How Will You Earn Your Professional Wage in 2020?

I've worked for about 20 years as a Learning & Development professional, on an employed and now self-employed basis. But what does being a 'professional' mean? Just the fact I get paid for it, or does it mean I do it in some special way that a non-professional cannot? I have been thinking about this a lot recently as I am currently reading the brilliant 'The Future of Professions: How Technology Will Transform the Work of Human Experts' book written by father and son team Richard & Daniel Susskind.  Already a bestseller, I recommend it if you have people in your life whom rely on your ability to earn ‘as a professional’.

Did you know that more people signed up for Harvard's online courses in a single year, than have attended the actual university in its 377 years of existence? If you work as an education professional fighting for every penny of funding right, how on earth are you to compete with this? The book proposes that the 2020's will see enormous change to the way our professions will need to work as we see the impact of this new digital democracy (information available to all) play out in our increasingly virtual world. In my area, house prices are now more influenced by internet speed than the walking distance to the train station.

In my line of work, I get paid to help people learn practical and cognitive skills that (hopefully) facilitate their success and wellbeing at work.  In terms of the currency I trade in – knowledge, Google already has completely changed the way I need to work to continue adding value.  For if we can all access the same processed information, what value a training course? All things being well, I would like to still be able to work for at least another 20 years. So how does anyone working in the L&D world continue to add value as we see the world of learning transform? 

The key for me is the fact the internet provides 'processed information'. So there is still value to be added by presenting knowledge in way that is different from the internet. Just like with food, I believe there is a premium on Organic Knowledge- information either created from fresh or spiced in an unusual or tasty way. Knowledge needs to be presented in a way that evokes an emotion or sensation that is strong enough to be recalled at a useful moment at some point in the future. It is now not enough to just copy and paste stuff from Google onto a PowerPoint slide. Knowledge professionals need to plate up what we serve, because there’s now a whole buffet of free stuff right over there.

Just like LinkedIn has transformed the recruitment industry, the book serves as a wake-up call for the other established professions including legal, education, accountancy, medical and management consultancy professions. What are your thoughts on this? I am being asked to run more career planning workshops for organisations as people recognise the need for change to still add value amidst the apps, sites and systems. So I was pleased/relieved to see that my thinking aligns with the authors with regard to advice for parents or anyone embarking on their career right now.  I loved their simple advice on how we need to embrace one of two career strategies:

1) Compete with machines: look for jobs that are likely to favour human capabilities over Artificial Intelligence (AI). They summarise this as jobs requiring creativity and interpersonal skills, but check out my blog posts on this I've been focusing on precisely this sweet spot for over a year now.

2) Build the machines: look for jobs that that are directly involved in the design and delivery of these increasingly capable systems - e.g. systems engineer, data scientist or knowledge engineer.

These are three jobs that weren't around when I was first job-hunting in 1999. I find RoboHub’s and Ray Kurzweil’s weekly newsletters a great way of ‘plating up’ some knowledge around this new digital world. Whether a supplier or consumer of a profession, there is a new world of work that lies ahead of us all.

P.S The robots are coming…They can only get smarter and cheaper. How will you continue to add value in your profession?

Laura Thomson-Staveley is founder and leadership coach at Phenomenal Training and co-host of Secrets from A Coach podcast. For more information visit: phenomenaltraining.com and secretsfromacoach.com