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Fourth Industrial Revolution

Industry 4.0 with Prof. Daniel Mashao & Stafford Masie

Industry 4.0 with Prof. Daniel Mashao & Stafford Masie

by | Jun 21, 2019 | ,

by Alex Kinmont

Technology is rapidly changing the fabric of our time. We need to adapt the way we live, personally and professionally, before we are left behind. The question is, how?

On Friday we had Professor Daniel Mashao, the Executive Dean of the Faculty of Engineering at UJ and Stafford Masie, the first CEO of Google of Southern Africa discuss the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) and the effects it will have on business and society.

Prof. Mashao defined 4IR in three parts – new technologies, new business models and new value systems.

New Technologies

Smartphones and slim laptops are only the surface of new tech and what it can do. Robotics, virtual reality and artificial intelligence (AI) are the next leaps in technological advancement.

Masie describes AI as the “superpower” of 4IR. He sees the future ‘everywhereness’ of AI as rendering it intangible and invisible. Like electricity, it will become so streamlined within our lives that we won’t even recognise its presence. We will only experience it.

“It’s not the Internet of Things,” says Masie, where people and objects are connected via devices with wifi. “It’s the Internet in Things”, transversally, just like electricity.

New Business Models

These new technologies are redesigning the future and how we see the world. As a result, professional success is reliant on how well we adapt to, and utilise, these changes. Businesses must take on new structures in order to best utilise advances in tech.

Old ways of doing cannot sustain new ways of being.

Business need to evolve into algorithmic marketplaces. Professor Mashao points out successful digital businesses Uber and Airbnb. As the world’s largest accommodation provider, Airbnb owns no property. As the world’s largest taxi company, Uber owns no cars.

We are all a part of Uber. We input our information, rate our drivers and travel in traffic. We use Uber, and in using Uber, we allow it to grow and continue. Uber owns no assets; instead, they use technological advances in geolocation and personal credit and compliment that with people and their own resources.

Latent Human Potential

Masie champions the value of humans and their creative capabilities. He explains that Uber is a platform, and not a traditional business, which combines advancements in tech with human potential. This is what makes them giants in the digital landscape.

Where machines can replace our mundane jobs, they can never imagine like we can.

Businesses who wish to thrive in the new digital landscape must take on an algorithmic marketplace model. Masie explains that businesses must recognise “latent human potential and let it cascade in”. Machines must not replace humans; they must provide a platform from which humans can fully exercise their creative abilities.

Uber, and other apps like Netflix, Alibaba and social media, have realised the key to keeping up with new technologies and the changing way of life and business. They recognise unique human potential and how it would be a waste to let machines replace the people in a business. Rather, machines must free up the time of employees to do more creative and complex work.

This is how we can prevent machines from taking our jobs.

Self-driving cars don’t have to take the jobs of drivers. Through AI, a driver can own a fleet of automated vehicles. Robots don’t have to take the jobs of stock takers. With automation, a warehouse worker can programme an army of box packing machines.

New Value Systems

It is important to note here that Uber and Airbnb are only possible with the new value system of digital trust. Online ratings on these apps allow hosts and drivers, guests and travellers, to build an archive of reviews and earn a grade in order to prove their honesty and reliability. Where machines cannot earn trust, an innately human function, they can be adapted to provide a platform from which its users can input data and create trust.

The future of jobs doesn’t have to be mass unemployment. Your business does not have to crumble under the waves of change.

Technology and its advancements will change life as we know it. The Fourth Industrial Revolution is coming and we need to adapt if we wish to keep up. Our businesses need to welcome the shortcuts of technology and move redundant employees upwards to better use their cognitive and creative abilities. We must let our latent human potential cascade in. Like with the Uber trust model, we must recognise the possibilities of humans and tech working together.

Masie concludes that if we lose our jobs it will not be because of technology. It will be because we weren’t imaginative enough.

To request more information on our Digital Skills courses, click here.

Are we wasting our saved time?

by | Jun 21, 2019 | ,

by Alex Kinmont

Technology is streamlining our daily routines.

We can order dinner online, saving us cooking time. We can work remotely, saving us travel time. We can shop online, saving us searching time. We let Google Maps re-route us around traffic before we see the first brake light and targeted ads tell us what to buy before we even know we want it.

The rise in technology has brought with it a rapid increase in the pace at which we live our lives.

