October 9, 2017

2030: JOB WANTED

LET’S HEAR IT FOR SPUTNIK AND THE USSR ! Choosing a profession was an easy task 60 years ago. If you were born in Mexico and were fortunate enough to have parents who provided for your university you basically had three choices: doctor, engineer or lawyer. There were, of course other university graduates in philosophy, literature, painting, archaeology and history of art, for example. But everyone knew that if you went that route you would be guaranteed a life of financial challenges, end up probably teaching and not be considered y society as a true professional. Life in the more advanced countries gave you bigger choices, but not many. If you were European, you probably were shunted to a vocational school at around age 15, if you could not cut it for university or polytechnic. And although non-professional degrees led to serious careers, in education and the arts, for instance, the income attached to these was not of the level of the true professions. Then something unexpected happened:  The  launched Sputnik 1 ( Satellite 1) into an elliptical  on October 4, 1957. It was a polished metal sphere, slightly more than 50 centimeters in diameter with four external radio antennas to broadcast radio pulses. Its radio signal was easily detectable even by amateurs, and the inclination and duration of its orbit made its flight path cover virtually the entire inhabited Earth. This surprise success launching of the first artificial satellite precipitated the American Sputnik crisis and triggered the Space Race. That launch ushered new political, military, technological, scientific and educational developments, which slowly transformed the laid back post WW II world and brought giant global social upheavals. After the space race was won when Neil Armstrong stepped on the surface of the moon, the world began a more dizzyiing series of advances in all areas of knowledge and technology that together with social changes have transformed the world in the last 50 years. Education at all levels has had a very hard time catching up with the changes around the world. These changes have created concern about the type of education needed that will provide jobs in the future.

WHAT JOBS WILL BE AVAILABLE IN 2030? This is the question that tortures the minds of many people, particularly, anxious parents as they try to determine the choices they must make to provide their children with the best advantage when they graduate from university. The issue could be approached from many different perspectives:

What jobs will be available, that pay more than others?

What will be the ten most coveted degrees?

What fields of endeavor are coming up in the next decade?

What is happening with technology?

What is happening to education?

The US Bureau of Labor Statistics has thought of the first question and recently released its projections for Job Growth Across Hundreds of Occupations Between 2014 and 2024. The key word is projections, so the list can be extended to 2030. The list is adjusted for salaries and is in reverse order of job growth: least jobs first, most jobs last. We must remember this is a burocratic list. Here are the top 21 jobs growing most:

Elementary School teachers

Nurse practitioners

Financial managers

Electricians

Licensed practical and vocational nurses

Lawyers

Wholesale and manufacturing sales representatives

Medical and health service managers

Software system developers

Market research analysts and marketing specialists

Physical therapists

Personal financial advisers

First line supervisors of office and admin support workers

Computer and information systems managers

Management analysts

Accountants and auditors

Physicians and surgeons

Computer systems analysts

Software applications developers

General and operations managers

Registered nurses.

The list shows three areas of big growth: health, computer technology and management.

Other organizations exploring the coming years have looked at the Top 10 Degrees for the next ten years answering the second question:

International Business or Finance

Bioinformatics or biomedical engineering

Any engineering

Environmental science or sustainability

Health information technology or Health administration

Computer sciences

Information technology security

Public health

Instructional design

Human resources

In this list health, computer technology, management and engineering prevail.

And other organizations have looked at Fields of Endeavor in the forthcoming ten years answering the third question:

Medical

Technology Sector

Financial Services

Education arena

Technical jobs

Business services jobs

Sales

Consultants

Engineering

Middle management

Again, we see that health, computer technology, engineering and management are the areas that prevail.

This is easily understood. Health management in the US is one of the biggest industries and will grow continuously as the population ages (The Graying of America) requiring not only physicians but an increasing population of nurses. Computer technology is fast becoming the driving force of most of our lives. Engineering is required to produce all the infrastructure necessary for our growing technology dependence. And the staff, supervisors, directors and executives to make all these industries work will continue to be a task of managers.

THE ROBOTS ARE HERE. MORE ON THE WAY. This addresses the fourth question. Where are we going with all the new technology that is taking away jobs? We have become immune to ATM machines, robotic automobile assembly lines, automatic machine mail sorting and thousands more applications; driverless cars and buses and trucks and trains do not astonish us. Amazon, for example had 15 thousand robots in 2014, double the amount in 2016 and again double the amount to 60,000 robots in its 20 fulfillment centers. Let me say that again: Sixty Thousand Robots or about half the number of people that work for the company. Yes, one robot, two humans.

Robot induced unemployment is a big, mounting concern. The solutions being looked at are interesting, particularly because they look at another side of the coin. Bill Gates, for example, advocates putting a tax on companies that use robots. This additional cost, Gates says, could delay the use of robots and provide some funding for training people whose jobs are being eliminated and replaced by robots. Other people think that the US could be losing over 50% of the jobs available now over the next 10 to 15 years. These are jobs that are not going abroad or offshore. MIT which is good with numbers, estimates that from 1990 to 2007 adding one robot per 1,000 workers lead to the unemployment of six workers. Unions, of course, are also worried about this situation and are discussing their strategies for contending with a robot-clogged future.

