Networks and workplace freedom

I have just renamed this blog to reflect the issues I've covered in my new book, The Future of Work. Collecting material ahead of two speaking engagements last week it was clear that events with an impact on our working futures are happening constantly so I want this to be a living document featuring developments that I think are relevant to the changing workplace.

Some of these may seem surprising. What, for example, does the news that a former Guantanamo Bay inmate now includes his former jailer as a Facebook Friend have to do with work? I think this shows how people are connecting with each other today at levels that are challenging the controls and expectations placed on populations in the past.

Imagine back in December 1914 if British and German soldiers fraternising in no-man's land been able to exchange their Facebook and email details, organising a "let's go home" group on Facebook, for example.

You think it couldn't happen? I'm sure some EMI marketing executives had similar thoughts when Jon and Tracy Morter, a couple living in Essex, decided they would orchestrate a Facebook campaign to ensure that their favourite song by Rage Against the Machine, became the Christmas number one single (see augmented reality blog below).

People didn't just vote for the song, they dug in their pockets and bought it, such was the bloodymindedness of a section of the British public.

Much of the corporate sector has become increasingly controlling in the way it runs business. Employees are often forbidden to talk to journalists about their work without referring queries to press offices. But attempts to create workplace firewalls simply will not work in a world of Twitter and Facebook.

How will China's standoff with Google pan out? It's too early to say but the struggle for communications democracy is important not just for our personal freedoms but also for our freedoms in work.

Augmented reality and the future of work

In my new book The Future of Work I included one chapter of out-and-out futurism. The book concentrates on themes that are influencing workplace change today and which I believe will strengthen in the future.

I thought it would be dishonest to suggest that I had some kind of crystal ball capable of predicting future events. Nonetheless I thought it might be interesting to indulge myself in a description of what life might be like 50 years in to the future.

This presented immediate difficulties. How can we know the rate of resource depletion when we have no idea of the breakthroughs that might, for example, make fossil fuels an unnecessary resource?

Two strands of thinking dominated the projections. The first concentrated on communications technology and the second explored the idea of extending democracy in government to the kind of decision-making we already experience in "vote-off" shows such as the X-Factor and Strictly Come Dancing.

These shows already have a kind of government - an appointed panel to help us with our decisions, aided by a supporting administration of experts who help to find and groom the talent. But the decision about who wins and who loses is taken by the TV-viewing population. Why couldn't this approach be adapted for the process of legislation?

Politicians might point to the dangers of disruptive voting organised by so-called "mavens", under-the-radar influencers who can use modern communications channels to work beyond established norms of market behaviour and control.

A good example of this is the way that husband and wife a Jon and Tracy Morter, unhappy at the way that the Christmas number one music singles were being monopolised by X-factor winners decided to orchestrate a campaign on Facebook to promote the rock group, Rage Against The Machine, as an alternative. Enough people bought downloads of the track, Killing in The Name, to ensure it occupied the number one spot at Christmas 2009.

What started, said Tracy Morter, as a "silly idea to spice up the charts" developed a bandwagon effect, initially through social networking media and latterly through mainstream media as the campaign became a news story.


The old market-dominated rules of transactional behaviour have changed. Yes, the market is cleverly exploiting the new forms of communications, in viral marketing on YouTube, for example. But it no longer controls the winning idea. Winning ideas, such as that of the Morters can and will emerge anywhere. The Morters' success also makes a mockery of so-called talent management. The couple have proved themselves masters at social-network-based manipulation without an ounce of formal expertise.

I believe that it is inevitable that advances in electronic communications will transform democracy. The only question is how long it will take Governments to respond. The age of the metal ballot box where people enter voting booths is coming to an end. In future we shall all vote from our living rooms.

The chapter also looked at screen-based technology. This feature on Augmented Reality - a system for integrating the use of screens with all kinds of decisions we make in everyday life - fits with the scenario I outlined of wall-sized screens in domestic homes. In future I believe that miniaturisation of screens will develop side-by-side with super-sizing. Small size will equate with convenience whereas bigger screens will allow a variety of uses similar to those discussed in the article. The cost and availability of power, however, may be a limiting factor. But in 50 years time I'm sure that other power sources, including human-powered machinery, will have become far more efficient.