If technology is making things run faster, then we’re saving time. So what exactly are we using that saved time for? 

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Are we saving time just to waste time?

South Africans spend an average of 8.5 hours online every day, according to a 2019 study. That’s an hour and a half more than the global average.

The more attention we give online, the more profitable the online world becomes. An advert seen is money made, so the goal for companies and advertisers alike is to keep us online for as long as possible.

Our online attention has become transactional.

Developers don’t just hope that we will spend time online. Smartphones and social media are specifically designed to keep us hooked for as long as possible. Of those 8.5 hours online, South Africans spend almost three hours on social media (Whatsapp, Facebook and Youtube proving most popular).

Are we really to blame?

Steve Jobs never let his own children use the iPad which he first released in 2010. This was our warning sign.

Feedback is a major ingredient of online addiction and it’s biologically enforced, says author Adam Alter (Irresistible). Feedback is the flash of the red heart icon when you like a photo on Instagram. It’s also the bright notification which pops up for the person on the other end. It’s the swooping sound when you refresh your Facebook feed and the click of your keyboard when your phone’s not on silent. 

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Are we saving time just to do too much?

The digital revolution and its onslaught of overstimulation is rendering us less and less capable of concentrating on a single thing at a time. The average attention span in a human has dropped from 12 seconds to 8 seconds since the turn of the century. That’s less than a goldfish.

Have you ever felt the urge to punch your computer when it freezes?

This is where we see how impatient tech has made us. We are already so accustomed to technology and the swift lifestyle which comes with it that when it lags we tend to curse at it.

As tech grows, so do our expectations.

Whereas our ability to multitask has improved thanks to tech giving us the means to do more than one thing at a time, it comes with a cost to our ability to do just one task effectively.

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So what does this quickening mean for us professionally?

The World Health Organisation has recently announced that it will be adding ‘Burnout’ to its International Classification of Diseases. This will make burnout a globally-recognised medical condition from the year 2020. Burnout is defined by the WHO as “chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed”.

In trying to keep up with new technologies, we may be overdoing it.  In constantly being connected, we never really get a break from the office anymore. We can access emails and our workload all from home, meaning we are never really completely free from our office.

On top of that, when do get a small break from our working hours, we’re spending it mindlessly on social media and the internet.

Are we ever really able to rest?

4IR can both worsen and alleviate our energy. It allows us to work continuously, yet it also allows us work faster and then rest.

So how do we go forward?

The answer therefore lies with people and their intentions. When advances in tech quicken our schedule, we must not forget that resting offline in our saved time is not wasting it.

Managers need to evaluate productivity in terms of quality of work done, and not time spent working. Employees need to recognise that time spent online is not as restful as time spent offline.

We need to disconnect daily – from our work, and from the internet.

Machines are going to take over tedious and time-consuming jobs, not so that we can fill our time with working more, but so that we can free up our time for more creative pursuits. The fourth industrial revolution will bring with it more options for spending our time.

What are you going to do with it?

To request more information on our digital skills course, click here.

Should we look at the 4th Industrial Revolution with excitement or fear?

Should we look at the 4th Industrial Revolution with excitement or fear?

by | Jun 21, 2019 | ,

by Stefan Lauber

Should we look at the 4th Industrial Revolution with excitement or fear? There is widespread agreement that it will lead to largescale job losses, particularly if the work is repetitive and low skilled.

A report by the World Economic Forum (WEF) anticipates that 75 million jobs will be destroyed but it also forecast than another 133 million new jobs will be created with a net gain of 58 millions.

Jack Ma, from Alibaba, the Chinese Internet giant, predicts that humans will do whatever machines can’t do. But instead of pitting machines against people, he sees that machines will become human partners that will open new opportunities for humanity. 

Foretelling the future is nearly impossible. But we do not need to be helpless bystanders. We can imagine possible future scenarios and then purposefully work towards creating for ourselves the scenario that we prefer most.

Even though the future is uncertain, we can confidently anticipate that:

  • Technology will change entire industries
  • As organizational configurations will change, people will have to be able to transition into new roles
  • Traditional employment relationships will be replaced with short term engagement. A large number of people will be self-employed.  
  • People will need continuously new skills. Lifelong learning will not be an option but a fact of life.
  • Companies will have to get more and more involved in the development of these skills because schools won’t be able to teach the skills that we do not even know of today
  • As other industries will change, so will education. Traditional modes of training delivery will be complemented with new ones.

