E080: The Future of Work, Corona and I/O Psych

This is the world of work podcast with James and Jane. Hi. This

is James and just before we start this episode, I wanted to remind you that you can support us via Patreon on our website at WWW dot, World of work.io. Forward slash support. Okay, let's get on with the episode. Hello, Mr. James, and this is Jane, and here we are again with another episode of a world of work podcast. What are we speaking about today? Jane, well,

today is one of our interview episodes, and we are going to be talking to our good friend, Professor Bernardo tirado, about the future of work, given the current way of the world. It's

an interesting time, isn't it? I mean, you know, with a lot of world in lockdown, we're recording this in May 2020, the way that we work is changing. Our relationship with work is changing. People are going into work, they're leaving work. I mean, there's so much variety, it'll be really interesting to see what we learn. Yeah, and

I think more broadly, if we think about what's going on at the moment as a big economic shock, then it's just interesting to talk about what happens to our experience of work when things like that happen. Yeah, exciting. All right, well, let's get into the conversation and see what

we learn. Okay, so here we are in the main body of this podcast, and we're really pleased today to be joined by Bernardo tirado from New York, and we're going to be talking about the future of work, and we're going to be exploring that in the context of Coronavirus and some of the impacts that that's had, and where we see that going, as well as looking at it through the lens of organizational psychology before we get into that though. Bernardo, would you be able to introduce yourself and say hi to the audience and explain a little bit about your background and what

you do now? Absolutely. Hello everyone. Thank you, James and Jane, for having me on your show. So I'm a behavioral scientist and industrial psychologist, and have worked at senior positions at American Express, Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan. And most of my career, I focused on really blending in the psychology of work with process optimization, Process automation, so really looking at it from the perspective of, how do we go about implementing change as it relates to technology? And it's something that I've been very passionate about and been focused on for the last several years, and hopefully we can cover that at some point at another time. Yeah,

that sounds great, I mean, and I know you've written a few books on that, and as a project manager in my background as well, that would be really interesting to explore that. So yeah, I'm sure we'll cover that before we move on to exploring the future of work, though. I just wanted to touch a little bit on, I guess, the current state and where we are now, and we are in the, you know, coming to the middle of May here, over time that's gone since, I guess, the start of year, when we've started see the Coronavirus popping up over across the world. What impacts have you seen for, you know, the virus having on organizations and individuals from a work perspective, what sort of changes

have you seen taking place? So I'd say I think at first, people were very fearful, and still are about the disease itself. But I do think that the several lining initially was that people who could work from work, could work from home, sorry, are able to do so and have a relief of not having to commute. But as time has passed, that that luster has kind of pretty much lacked, because many people are now stuck indoors. They're not able to go outside. And although there are a lot of countries and different areas of the world that are starting to open up, there is a sense of anxiety that's coming into play about how do you go back into the office and the commute to going into the office itself and making sure that you're trusting people that are around you. And so this anxiety is something that I do think employers are going to have to think about as to how to help provide a platform to help people feel more comfortable. I envision that this is going to be also changing how organizations are structured physically, as you probably are aware, many companies, and if you think about it, airlines and so forth have been pretty much cramming in people as much as they can into small space. That can't happen anymore. So there's that additional logistical challenge that companies have, as far as making sure that there's enough social distancing, but also, how do you encourage and allow for trust of employees to want to be able to work in one location? Yeah, there's some there's some interesting things in there.

When you're speaking about the impacts on organizations and their efforts to change, potentially, the way that they bring people together, I imagine there a lot of other changes they'll be going through as well. If we think about the impact that they've experienced over the last few months as well, what sort of direct impact do you think you'll have seen on the smaller organizations and even some of the medium sized ones that you work

with? Absolutely so I think that the smaller organizations are the ones that are startups, pretty much. Have been functioning in a remote environment for quite some time. So I think they've been very nimble enough to be able to adjust to this particular pandemic. I think where we talk about middle or large, it's really ultimate, up to ultimately, up to senior management and to their philosophy. I've had many conversations with many senior leaders where they, previous to COVID 19, were very, very, very hesitant in having employees work from home, because they felt that being in a physical location is extremely important. But due to this pandemic, they're now starting to realize that their companies are still able to thrive in the fact that people are working from home. So there's a change in mindset as well, excuse me, where companies are now reevaluating whether or not they need to be in major hubs like the New York or London or Hong Kong, and could they actually be dispersed? And so there is that mindset change as well. The other I would say, is companies that pretty much make their money from conferences are now struggling to figure out, how do you continue to have conferences where you can't have people co locate and move that into a virtual environment. So there's definitely a lot of shift in quickly adapting to newer technologies to continue to evolve their operating model, as well as where do they go about ensuring that they have enough workforce to be able to keep the organization moving forward.