But whatever the situation and the effect on employment, new robots are on their way. There is a new industry already, for instance, manufacturing robots that prepare salads out of cut vegetables stored in refrigerated canisters. At the touch of a screen, individuals place their orders choosing from a menu or concocting their own recipe. The machine calculates the number of calories per salad and drops the vegetables into a bowl in less than one minute. The inventor foresees salad machines in train stations, in floors of buildings, in corporate kitchens, in schools, just like soft drink dispensers. And the list of robots continues.

WHAT ABOUT ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE? An argument was made in the past that robots did repetitive, mindless work, but with the advent of artificial intelligence, the tasks that can be done by robots, including, for instance, dictation directly into typed texts, or Alexa and Siri. Now, even oral translation, seems imminent, but not as touted by the industry. Google recently announced that it has a new app that can translate orally instantly from one language to another in about 20 languages. This is a lot of hype on the part of Google. Google Translate is an app that translates texts into many others with a high degree of accuracy, but mistakes are blatant, such that an automatically translated text cannot be used for a legal process. For instance, the German compound word Alleinvertretungsansprachung which means “exclusive mandate” is GTd (Google Translated) as “sole representation demanding”. Or the Spanish expression “Pido claveles y me dan clavos” is GTd into French as “Je demande des oeillets et ils me donnent des ongles.” In Portuguese “saudade”, which means “the feeling of missing a person who is gone” is GTd as “missing”. Gemütlichkeit in German is GTd as Gemutlichkeit, not as “cozy, friendly, nice atmosphere.” And this does not even starts to address the spoken language, with its enormous amount of dialects and pronunciation, intonations and slangs. “A todo dar” which is Mexican slang for “outstanding” is GTd as “to give”. Or in Italian the proverb “Donna/danno” that comes from the Italian “Chi disse donna disse danno” which is a popular saying “Who says Woman says Damage” (as in your broken heart) is GTd as “woman give.” Traduttori, traditore! (Translator, traitor) is an old expression attributed to Dante Alighieri who feared that the translations of his Divine Comedy would be execrable, since he found some of the Italian translations of Latin texts execrable as well. We are not yet at the point of totally substituting humans by robots in the UN interpreters’ booths. The point of all this is that more and more repetitive jobs are going to robots, but any job where, feelings, nuances, interpretation, sensibility and empathy are required cannot yet be done by robots.

WHAT IS A PARENT TO DO? To answer the fifth questions, these musings have everything to do with education for the future. The basic question that every concerned parent is asking is “What should my child study to have a job in 2030?” As we saw above, the answer, from the statistics and analyses done so far is a job in the health sciences, in the digital information world, in engineering or in management. But there is something more important than a specific job or a specific industry. In our times most children in their early years and even into their teens are not focused on specific jobs. They have certain interest but not specific goals. So what is a parent to do? There is always the nagging fear that the next generation will be educated to deal with what will fast become obsolete. Let’s take a quick look at the past: there was no use for engineers who were taught radio bulb design: the transistor was invented; for printers who were taught typesetting: the transistor appeared; for doctors who were taught to use sulfa: penicillin was discovered; and the list can go on. The educational system recognized these changes and left the cookbook approach to education and embarked on teaching principles and problem solving.

But the question is still valid: Are we fully preparing students for the needs of the 21st century in our schools? The answer is categorically, No. We are addressing some of what they need to know. But if it is true that students need to understand particular subjects in depth, they also need to understand the connections between subjects. For example, the connections between math, science and geography. Or history and chemistry. Or poetry and painting. Or music and literature.

Students also need the kinds of skills that will help them to be effective learners in the 21st century. They need to develop critical thinking and analytical skills; to synthesize information; to use their metacognitive skills: to know what they don’t know and think about their own learning more explicitly; to know how to set goals that are challenging and realistic; to ask themselves good questions; to prepare properly; to monitor their performance, seek out feedback and use it; and my old mantra: to keep a diary to build self-awareness. More simply put: students must be trained so they can be effective learners throughout their lives. The teacher is there to help the learner reach their potential, but the role of the teacher must change.

I hope teachers become much more actively involved in developing learning resources, that include development of technologies. They need to be partners with those who develop technologies and resources, along with learners who are all part of the design of these tools so they are much more suitable to meet the needs of learners and teachers in the classroom. I suggest parents ask and explore whether the school is providing this type of support. I see an exciting future for teachers; that also comes out in the analyses above.

WE DON’T HAVE A LIMITED QUOTA OF INTELLIGENCE. We can, with the right support, achieve phenomenally significant things way beyond what we might have imagined. The anecdote of one of the geniuses of the 19th century, Thomas Edison, comes to mind. When Edison was in third grade he came home from school with a note and told his mother that his teacher had told him to give it to his mother to read. His mother read it and when young Thomas asked what the note said his mother replied,” Your son is a genius and we are unable to teach him any further. You will have to teach him at home.” And she did for many years. After Edison’s mother passed away; after he had invented the incandescent light bulb and the phonograph; after he founded the Ellison Illuminating Company, which later became General Electric; after he had obtained hundreds of patents, he went to his mother’s house, looked into her desk, found the letter that his teacher had sent her mother, and read it. The letter said:” Your son cannot learn anything. He is expelled.” His mother, clearly thought otherwise. Edison went on to continue his inventions to the age of 84.

