Category: Change

How to Overcome The Critical Issue of the Working Poor in the Collaborative Age

New technology and the rise of the independent worker is a factor for creating “working poors” – people that work hard a substantial amount of their time but do not earn enough to support their families. This excellent post addresses the issue in an interesting manner: ‘Work please but poverty, no thanks: how can we avoid the rise in the working poor?‘.

“The growth of new forms of self-employment provides an additional dimension to the in-work poverty challenge. In almost all countries, in-work poverty is higher among the self-employed. A recent study on self-employment showed that there is greater polarization in incomes for the self-employed than for employees.”

This is clearly a challenge that needs to be addressed and that our current employment system underestimates. On the other hand it was Henry Ford who spontaneously increase the wages in his factory to create the virtuous circle of the Industrial Revolution and the associated consumption and he did not need any regulatory incentives. How can we make the operators of the Collaborative Age that it is in their interest to guarantee minimum earnings for their contributors?

“In any case, it is vital not to underestimate the risk of allowing in-work poverty to continue unabated – when people feel that they are losing out despite playing by the rules, the risks to society extend beyond precariousness to decreased social cohesion and increased populism.“

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How Machine Learning Will Lead to More Conformity and Less Creativity

One thing most people forget is that machine learning, the essence of today’s Artificial Intelligence (AI), is basically about reproducing the same patterns than the ones fed during the learning process.

A typical machine learning neural network
A typical machine learning neural network

Therefore, the introduction of AI will first lead to an increase of conformity. Anything outside of the ordinary (i.e. outside of the set of circumstances used for the learning process) will cause problems, misbehavior and defects.

If we draw this observation further, it will not be possible to have AI achieve any kind of disruption. Disruption can be created by the human mind, as history shows. So, for a while there will be a significant difference between AI and the human mind: the ability to think out of the box and to create disruptive patterns. Or, what is exactly is generally covered under the word ‘creativity’.

The massive irruption of AI in our lives will force some amount of conformity on us and that is a danger. At the same time, creativity will remain an unrivaled feature of the human mind.

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How to Create Disruption With Small Steps

In a complex world disruption does happen, always with far reaching consequences. But creating disruption is hard. I am in the midst of an experiment with my venture CleanuC (trying to disrupt the way the nuclear industry tackles decommissioning) and it is tough to change things although it would seem the system should be ripe for change.

One way to look at creating disruption is to proceed with small steps. This might seem paradoxical, but I truly believe that it is the right way to go. Proceeding with small steps relies upon experimenting, gauging the reactions of various stakeholders and improving the model until reaching a condition that is ripe enough to create a real tipping point. It is a bit similar to the Lean Startup concept of product development, in that case it is about disruption.

Moreover the small steps approach is also deeply antifragile as underlined by Valeria Maltoni in this excellent post ‘How Small Things Make a Big Difference‘ that serves as an inspiration to this particular post.

Proceeding with systematic small steps, with perseverance, is not contradictory with huge disruptions. It is just a way to reach more effectively the tipping point. When do you start the first small step for a big change?

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How Daring Ideas May Be Beaten, And Start a Winning Game

Following on our previous post ‘How to Create Disruption With Small Steps‘ I like to share this quote from Goethe: “Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward. They may be beaten, but they may start a winning game“.

I find this quote very inspiring because it shows how we sometimes need to sacrifice some of our ideas in our small steps strategy, and lose some battles in order to win the overall jackpot.

Actually it is quite necessary to live through small disappointments and setbacks. But if our disruption vision is good enough we will eventually find a way to express and implement it in a way that will win the day.

In our strategy it is essential to know how to sacrifice some stuff that is not so important for what we really believe in. The process might be tough at times, and necessary. Ready?

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How To Deal With The Illusion of Permanence

While we would like to believe our environment is stable and permanent, reality is more that it is impermanent. Suddenly our conditions may change sometimes drastically.

impermanence
Japanese gardens are there to remind us of impermanence

In a beautiful post ‘Impermanence‘, Om Swami expands on the struggle with impermanence and the suffering it sometimes creates.

“Sometimes, I wonder why are we so averse to adversities? Anything that doesn’t fall in line with our expectations from life, we label it suffering. […] The real problem is with the unrealistic nature of our expectations; the greatest being our desire that anything good in our life should stay as it is.”

An incident can be our awakening to impermanence. “That’s all you need sometimes, just one incident to awaken you. Just one wake up call to help you see what this samsara truly is – irrational and impermanent. Such a life transforming incident then changes your perspective forever. Your old tendencies still come and haunt you, but the awakened you handles life differently.”

We should lean into change in particular if there is nothing we can do about it and understand that it is the way the world goes. Just remind yourself that nothing is permanent. What we do with it is our choice.

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How We Can Evolve To Be A Totally Different Person

Traditionally many psychological and personality tests assume that their result won’t change dramatically over a life time. New research shows that it is a misconception: during our lifetime we will change significantly and dramatically. Read the Quartz article You’re a completely different person at 14 and 77, the longest-running personality study ever has found.

The famous Myers-Briggs personality test

I have observed that the results of personality tests tend to be quite stable over 3 to 5 years periods and this is quite a common observations. However people do evolve, have different experiences, and what these studies show is that over a lifetime (50+ years) our preferences are not any more correlated with those we had initially.

“The longer the interval between two assessments of personality, the weaker the relationship between the two tends to be,” the researchers write. “Our results suggest that, when the interval is increased to as much as 63 years, there is hardly any relationship at all.”

