The Robots are coming. What does this mean for management. Cultivated Management newsletter.
Hi and welcome to this week's Cultivated Management newsletter.
This week I’ve been in Dublin at the Dublin Tech Summit and my mind is spinning with the sheer amount of new tech flooding the market.
So here's a quick run down for you, as managers, and how this new tech may affect your careers, work or team.
Automate humans and tasks. The big take away is that technology is automating and augmenting (supporting) tasks that humans do. Big markets are emerging in areas where humans can be replaced for cost reasons, but also for altruistic reasons like health and safety. Look at driverless cars, chatbots instead of call centre agents and autoscaling/deploying of software. The legal world, medical world, finance world and fashion worlds are also being upturned by startups using cheap tech to bring new products to market.
The mindset of this section of the tech community is build, iterate and repeat. Their mindset is about collaboration and making a difference with products, not just revenue. If your team aren’t iterating and shipping often (no matter what your industry or product) then you’re going to be out of business soon - that’s the message. Innovate or die away. Ship often. Add value.
The other thing that was prevalent was staff engagement and enablement - the very field I work in. It's hot right now because good, talented people are hard to find. Once you find them you have to keep them too. So employer branding, retention, well being and meaningful work is important. Hot topic.
As usual at tech events, there was a certain bias towards tech solving every problem in the world. Part of me sees tech being an enabler, part of me sees it creating a whole host of other problems. And of course it doesn’t always add value.
From a management perspective it was really interesting networking with the delegates. It seems lots of companies are struggling with bad management and a lack of leadership - even some of the big names. There are disgruntled designers, developers, creatives and support staff working under bad management. So it's a good time for Cultivated Managers - managers who are constantly cultivating themselves and others. It's a good time indeed - at least in the tech world.
So here's some key takeaways
Look at repeatable tasks and use tools/automation to reduce costs and improve accuracy.
Look at tasks that humans are good at but computers are better at - like operating machinery, driving or crunching numbers.
If you're doing lots of repeatable tasks then stop it! Start doing value added work - get computers to help do the repeatable stuff.
If you have a team of people doing repeatable tasks provide a plan for them to move on to work that won’t be replaced - trust me, the robots are coming - and who’s thinking about the thousands of people who now have no job?
Keep learning how to build self organised teams where learning is at the heart - and stay out of their way. Good people know what to do.
Tech will both solve all of the world's problems and create more - be ready to evolve to deal with new problems.
There is an epic bias towards tech for any manager working in tech - stop and ask whether tech really is the answer - sometimes the best way to solve a problem at work is with a pen and paper and a conversation.
Hire good people, find out what makes them tick, give them good work and try your hardest to keep hold of them.
Not everyone is a good speaker, even some of the big names in the industry that you expect to be. So if you're debating speaking at an event, go forth and speak at it :)
Go to a conference like the Dublin Tech Summit. You see a lot of good stuff, but you also realise that at the heart of it all are humans. Products for humans. Products to replace humans. Products to augment our abilities.
Great event. Keep your eye on the tech world. Go forth and hire great people. Keep managing people like people (at least until you have to start managing cyborgs).
Until next week.
Rob