I recently interviewed Dan Pink, author of A Whole New Mind and Free Agent Nation, two of the best books available about the fundamental changes occuring in the U.S. workforce. I asked him what skills and people would prosper in the future. Here's part of his response:
Of the five most important psychological traits that distinguish human beings from one another, openness to new experience stands out as the factor that I think defines who will be more inclined to becoming contingents and enjoying it. That also involves tolerance for risk. I think all of us have the capacity somewhere in us and if the context changes enough we end up moving in that direction.
My argument is that the left-brain abilities — create-a-spreadsheet and zero-in-on-the-right-answer type of thinking — still matter and are necessary but are no longer sufficient. The abilities that are characteristic of the other side of the brain — artistic, empathetic, inventive — are increasingly becoming first among equals in the world of work both at the level of individual careers and at the level of organizational performance.
The reason for that is that some of these left-brain abilities can be done cheaper overseas or faster by computers. For example, about 2 million U.S. tax returns were completed by chartered accountants in India
At the same time we work in an economy that requires us to deliver not only utility but significance, a sense of meaning or even esthetics. Those forces require people to do something that is hard to outsource and hard to automate and satisfies these other needs of a very abundant age.
(The full interview with Pink will appear in the September issue of Contingent Workforce Strategies magazine.)
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