I'm you know, fascinated by the pace of change that we've seen in the last few months, I think, at a societal level as well, but particularly in organizations. What I've seen is the really rapid acceptance and implementation of new ways of working in places. You know, I've never seen that before, so I think that's that's really interesting in this sort of transition that's taking place in affecting organizations as they change and individuals working in them. What role do you think industrial or organizational psychologists have been playing? How have they been helping or facilitating or maybe even hindering this type of change?

So as an untraditionalist io person, I think that majority of IO practitioners either going to human resources or going to consulting and by the way, that's not a bad thing at all, and that's not what I'm implying. But I do think that there is an ability as an IO practitioner to really go back to the foundation of the work that you studied when you were at university and starting to look at how do you create an environment that provides a mentally healthy state where people feel comfortably, comfortable being able to work back from home? In addition to that, I do think that there's an opportunity there to reevaluate some of the policies that probably were created years ago around how to go about providing that level of support. So as I mentioned previously, the fact that people are working from home. The challenge that I think that that exists where I think IO could really step in and help out, is where, if you're having employees work from home and their space is small, so if they live in a studio apartment, or they don't have space to be able to have a proper office, how do you enable to have motivation happen from a remote perspective. What tools could you implement, or activities can can be designed that will allow for a sense of of cohesion and connectivity? So we're experiencing that now, where you have a lot of people conducting meetings through zoom or some sort of video teleconference. And as I mentioned before, there was this excitement that you can be able to do this from home. And what I'm sensing now is that there's a fatigue around that now where people just want to do typical old phone calls so that they don't have to worry about what they look like. They can just relax a little bit, because when you are on camera, you are also being seen in as how you're dressed and your background. And I know sometimes people don't necessarily care about that, but there is a branding aspect as to what you're portraying when you are having conversations on Zoom. So I know I'm digressing a little bit, but I do think the IO psychologists have a very good role to play here. It's a matter of identifying where could they really tap into some of their background, and moving from more of a human resource consultancy standpoint to what else can I troubleshoot, and how else can I help the company be able to move forward? So an example I can think of is, for instance, schools or education, there is going to be a challenge around, how do you have children go back to school and socially distance? So what programs could potentially be put into place that IO psychologists could help administrators? And I know I'm going into education, but that's just an example where I do think thinking outside the box, there's going to be a lot of benefit where IO could really play a big role in helping organizations transform.

I think there's some interesting stuff in there. One of my friends works for a large international bank with a lot of Asian presence, and it's been interesting watching the sort of global change in. Coronavirus response over the year. So obviously, China and Hong Kong were locked down very early on, and you spoke about small spaces. And you know, if you're working with people out of Hong Kong, some of these people working there are actually, literally in closets. You know, they've set up a little desk in the closet and have their family crammed around them, and that's difficult. And seeing you know them go through that at the start of a year and then come out a little bit later, as more of a West is starting to go into seclusion, has been interesting. And watching the dynamics within these international teams has been interesting. If we think about the role around sort of creating motivating and engaging cultures at a remote level, do you think that org psychs are in a good position to address that specifically? Have you got specific thoughts on what they can do from a cultural perspective? Do you think it involves changing leadership and investing in leadership development? Or how do you think one would go about creating those cultures that foster good, remote, working?

