Author_Institution :
EraNova Inst., Mountain Lakes, NJ, USA
Abstract :
White-collar work is increasingly being automated, or "off-peopled," just as happened with farming and manufacturing work. To survive, workers will need to develop skills that can\´t be performed by machines. As information technology automates white- and blue-collar functions alike, most of the remaining jobs as we know them are being transferred into all-electronic systems. A new class of jobs has yet to be named: work involving hard automating hyper-human skills that go beyond know-how. The right strategy is as know-how gets easier and easier to store and apply through networks and automatic systems, the winning strategy is to move up from know-how work to "hyper-human" or "meta-mental" work, which consists of those functions that computers cannot easily replicate. In order to move to a hyper-human future, we need to mobilize, hyper-human skills right now: clear, sensible thinking as well as caring, responsible goal setting, planning, and determination.
Keywords :
human factors; multiskilling; personnel; automatic system; blue-collar function; electronic transfer; farming work; hyper-human skill; information technology automation; know-how service worker; manufacturing work; meta-mental work; off-peopled; planning; responsible goal setting; sensible thinking; white-collar work; winning strategy;