The most exciting learning environment is one where learners are free to explore, and have support to make the most of that exploration. Where they aren’t constantly required to complete tests. Where their contribution is valued, and they are aware that their contribution was valued. Where groups of learners and teachers are working together to explore their own learning and how problems can be solved and solutions achieved. There’s huge potential for exciting learning environments that combine the best of human intelligence and artificial intelligence, the best of physical and virtual reality, so that we can all find out exciting things about the world.

There are many different routes being explored; the five Rs is one that challenges the way we think:

Refresh your fundamental thinking

Reset by disconnecting and stepping into tomorrow

Reframe and examine past solutions

Reimagine how to design a better future

Re engage in the world around you

But there are others. I am partial to the one that follows the key aspects of creative thinking, as I learned at UCLA, and later applied at UArts for the Center for the Creative Economy. It consists of an approach to solving problems by thinking in different directions. The process involves:

Analogy and Metaphor — Not only useful for visualization, but also for problem-solving: if we can resolve an analogous situation or issue, we can perhaps then solve the particular challenge we are facing.

Perception — In the creative sense, the ability to see patterns where others are unable to do so.

Simplicity — Often the most creative solution is that which is most simple.

Adversity — The human mind deals with obstacles in thee ways: indifference, retreating from them, or seeing them as challenges. The creative mind will often use the difficult or hostile environment as a chance to solve problems and display innovative thinking. The Roman writer Seneca said: "The good things of prosperity are to be wished; but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired." In Philadelphia, the celebrated Benjamin Franklin, put it even more concisely, writing, “The proof of gold is fire”.

Technical Mastery — Creative problem solving demands the proper tools, techniques, and methods. Creativity can only come flourish if the appropriate “vehicle”exists.

Persistence — Many creative ideas meet resistance. New ideas, new art, new discoveries and inventions often defy traditional concepts or aesthetics, and are not readily accepted. But creativity can demand of the innovator that he or she persist despite such obstacles. Edison said “Invention is one percent inspiration and 99% perspiration.” Richard Feynman, the Nobel Laureate physicist, believed in doing lots of experiments and working through many possible solutions in attempting to find the right one. He said: “To develop working ideas efficiently, I try to fail as fast as I can”.

These are all things children can learn at home as well, with guidance from their parents.

As to how we offer education and training, the big message is: churn, mix, stir. Many job holders will need to retool in the future as they have done in the past, as their roles become outdated. Jobs with more highly specialized professional and terminal degree requirements (education, law, health care) are more protected against computerization. While many of the jobs at risk of computerization also have educational attainment expectations (such as repair, administration, sales), these tend to be tied to shorter programs (such as certificates). If higher education wants to stay ahead of this curve, it should grow its access and opportunities specifically to help at-risk job holders to retool early and often. Even for those in safer fields, the rate of change has created very complex environments in most fields, so teaching the range of motion and creative problem solving has been cited in IBM’s global CEO survey as the biggest capacity needed going forward. We have seen a surge in the Seminars that update lawyers; conferences that update physicians; webinars that update management.

FORGING OUR WORLD FOR 2050 AND BEYOND. I always go back to my beliefs in a solid science education and a fundamental humanistic education. And to the joys of discovery. Let’s give our next generation an understanding of the history of humanity with all the efforts, failures and successes; a connection to the incredibly magical world of biology and mathematics, physics and chemistry; an admiration of the power of the word as expressed in literature (I still don’t know why parents do not confer the privilege of using a digital screen for one hour, for every one or two hours that the child has read a book); the satisfaction of creating art and exploring the joys of lines and colors and spots and blobs and trees and water; the revelation that music and poetry go together and that one can paint poetry and smell music. We can easily be misled into guiding the next generation into a profession rather than into a process of learning to learn a job. In a recent study, university graduates are distributed along a bell curve in their first year of having a job: approximately 60% are still in the job but are ready to leave and are already looking for another opportunity; 20% have quit their job and are already looking for another and the other 20% stayed in the job. They will all learn from other jobs or go to graduate school to specialize. Or they may decide, finally, that they really know what it is that they want to do and go forth and do it.

THE PURPOSE OF GOING TO A UNIVERSITY is not to learn a vocation, or to become a specialist in some technical field. Most universities have equipment that is many years behind what can be found in industry. The purpose is to open your mind, discover new worlds, relate to other people, listen to other arguments, explore different fields, absorb new knowledge and train your mind to learn faster and understand better. That is what they should seek in a university education. If the next generation masters the meaning of money earned by working part time from a young age, cultivates the joys of curiosity, develops social skills, learns respect of others and believes that a whole world of opportunity awaits, then a first job is certain in the future 2030; many more will come later. And this next generation will forge our world for 2050 and beyond.

Vale