Absolutely. I think that the the IO function. I mean, they're psychologists. It's like, it's not the same as a child psychologist or clinical psychologist, but we're psychologists. The thing is that we specialize in the psychology of work, so studying people in the workplace, so we're best equipped to be able to work with either senior leadership to design or look at, how do we continue to motivate employees provide tips? An example for it would be like the fact that you're working from home. Many of us are probably hunched over, so providing tips to stretch or move away from from the computer. I know it sounds very basic, but still, I do think that there is a value add that could be provided as it relates to insights around changing the monotony of being in one location. So for example, instead of sitting in the same desk, if you happen to be working in a laptop, instead of staying in one location, move around in your apartment, and even if it's a studio apartment, create a space where you're creating a mental change as to your day, so that it allows you to feel like you're in a different workspace. So when it comes to IO psychologists, and being able to be on the forefront of it, they could do a couple of things. One is really look at the cultural impact as it relates to as you mentioned in Hong Kong. What does it mean for someone now that is stuck inside with with family. What could be designed to help change and provide mental breaks throughout the day and when it comes to leadership, because this is also a test for leaders who are micro managers who love to control. How do you provide an environment for that type of manager to really let go of control, where you're not having to check in on your employees every single day, because that's the style of leadership and insecurity as a leader you may have. And I'm not going to go down that path. But the point I'm making is, as an IO psychologist, you can identify your population, profile your population, and then come up with good strategies to really look at ways of helping not only leaders become better leaders, but also help employees feel more comfortable in the space that they're in. It's

it's a funny thing just listening to you talk about it. I was just reflecting on the fact that I've moved around all my furniture because I work from the same room that I relax in afterwards, but I about two weeks in, I moved around all my furniture because I was in a place where I was like, actually, I need a different perspective. And I feel like that's really important to me at the moment. And I think that that bringing that awareness of the physical space, especially when you're a knowledge worker on your laptop, and you sometimes perceive workers only at your screen, I think is really important. We're going back to work at some point. In fact, I just had a text from a friend in Spain who is back in his office part time as of Monday. What do you think people are feeling at the moment about the prospect of potentially going back to work whilst there is still a pandemic happening around them.

I think that there are two camps of individuals, those that are taking this very seriously, and others, perhaps because they haven't been impacted indirectly, are probably a little bit looser around the thinking around what this impact will mean to them or their extended family, and that will really create the lens as to what will happen as the person comes back into the office. For the most part, I believe many are in the first camp, which is taking this very seriously and very concerned about family members and friends, especially if they're older. And as we are hearing that this particular virus is mutating and may affect children. So there's a lot of unknowns that are out there that being said, what it will result in is really an environment where people will feel very anxious, anxious to be inside the office. I do think that there's all. So to kind of balance that out, they're going to be happy to actually physically see their old co workers, especially the ones that have built good relationships. And perhaps because they're tired of looking at them on video, physically seeing them. They'll get some sense of happiness, but it won't be lived. It will be short lived, I should say, because then the reality will start to sink in, the fact that they're in this space and probably six feet away. And that's a challenge also for a lot of companies, is how do you bring these individuals back to be able to work in a confined location? So I'd say the first is the anxiety aspect of things, also thinking of transport, the to and from. How are they going to get to the office? If they're if they have the ability to drive to work? I think that's that's great, but for some folks that work in metropolitan areas, they have to rely on public transport to get to the office. So that's also going to cause an anxiety around how or what do they wear? And some companies may be dressed conservative to conservatively. So does do they relax some of those parameters so that they can be a little more comfortable? There are a lot of unknowns, but the first I would say, is the anxiety, and I do think that there's opportunities there to help ease that concern and be proactive about it, around how to create an environment that people feel safe and really able to focus on the work that they're looking to do. And

what, what would your advice be for those so if someone's sitting at home right now and feeling a little bit anxious about the prospect of going back to work, what, how would what would you encourage them to do or think about in order to try and manage that.

The first I would say, is really be able to vocalize what exactly is it that you want to control, and how do you go about controlling that? And what I mean by that is, if you're comfortable in being able to go into the office and you're anxious about the commute, then thinking through and planning ahead the steps. Do you wear gloves? Do you take a little bottle of disinfectant? Whatever is it that you will feel comfortable steps that you'll feel comfortable doing to get to that point? Like I spoke with a friend who actually was moving their daughter from a school down in Florida, Florida or Tennessee, I can't exactly remember anyway, down south, up to North New Jersey, and because they were very paranoid about using public toilets, they would actually stop every four hours and get a hotel so that they don't have to worry about what's happening outside. But that's what it took them, and it was what normally would take. A three hour drive took, like pretty much 24 hours, because they had to stop in different hotels along the way, but that's what it took that individual to control their environment, to feel comfortable, to go from point A to point B. I'm not saying that that's what's going to happen for workers going from one point to another, but planning ahead and thinking about what will it take for you feel safe and comfortable is going to be extremely important.

