predicting that everyone would be out of a job within six months and

[00:49:55] obviously that's not happened um but you know the that that that that that speed of travel

[00:50:02] it is there and I think that if we look back into a month's time there will be a far bigger

[00:50:07] sense of urgency about things by the time we get to episode 700 but for episode 600 that's it

[00:50:15] so mervin thank you very much as ever for joining me

[00:50:19] Matt as ever thank you very much for having me on the show it's been a pleasure

[00:50:24] and in a year's time I'll look back on this and think oh I didn't say that yeah

[00:50:30] thanks for talking to me it's pleasure as always

[00:50:34] my thanks as ever to mervin and a huge thank you to all of you who listen to the show

[00:50:39] and just to give you the web address for the course wait list again

[00:50:42] it's matt alder dot me slash course that's matt alder dot me slash course don't forget there's

[00:50:50] also a video version of this podcast episode I'll put the link to that in the show notes you can

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[00:51:20] everything that's coming up on the show thanks very much for listening I'll be back next time

[00:51:26] and I hope you'll join me