(Article written for IET’s Flipside Magazine for young people)

Everyone faces the challenge of what to do after full time education is finished. It affects the choices students have make when studying or training and involves trying to balance what one likes doing, what one is good at doing and what work may be available. The number of years worked before retirement will be longer in the future as people are living longer, so it is likely that some people may have several careers and many jobs. The world of work has changed and is changing very quickly.

Office life in the most advanced organisations is already almost entirely electronic and flexible working using mobile wireless communications means that what is done is being decoupled from where it is done. Perhaps most offices will be replaced by more informal coffee-shop like environments and the daily commute replaced by a healthy (and greener) walk or cycle to work which will be local. Telepresence (e.g. video-conferencing) will be used to eliminate unnecessary travel People managers are being replaced by computer applications that free people to manage themselves. Many people will live and work in the same building.

Many experts will be replaced by artificial intelligence (A.I) and the web, which has already given everyone access to mountains of free information, will get smarter as the semantic web and similar A.I initiatives, bridge the gap between humans and computers. Robots will be replacing more and more human activities and we will eventually see machines able to perform most manual tasks that people can do.

So if machines are likely to be capable of doing almost everything what is left for us humans? The answer is that people are sociable and want to work and engage with people, so jobs will always exist for those with good interpersonal skills. Culture is a human activity, so arts, media, entertainment, religion, politics, are all examples of areas where people will be dominant. If machines and computers are to become more widespread then they will have to be conceived, designed, managed and maintained by people (aided by machines). The pace of science is quickening, so there will be greater need for people to work in nanotechnology, biotechnology, cognitive sciences and the engineering required to apply the science. An aging population will need more doctors and health workers but some may be eventually replaced by machines.

Change is the only certainty, so the best advice is to be flexible, multi-skilled and to never stop learning. Some basics do not change, such as the ability to communicate well but science and technology will be transforming the world so that many of today’s jobs will simple not exist in the future. Machines will do the work better and cheaper thus enabling people to work more with people. The need for sustainability may change some of our habits so more people will be needed locally to grow, make and repair. Not everyone will want mass produced articles so there will be a need for traditional craft workers. Perhaps some will choose to live a very simple life and reject technology (except when they are ill!).