This is great news because it demonstrates that we can change ourselves if we want to, and that there does not seem to be any limit in our capability to completely overhaul ourselves.

So, ready for change?

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How to Reconcile Two Opposite Sides of Human Factor

In too many accidents the ‘human error’ is at fault. Autopilots and Artificial Intelligence are developed with the aim to diminish the frequency of accidents. At the same time, only humans can deal with certain unexpected situations and find ways to manage them. These are two sides of the coin of the ‘human factor’ and we are struggling to reconcile them.

One of the issues of the Fourth Revolution is that the border between the intelligent automation and the area which still requires active human input is moving fast. Commercial aircraft flying is already largely automated. In a few years, automobile driving will be automated to drastically lower accidents. Still there will always be some situations where humans need to take over because they go beyond what the automation can deal with. And this means that increasingly, humans will largely monitor automated systems and at the same time will be required to be able to deal with extraordinary situations.

This is because humans are expected to be able to deal with a wider, more systemic view of the situation and find a way to move forward. This type of intervention will be prone to a high rate of failure in particular if there is not too much time to analyse the situation. Still we will continue to rely on this human intervention in extreme cases, sometimes with unsatisfactory results.

Finding exactly how humans can contribute best and setting up the right ergonomics so that this intervention is effective is a key area of research.

How strange is it that at the same time we complain loudly about the fallibility of humans and still expect them to deal with those extra-ordinary situations automated systems can’t deal with!

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How our Origin Explains Why Actual Facts Don’t Change Our Mind

A number of older and newer experiments are described in the New Yorker article ‘WHY FACTS DON’T CHANGE OUR MINDS – New discoveries about the human mind show the limitations of reason‘. They clearly show that even exposure to real facts may not change an opinion we would have developed beforehand.

The interesting part of the article is the reference to a study that would show that these limitations of our reason could be linked back to the context of the hunter-gatherer. The need for collaboration, fostered by evolution, may have blunted some aspects of our reasoning. That would be in particular the case for confirmation bias (the tendency to find confirmation that confirms our opinions).

There is hope still: “Humans aren’t randomly credulous. Presented with someone else’s argument, we’re quite adept at spotting the weaknesses. Almost invariably, the positions we’re blind about are our own.” The trick is to be able to get others look at our situations. And, maybe, try to get over those limitations we have inherited from our ancestors.

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How Banks Are Really Replacing Back Office By Bots

In a stunning move, JP Morgan has automated a process that was worth 360.000 lawyer hours every year. This is detailed in Bloomberg’s ‘JPMorgan Software Does in Seconds What Took Lawyers 360,000 Hours‘. Of course the article does not mention in detauil how much it cost to develop this new ‘Contract Intelligence’ software, but the result is that a number of lawyers are not longer needed for basic legal checks.

robots-at-workThis requires a tremendous investment (9% of revenue according to the paper, which translates into billions of dollars) but it is clear that the standard, mundane work is getting automated fast by the most performing companies. Apparently it has also allowed to diminish human error in the interpretation of contracts and deals.

Like traders have been displaced by algorithms, it looks like banking back office is ripe for being displaced by Artificial Intelligence and bots. And this might be the direction all transaction-based companies (like insurance and other similar industries) will take soon. This will create a huge social issue, that can already be observed as to the state of employment in the banking industry.

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How To Properly Apply the Open-Close-Act Facilitation Method

In my facilitating I like to use a simple process that I call the ‘open-close-act’ approach. Faced with a problem, we first open to the widest possible range of solutions before converging and deciding which way to act.

open-close-actIn this process, the first ‘open’ step is essential because people too often jump for the most obvious solution without taking the time to stand back, reflect, and spend some creative moments. The second step is also sometime difficult because people hesitate to take action.

This is very well touched upon in Seth Godin’s post ‘The simple two-step process‘: “The problem most people run into is that they mix the steps and confuse them. During step one, they aren’t open enough, aren’t willing enough to consider the impossible. And then, in step two, fear of shipping kicks in and they stay open too long, hold on to too many options and hesitate.”

This is a reason why in my method I have added a third step, which is action. This needs to be constantly reminded to participants: the goal is certainly to take action – after having undergone a proper process to determine what is the best one.

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Why We Need to Move Forward Always, and Never Stop

I love this quote from humorist commentator Will Rogers: “Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there“.

right-trackThis recommendation for always continuing to move along in the right direction is compelling. Remaining static actually creates the possibility of becoming obsolete with regard to the rest of the world; it also creates the possibility of self regression by lack of evolution. If we stop, it is a kind of small death.

I believe what is meant here is not necessarily to always try to move forward at great strides; sometimes, we need to resupply and move slower, but what is important is to move forward at all times.

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How to Create New Lasting Habits

One thing that goes in the way of creating new different habits is certainly the way we look upon ourselves. If we want to change a habit that is aligned with our sense of identity, or the identity we want to project outside, we will fail.

Identity-Based-Habits“The key to building lasting habits is focusing on creating a new identity first. Your current behaviors are simply a reflection of your current identity. What you do now is a mirror image of the type of person you believe that you are (either consciously or subconsciously). To change your behavior for good, you need to start believing new things about yourself.” writes James Clear in his post ‘Identity-Based Habits: How to Actually Stick to Your Goals This Year’.

I would add, not only starting to believe new things about oneself, but projecting them and publishing them too, which will make the case much stronger for change.

Reflect on your identity and check whether there is not something there that impedes changing some habits?

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