Three Ways Advancing Technologies Are Changing the Workforce

24 Sep 2020 / GP

It is an indisputable fact that technology is changing the workforce in new and unpredictable ways. Whether or not the disruptions it will cause are going to be beneficial is yet to be seen. To that point, however, there are a certain number of disruptions we can already watch in an attempt to see how all industries will be affected as technology continues to advance.

First and foremost, it’s important to acknowledge that rising technologies are not going to cause widespread permanent job loss. Unfortunately, the keyword is permanent. In the short term, technology may displace millions of workers as their jobs can be performed by technology. However, in the long-term, creative destruction ensures that new jobs will emerge to replace the ones that have been lost due to disruption. Technology will not displace all human workers. With that said, it is still important to look at some common ways technology is going to change the workforce.

Integration of Artificial Intelligence

Automation has slowly been occurring over the course of decades. When the technology developed by society can handle a task that a person does now, there is not really a purpose in hiring an employee for that job. That’s just the nature of automation.

With that said, artificial intelligence, like technology as a whole, is going to create new jobs in the future. Forbes released an estimate of about 58 million new jobs by 2022 alone, which shows how this field will provide workers with copious new opportunities should they be replaced by robotics or technology.

A facet of artificial intelligence that will likely affect business markets will be machine learning. Whether it be crunching numbers at an accounting firm or making investment decisions, machine learning can use algorithms to better handle any task. However, there will always be a need for skilled tech workers to maintain the technology, one of the factors for the growth in artificial intelligence jobs. Acquiring these skills could be as easy as attending a trade school such as Springboard which offers courses in data science. As technology gathers information, human workers will still be needed to interpret it and make key business decisions.

Higher Demand for General Tech Jobs

Going a little broader, tech employees as a whole are going to see an increase in their demand due to the skills they boast. As every industry across the world becomes disrupted by technology, tech workers will be needed for a variety of tasks. These tasks could be anything from troubleshooting technology to simply being a member of the team who has extensive knowledge of technology.

There are certain professions, such as becoming a full stack developer, that are growing at a rapid rate. Employees of this profession specialize in both front and back end web development, which means they can build a website from scratch for any organization. 

Recent statistics have shown that the number of active websites online is around 170 million. This number is only set to increase as the prevalence of online business becomes widespread throughout all industries. Covid-19 has influenced this change with the introduction of remote work and it is only likely to continue into the future, therefore skilled full stack developers are going to be high in demand along with many other tech employees.

Increasing Wages

Luckily for tech workers, a wage increase is highly possible for most fields. For perspective, a programmer’s salary currently sits at around $85,000 for experienced programmers. This is during a time when technology still hasn’t fully integrated with the workforce and coding, as well as programming, is just beginning to be seriously offered as curriculum at schools across the country.

Imagine in ten years how many programmers will be needed within industries across the country as a whole. Tech salaries are going to increase exponentially as the number of skilled workers within the market increases. With traditional industries, this would potentially saturate the market and lower wages, but tech skills are so versatile that almost any task can be completed with their skills.

Conclusion

At the end of it all, technology is going to completely merge with and disrupt the workforce. It is an inevitable change that cannot be stopped, but perhaps it shouldn’t be. Work needs to evolve to match the times and technology is changing all of society as a whole. Accepting this change and preparing for it can help you to become an asset in the future of work.