And it strikes me that these are because by nature we will, especially with open plan working being so prevalent, as you talked about, we're kind of not squashed in but there's certainly, you know, office space is a premium these days. There is a challenge that some of these things are going to have to be somehow agreed amongst groups. You know, if something that makes you feel safe is something that someone else needs to do, how would you be encouraging leaders to sort of talk to their teams? Now, how would you encourage sort of colleagues to talk to each other in order to try and figure out how they can work together on it, to find a solution that works for everyone?

The first I would say is that the leader of the organization really needs to have a heart to heart with all its employees, with their employees and and start off by saying that their safety is their number one concern, and walk the talk. And so in order for them to be able to walk the talk, they perhaps create a committee or a group of people who could help represent the larger part of the organization. And it also depends on how big the organization is, but if it's big enough, then have a consortium of people to join in a task force to say, what really would it take to have people come back from home? There are going to be people who don't want to come back to the office and can easily do their role from home, and if that's what they want to do, then being open to the fact that that will be the case for that particular individual. So I do think that there's a level of flexibility that's important. I also do think that it is a matter of working together as a company to really defining what would be the what would it take for people to want to be in the office? For those that do want to be in the office, the last thing you want to do is force people to be. In a situation that they don't want to be in, and that is probably the quickest way to get rid of an employee, if that's what you're looking to do, and that's not something that I would ever recommend. So I do think that it's a matter of being inclusive and collaborative and thinking through what will best work for you and your organization.

I think that's there's lots of good advice in there in terms of the more sort of, aside from the anxiety and emotional sort of experience of returning to work, do you think there's other things that organizations can do to help with the return to work, maybe around more practical stuff, or indeed, just the very nature of moving back to a much more nine to five, if that's your shift level, you know, structured day with a commute, etc. Is there other things that organizations can

do? Absolutely, I do think that now more than ever, they could do virtual happy hours. They could do virtual coffee talks, where perhaps previously, the CEO or senior leaders were not easily accessible because they're in closed doors in their office, and now we are able to have easy accessibility. So I do think that there is an opportunity here to create the culture that you're looking to define for your organization, and pretty much really look at how to create platforms that allow for open communication across all levels of the organization that could be started, that could start now, in regards to kind of coming together again, I think it depends on what sort of environment you're looking to create, and where do you really need individuals to be in the office, if you happen to be, let's say, a person that works in sales, where you have to meet with people seeing whether or not, is there a way to work with clients through a teleconference, or being able to create a space where the client that's seeing one of your sales People feel comfortable being in that location, so space, the environment, the safety, is going to be very critical. And I also think it's a matter of trying to go through the workflow of key roles within the organization that do require physical presence in the office. If the role doesn't require physical presence, then being more flexible again, as to allowing those individuals to work from home if that's what they desire to do.

It's really interesting. It just struck me that, as you were talking about, particularly around like the concept of how workers interact with customers or beneficiaries of the organization, it strikes me that there's actually quite a lot that organizational psychologists could do to help this transition beyond the actual experience of work itself, but still around how the organizations function. I guess is that. Is that a role you see for IO psychs being able to do to support businesses as they get back up to speed?

Absolutely. I do think that I O psychologists have the ability to profile or create personas within the organization to and again, this is dependent on how large the organization is, but create personas to really come up with strategies for each of those roles. So I kind of just alluded to the fact the roles that do require customer facing or client facing, where there do have to be in a particular location, versus, let's say, a finance function that the or an accounting function that does not have the need to be in the office. Coming up with ways of looking at, okay, how do we create a criteria to assess the jobs and looking at what does require physical presence, and where we can provide some options to employees as to whether or not they want to be in the office or not. So I do think that I O psychologists have that ability also. I O psychologies, you know, they study change they study change models so they do understand when there is a change impact happening, such as a pandemic, whether you're going into one or you're looking to adapt to the particular environment that we're in, they can come up with change management models that really will help facilitate how to go about making these changes happen again, whether it's through policy, whether it's through physical location, whether it's looking at remote working, or even creating communities that will help provide support amongst the employees, they do have a good role here to play, and it's really up to that individual to see, at what length do they want to be able to go into and contributing to the success of the organization.

