This period is like the Industrial Revolution, it’s like Dickens’s London, for the amount of convulsion and change, and we only recently have begun to think about it that way,
Mark Muro – Fellow at the Brookings Institution
What will managing and leading the Future of Work look like in COVID time? No one really knows.
The true challenge will be developing new organizational structures, mindsets, and new rules of work. The logical response to VUCA is to mitigate and control risks by developing risk-controls, establishing narrow boundary conditions, specifying specific work tools, and limiting expectations.
Why focus on risk-controls? This is the traditional and logical reaction to limiting risk exposures, consequences, and likelihood. People, process, and technology controls are designed and deployed according to the organization’s risk appetite. The down-side to this approach is that VUCAN’s inventiveness, flexibility, and engagement can be severely thwarted.
The following excerpts from the Future of Work Study project describe the challenge and another possible response:
Challenge:
“Too many leaders are willing to be out of sync with the needs of the workforce because embracing the Future of Work, including changing how companies are run, means higher risks, uncertainty and (perceived) loss of control of outcomes.”[i]
Response:
“Many of today’s most successful ventures … are either based on new ways of organizing and empowering people or are creating the tools for all people to empower themselves. Every company needs to stop restraining its people by holding back and risk-managing and tip-toeing around the approaches that will deliver the Future of Work.”[ii]
Work Lesson Earned: Take many of these stories to heart as you understand and decide your Future of Work in COVID time.
[i] ‘Search for a Simpler Way: Future of Work Study’, Jensen Group, 2014.
[ii] ‘Future of Work, Making the Future Work 2015, 2020’, Search for a Simpler Way Study, 2014.