Challenge Convention

Challenging convention is the practice of going against and challenging the common assumptions that our organizations have been built on. For the better part of a hundred years our organizations have remained relatively unchanged. Employees commute an hour each way to get to their cubicles while feeling disengaged at work, managers act like stoic creatures that delegate tasks and control information, and our organizations are rigid hierarchies which stagnate communication and collaboration all the while assuming that the only time it makes sense to change is when tragedy strikes. This is no way to operate a company in today's dynamic and rapidly changing world.

It’s no wonder that synonyms for employee, manager, and work include words like cog, slave driver, and drudgery. We have literally built our organizations from the ground up with the notion that work has to be unpleasant. That is, until now… Today there five trends shaping the future of work which are forcing organizations to challenge convention around how employees work, how managers lead, and how organizations are structured.

These five trends are:

New behaviors: Easy-to-find information online, build communities, connect with people and information, live a more public life, and share.

Mobility: Most people in the world have a mobile phone and the majority of those people have smart phones. This means that I can get access to the same information living in the Bay Area as someone who works in a remote rice fields.

Millennials: Those weird alien-like creatures that are bringing with them new expectations, values, and ways of working into our organizations.

Technology: Collaboration platforms, big data, wearables, the internet of things, the cloud, robots, and a host of other things that are all impacting how we work.

Globalization: The ability for organizations to work in a world without any boundaries regardless of where they are located.