So, so if we manage to get to the stage where people are back into work and back in the office, for those that are back in there, is that going to be the new normal? I mean, the phrase for new normal seems to be everywhere, and certainly where we are, we hear the new normal. This a new normal that what do you think the. New Normal is for a world of work. Do you think we know what it is? Do you think it's stable? I don't

necessarily think it's stable, but I do think we've been going and evolving into accelerating technologies to do some of the work that we've been doing in person. So as we can quickly see, many companies were able to move into a virtual environment, leveraging video teleconferencing as ways of connecting, creating a workforce that can see each other talk and pretty much continue the work going forward. So I think that it's a continuous evolution of where technologies will come in to help create a new world where it's more remote working than working in a particular office. And that could mean, for instance, leveraging technology to look at where you can interview so like, for example, the interviewing process for most companies, it's comfortable to bring in candidates or in their final rounds, or maybe even the beginning of the rounds, to meet with them face to face. Moving towards that video, interviewing is going to be very critical. You have companies already like HireVue and aspiring minds who are using artificial intelligence already to pretty much, I call it detect deception, but they call it looking at and validating what is being said. So it's a matter of semantics, I suppose. But if you look into those companies, I mean, they're doing great work, by the way, it's just a matter of there are a lot of companies out there that are looking to really leverage technology as ways of either acquiring talent, managing, talent, evolving talent. I think I saw a report through CB insights, they're like 120 startups that are looking to disrupt how the HR function works, and that goes from benefits to a whole host of different activities. So I think the world of work is definitely going to change. I think it's been changing. I think as a result of this, it's accelerated a lot of these capabilities into really moving forward with them. Sooner than later, I

am in one of my old roles. I worked for an organization and for the graduate recruitment process. They used VR headsets, and would give people VR headsets, and they'd undertake virtual tasks, real interactive tasks using the virtual reality. And that strikes me as the type of thing that potentially, you could do remotely if you were willing to to send those, those kits to people. Which is interesting. I not thought too much about the impacts on the recruitment side of things which, which is neat. One of the, one of the bits of commentary I hear a little bit, is that, at the moment, lockdown is affecting social strands of society in different ways. So we hear messages where we are that those who are in higher level jobs are saving money, they're still in their jobs, they're staying home, they have gardens that support their mental health and things like that, whereas people in lower paid jobs are typically suffering a reduction in income and are living in more potentially confined spaces, and as a sense that this is increasing a little bit of inequality between the types of jobs that we have. Do you see that improving? Do you see that changing? What are your thoughts on that?

So I don't necessarily see it improving. I still think that it, it's going to, most likely get worse. And so here's where I base it off. Of you have companies, this is pre pandemic, companies that are investing in technology to have what's called lorries. Oh, yes, Lori, yeah, we'll take Laurie, yeah. Lories that have been automating drivers. So lorries that self drive. So there's an there's already self driving cars. I know in the US, you have the United States Postal United States Postal Service investing in doing driverless trucks. So these are jobs that are not in the office. They're good paying jobs, but may not be at the top of the food chain, and they're going away, and that's because there's a massive amount of investment, even in corporations, there's been investments in blockchain technology, machine learning and artificial intelligence, which in essence, would pretty much automate some of The work that's already being done by an accountant or by any other sort of function that exists that AI can be applied. The only good news on that side is that the intelligence of machine learning right now is about like a five or six year old, but it will quickly accelerate in the next five years or so. So maybe even earlier, where you now have that machine learning functioning, maybe as a young adult, and then at some point as a mature adult. And when I'm talking about the level of age, I suppose it's I'm talking about the cognitive reasoning and being able to make decisions on its own. So I know we hear AI machine learning, and people freak out that's going to happen today. It's not going to happen today, but it will happen tomorrow. So I do think that the future of work has been on a path of automation, streamline, looking at ways of being able to leverage technology to do some of the work that probably requires more complexity, whether you're in a corporate job or you are in a job that requires you to work with clients face to face. So that's that's the first as far as the disparity, I do think that that this particular pandemic, and I've seen some great work that's being done by senior leaders, yes, they are getting highly paid, but they've implemented tactics to not focus on laying off their employees, either by not providing bonuses or looking at different compensation schemes to retain the employees that they have. How sustainable that is, I don't know, because things don't look like it's getting any better, and for many countries, the path to opening up is going to be quite slow. So that means that there's going to be a lot more, unfortunately, a lot more layoffs and a lot more impact. To think of small businesses and large corporations. And if you look at small businesses, like the restaurant businesses, many of them are closing down because they can't afford to keep their staff. So a lot of this is actually accelerating and affecting the employment. And there is already a lot of unemployment taking place. I foresee a lot of that continuing forward. I think what will help is really seeing where are there new industries, where some of this where, where employees, whether you're working in retail or you're working in a corporation, where you can be able to upskill and apply those I don't know where that sits yet, because I know we have three or four, sorry, three economies, like agriculture, manufacturing, and you also have services, but I don't know where that is yet. And I'm sometimes wonder, where will that come? Yeah,