A key factor for people to prepare themselves for the future, will be that they position themselves proactively. We should, as individuals or organisations:

  1. Take stock of our strengths and skills
  2. Create a vision of where we want to be and how we see ourselves making a contribution
  3. Identify the gaps between where we are today and where we want to be in future
  4. Develop a broad action for the next 5 years
  5. Define a detailed action plan for the next year
  6. Regularly revise our progress and adjust our course of action accordingly

Critical area to consider for us to transition will be that we have the necessary skills. What skills will be in demand?

  • IT skills such Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Robotic Process Automation, Data Science and Analytics, User Experience Design, Internet of Things and Augmented Reality
  • Problem solving skills, logical thinking and mathematical skills are required
  • Entrepreneurial skills because a lot of people will be self-employed. Managerial skills will remain important.
  • Caring skills such as nursing, teaching or counselling. Proportional to the increased role for technology the desire for the warmth of the human touch will raise
  • Empathy, soft human and creative skills will be need more than ever to help improve human interaction and innovation.

iFundi is well positioned to prepare you for the future. We offer in-depth training in key digital skills but also close to 100 soft, entrepreneurial and management skills.

To request more information on our digital skills course, click here.

Reskilling a Priority to Prepare Workers for the Fourth Industrial Revolution

Reskilling a Priority to Prepare Workers for the Fourth Industrial Revolution

by | Feb 20, 2019 | , ,

Written by Lameez Omarjee for Fin24

A significant amount of reskilling and upskilling is necessary to prepare the workforce for future jobs created by the fourth industrial revolution, according to a report.

The World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Future of Jobs 2018 report released earlier this week, unpacks the potential of new technologies to disrupt and create jobs and what should be done to prepare the workforce for new roles. The findings are based on a survey of chief human resources officers and strategy executives from companies across 12 industries and 20 developed and emerging economies.

According to the research, more than half of all workplace tasks will be performed by machines and algorithms as opposed to 29% currently. However, the evolution of machines in the workplace could create 133 million new roles, compared to the 75 million jobs that will be displaced between 2018 and 2022.

 “While we expect net positive job growth, there will be a significant shift in the quality, location, format and permanency of new roles,” the report read.

Although disruption such as automation will have an impact on the nature of work – the quality, location, format and whether roles are permanent or not – it also presents opportunities and demand for new roles. These roles include data analysts and scientists, software and application developers, e-commerce and social media specialists.

There is also expected to be increasing demand for roles which require human skills – such as sales and marketing professions, innovation managers and customer service workers, according to the report. However, roles which could become redundant include “routine-based white-collar roles” such as accounting and pay-roll clerks.

As for the displacement of jobs, surveyed companies indicate job losses in mining and metals, consumer and information technologies industries is projected to be higher than companies in “professional services”, while job demand will be created in other industries.

Businesses are likely to increase the use of contracted workers doing task-specialised work, more flexible work arrangements to be introduced, increasing use of remote staff, and increasing access to talent by shifting the location from which the organisation operates.

In turn workers will require new sets of skills to keep up with changes. Saadia Zahidi, head of the centre for the new economy and society at WEF noted that companies need to invest in human capital to remain competitive in an age of machines”.

“There is both a moral and economic imperative to do so. Without proactive approaches, businesses and workers may lose out on the economic potential of the Fourth Industrial Revolution,” said Zahidi.

But the survey showed that over half of the companies plan to reskill only those in key roles, while only a third plan to reskill at-risk workers.

Even though all industries are expected to have skills gaps, the aviation and travel and tourism will have the highest reskilling needs between 2018 and 2022.

“Skills gaps are also a particular concern in the information and communication technology, financial services and investors, and mining and metals industries,” the report read. Global health and healthcare, chemistry, advanced materials and biotechnology sectors are most likely to retrain their workers. 

The demand for roles will also vary across regions – for example in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, Middle East and North Africa there will be demand for assembly and factory workers. While in East Asia and the pacific and Western Europe there will be demand for financial and investment advisors.

The WEF highlighted the role of government in addressing the impact of new technology on labour markets. This past week stakeholders in government, business and organised labour came together for the Presidential Job Summit in an effort to address the challenges to job creation. Business and government plan to create 275 000 jobs every year for the next five years. Among the solutions proposed includes a focus on training of technical skills in the automotive, construction and hospitality sectors.