it's interesting. When you were speaking about, you know, the rise of automation in this area, one of the people we spoke to recently, somebody we speak to a few times we asked about the value placed on different roles within the economy and whether we thought that would change. And the question is based on the fact that here in the UK, there's a lot of celebration of at the moment, of what are being classed as key or essential or frontline workers. So these are care staff. These are retail individuals in supermarkets, people like that, who are really on the front line and at risk of this. And we're celebrating them at the minute, and we say thank you. And there's Thursday night people go out and clap as a community to celebrate, you know, the work of these individuals. And when we asked him whether we thought, whether he thought that that would continue and there'd be a change in value placed on on those roles, his view was actually that we'd probably see an increase in automation of those roles as people, you know, organizations attribute more risk to those roles and see more risk of disruption in future pandemics and seek to de risk themselves. Does that make sense to you? Or what are your thoughts around that

absolutely, if you look at McDonald's, they've been reducing a lot of their individuals that work on at the tills, where you now have screens that you place the orders. So the amount of people there are a lot less. If you look at Amazon, they've opened up cashless supermarkets, small ones, but they're testing that out already. So although, yes, I do agree that they are heroes in my eyes, because they're putting themselves at risk at very little pay, I do think that unfortunately, due to the evolution of technology, many of those roles will be automated in one way, shape or form.

And I guess where we are getting to now is for the point where the cost benefit makes sense to do that, because I guess if the cost of technology gets cheaper, it becomes easier and less risky to automate away roles, and then you benefit from the salary differential. The other day, I picked up this week's economist, and on the back of it, I'd had an advertisement by somebody who I can't even remember who they were, but the sort of banner headline on their advertisement said in 2030 85% of the jobs that are in existence will not have been invented as of today. I mean, I've phrased that dreadfully, but you know what I mean by saying that 85% of the roles in 2030 don't exist now. So what do you think about that? Do you think that's a fair sort of assessment of a rate of new job growth? And I guess Have you got any thoughts on how that might contribute to a future

of work? I do think that it will be the case. I don't know if it will be that exact number, but when I think about the fact that technology continues to evolve, we have a lot of talented people out there that are always thinking about new products and reinventing what currently exists like, if you think about, you know, several years ago, there wasn't an Uber, yeah, you know. So you had someone who was revolutionizing or rethinking how to solve a problem, which was, how do you get a taxi when you need it at the time you needed at near where you are, versus having to run down the street and figuring out if they're off shift or not, and so you can be able to get a taxi. So I do think that the the the resiliency of people who are out there and the ideas will be in the forefront of innovation and coming up with ways to be able to either reinvent what already exists, or coming up with other new ideas, to be able to add value and come up with new new things. So for instance, if I think about here in New York, a lot of being the the kind of the center of the pandemic here in the US, to a certain extent, one of the things that we were facing is lack of, for example, PPEs and ventilators, and a lot of it has been around the fact that we are globalized. So there are pieces that you know are manufactured in other locations. As a result of that, they've kind of come up with a different strategy, which is now they're going to build their own stuff. I know in New York, they're investing in building out their own ventilators. And that actually came about because they brought in the best minds in either engineering and science and a whole bunch of other disciplines to come up with ways of how do we create this so that we are not spending hundreds and 1000s of dollars for this massive ventilator and create something that will be economical and also do the job that it needs to do for a fraction of the price. And so I do think that as a result of the pandemic, there are going to be a lot of people out there that are coming up with ideas that will generate jobs. And I don't know what that looks like yet, but I do think that that's going to be a fantastic way of being able to bring back employment around different capabilities, different services, different products. And so I do think that that will be the case.

That's it's nice to hear some some optimism and positivity about creation of new roles in the future. I think that's really important. I think we often lose sight of the fact that throughout history, we face disruption from technology that's eliminated roles, yet we have always created new roles. So I think that's interesting. The one

thing I was just going to say is I know when we think of the the work environment, initially what we think of our large corporations, but for the most part, across all countries, the the I would say, the the bread and butter, or the foundation of the economy, are small businesses, and it is making sure that we are providing the infrastructure and the space for entrepreneurs to go out there and figure out ways of inventing or providing new services or products. And so I do have a hope for that, that hope that that there will be a way to be able to recover. I know we typically look at larger institutions, which I'm not saying we shouldn't, but when we think of it as the the masses, that's really where I think we will see a lot of work happening. I will also see that when we think about college education. And this is digressing a little bit, so I apologize, but this is also a trend that I do think will happen as a result, not of just the pandemic, but just where we're going. Getting your your university degree is back in the 80s compared to now, are quite different. Back in the 80s, not that, but back in the 80s, getting a degree there, it wasn't as saturated. You had very few people that had university degrees or masters or PhDs. Now fast forward to today, having a university degree or college education is like having a high school degree or secondary education and getting a master's degree is getting like a university degree. So where I'm where I'm going with that is the fact that you have a lot of people studying getting into roles that don't really compensate for the amount of investment that they've made and the amount of debt that they've gotten themselves into. And so whereas you see tradesmen who are equally valuable. Making a lot more money than someone who is just out of school. So I know here in New York, someone who works in sanitation could be making $100,000 whereas someone graduating from university may be making 50 or 50 or $60,000 so I'm getting at the fact that I do see a shift into certifications versus diplomas, and perhaps even into more of the trades work, which then lends itself into that whole entrepreneurial piece that I was referring to before.

Certainly here, you know, plumbers are in high demand, so the whole building trade, electricians, all of that, I kind of wish I'd become a mechanic. I just never quite did it. So here I am with a university education, but I think that's an interesting reflection on how things might change. What do you think IO psychology can do to help shape a more positive future if we're defining this future with change and new roles and all that? What's the role of org, Psych and in helping create that?

So I think that it's important that the the role of IO really focuses on thinking outside the box and looking for ways of applying a lot of the concepts that are taught and practiced into other areas, so that it allows us to really add more, I would say, not so much more, add more value, and a lot a lot add more flexibility in how the world of work will continue to evolve. So I just mentioned technology. So I O psychologist, I do encourage them to learn about artificial intelligence, to learn about machine learning, Blockchain. Unfortunately, we can't run away from technology. And technology will affect our our daily lives, and it doesn't, as we cover today. You can be someone working at the till to being someone in mid management in a corporation. It will affect different aspects of work. So if and if the IO psychologists are thinking ahead, I think being able to understand the impact of technology, looking at what could be the ways of assisting resources that are no longer employed, how to upskill them. What are the platforms that could allow them to go into a different line of work, so that they are feeling or they are getting some sort of cash flow, but more importantly, that they are working towards a particular career than just a job. I think that's where IO psychologists could really step in and help add some more value, versus solely just focusing on internal human resources or consultancy as it relates to human resources, but looking at where else could we apply some of the these concepts in other industries and disciplines, along with technology?

Yeah, it's one of my favorite side topics is, how can we get better at understanding what skills will be most useful in the future? And I think, interestingly, the British are moving heavily invested in apprenticeship approach. And I think whilst I It has its flaws, the opportunity to leave education with the skills that your employer wants, because they're already there saying that's what they want and without debt is, in certainly the UK, incredibly appealing to my sort of nieces and nephews generation, who are currently going through education. And they are their awareness of debt and their understanding of investment in education is very different from what mine was 20 years ago, 25 years ago, right? I think sadly, despite that being an incredibly interesting new subject. Adding on to the end of that, I think we've we're pretty much out of time. I guess just before we finish off, it'd be interesting to know if anyone's got any final reflections, James, any thoughts from you?

Yeah, I think that's a fascinating conversation for me. I often come back to the uncertainty about the future, but the desire for optimism within there, I think it's a disruptive time. I think even before this pandemic, I think it's been a disruptive time. I have concerns about unemployment in the future and what we do with, you know, what were formerly low skilled roles, and where those people who were filling those roles go in terms of future employment, and I think we do need to work on creating opportunities in there, but I think they'll come the other takeaway for me is this reflection on education. I think there's some interesting stuff in there with education, and I like the idea of the shift towards the skills based, trade based, apprentice based approach. The one thing that I have slight reservations about is the duration of time it takes to get those and whether you potentially end up with more people in the labor force. That's my only concern with that. But I think. Maybe those are two interesting areas to reflect on. Yeah, absolutely. And Bernardo, yourself, anything,

any last reflections to share with the audience?

No, I'm really glad that I had this opportunity to connect with you and share some of the insights of what I'm seeing. I definitely do encourage many of my IO cohorts to really push the boundaries around what else and where else you can apply some of your skill sets. It's one of the reasons why I really focused on process optimization. My I initially started, and I've always been in business, the IO piece was an add on to understand the psychology of work, because I was doing merger and acquisitions work when I first started, and that's what interested in a topic, and I fell in love with it. And so I do think that for those that entered IO initially as a as their is their career path, think about where else you can add that value as it relates to change and also foresight around how populations and behaviors are evolving as the workforce continues to mature and also change. I

think that's a really great call to action and a really important and valuable thing that and I think it speaks to the point that James made earlier, which is what I take away, which is that we need to stop living in very narrow lanes of what we do. And I think whether it's an IO psych thinking about how they can apply their knowledge to a different area, whether it's about young people who are choosing their careers and how they're going to apply, I think we need to get better at understanding we can share learning across things, because I think that that's how we'll survive things like the current pandemic. Well, I think that's pretty much brings our conversation to an end, but thank you very much for joining us, and we look forward to maybe talking to you again soon. Yeah, just

one last thing before you go Bernard, how can people learn more about you and the books that you've written and the projects that you're working on,

absolutely so if you're interested in learning more about me and my background, you can look@insights.wellbeckadvisors.com I actually post a lot of content out there that's free for people to see how I'm leveraging IO and helping people focus on career development, as well as if you go into YouTube on career insights, the psychology behind work with Bernardo tirado, and you're more than welcome to reach out directly at hello@wellbeadvisors.com or on Twitter at Professor torado. Cool, excellent. Well,

there's lots of stuff there for people to follow up on. So I think it's just time to say thank you very much, and goodbye from me. Yeah And goodbye from me. Thank you very much. Have a great day.

Okay, so you are back in the room with Jen and myself. That was our conversation with Bernardo. We talked about some pretty cool stuff there, reflecting on the future of work and the impact of Coronavirus. Jane, do you have any key takeaways from that that you'd like to reflect

on? It's almost hard to pick which ones are key, because there's so much we talked about, but I think, I think the importance of reflecting and learning on what we've learned through this experience such that it can help us shape a better, better future. And I know that sounds a little bit cliched, but if we don't learn from something as big as this, then I don't, I don't know how we can ever make a workplace that suits all of us and works for all of us. Yeah,

I think, I think there's something really in that. And one of the things that struck me was the, I guess, the importance of optimism coming out of us. So we spoke about, the negative impact that Coronavirus and the lockdowns had on obviously, individuals and organizations and a lot of it is hugely dreadful, but when we think about the broader future of work, I think there is potentially some scope for optimism within there. Quite often, when we speak to people about this type of subject, we reflect on automation, eliminating jobs and changes like this, eliminating a lot of opportunity for people to have meaningful work in the future. And I just think it's nice to sometimes reflect on the potential for the creation of new roles as well. Do you have any thoughts on that side of things

I do about optimism? I think, I think day to day, it's quite complex, but I think as a society, I think we have to embrace it, and I think that's really hard when we're going through something that's so viscerally damaging to us and to those around us. But I feel like if we with a little bit of cheesiness, it's if we build it, they will come. And if we can envisage what a workforce that would be more robust and resilient in the face of something like this being the pandemic, then I think we work towards something that's better for all of us anyway. So yeah, I kind of, I see a lot in that,

yeah, and it like you said, it's a really difficult, visceral time with a lot of. Um, challenge on on so many different levels, hopefully we can work towards coming out of this catastrophic situation in a way that helps us rebuild a more positive and supportive way of working and set of organizations in the future. So I guess fingers crossed absolutely All right. Well, I guess that's it for me. So it's just a goodbye for me, and it's goodbye from me. Hi.