(Published in the BusinessWorld under the View from taft column, July 27, 2006)
In the recent 95th International Labor Conference in Geneva, Switzerland, the Philippines through then Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas, urged the international community to redefine the meaning of work. She cited that work has been traditionally defined as an activity for which one was paid and that which was done inside national boundaries, effectively excluding OFW’s as well as cooks, maids, and other mundane tasks.
Perhaps work needs to be redefined to account for the shifts that are taking place that shape its very meaning. Indeed, technological change, globalization, and shifts in demographics are affecting patterns and nature of work in developed as well as developing countries.
Advances in digital automation technology will replace more routine work involving processing of information or transactions with individuals. Already we are seeing this trend in the banking sector where Internet banking transactions have steadily increased over the years as more banks adopt such technology, effectively reducing over-the-counter transactions.
In addition, advances in information and communications technology (ICT) are ushering in a new form of working called telecommuting (also called telework). With portable computers, high speed internet connectivity, and ever-present mobile communications devices, many employees today can work almost anywhere, at least part of the time, other than one’s “official work station”. Already IDC, a research firm, is predicting that the global mobile workforce is expected to grow by more than 20 percent in the next four years, with 878 million mobile workers by 2009.
These technological shifts impact the nature of work in two ways. First, as digital automation replace information processing work, more and more work will shift towards those which involve analyzing information, solving problems, and making complex decisions (e.g. managers, salespeople, customer service reps, nurses), aptly referred to by a McKinsey study as “complex interactions”. Second, as more companies adopt a mobile workforce approach, knowledge workers will be more empowered and will be working in a more decentralized setting.
Dovetailing with these technological trends is the impact of globalization on the nature of work. As noted by Thomas Friedman in “The World is Flat”, “there will be an inexorable flow of jobs from developed world to the developing world, as these new jobs regularly become commoditized and more easily tradable..”
Because of well-developed ICT infrastructure and skilled labor force, the Philippines is now a strong contender for business process outsourcing (BPO) sector which includes call centers, medical transcription and animation firms. It will remain to be the most important sector in the next five years, accounting for 1.2 million workers to date. Sadly, what impedes the continuous growth of the BPO industry, specifically the call center sector, is the degeneration in English skills – only three to five agents are hired out of 100!
The nature of work is also being shaped by changing demographics, specifically the changes occurring in the supply side of work. Demographic changes in the developed world such as declining birth rates, aging population, and the emerging Generation X’ers and Y’ers who dislike menial and “dirty” work have spawned a demand for the importation of labor from less developed countries like the Philippines. This is why our country will still supply a significant number of workers – technical workers, nurses, caregivers, and skilled laborers – to the developed world in the coming years.
All these forces - technological change, globalization, demographic shifts – will truly change the kind of and the way we work in the years to come. It is, however, notable that in the preceding discourse, one important issue sticks out like a sore thumb – the need to continually upgrade workers’ skills.
There in more pressure now than ever to constantly upgrade skills and acquire knowledge in the workplace. The rapid “flattening of the world” and technologically changing workplace is driving workers to have skills faster than before. Acquisition and upgrading of skills that help one perform work - such as technical skills, information-handling skills, English-language skills, complex interaction skills and skills for labor required by the developed world - is the responsibility of the individual in order to survive in the coming years.
Ideally, the right skills should be properly distributed between developed and developing countries, so as to achieve what the International Labor Organization (ILO) envisions as “decent work”. According to ILO, “decent work sums up the aspirations of people in their working lives… work that is productive and delivers a fair income, security in the workplace and social protection for families, better prospects for personal development and social integration, freedom for people to express their concerns, organize and participate in the decisions that affect their lives and equality of opportunity and treatment for all women and men.”
However, reality is still far from this vision. As Thomas Friedman observed, “there are fewer and fewer decent jobs for those without a lot of knowledge”. Still a lot of low skilled laborers leave for the Middle East despite the high risks involved. And still many unschooled young women leave the country as “entertainers.”
That is why public policy should be placing education at the top of the national agenda. Bulk of our national budget should be spent on building schools and sustainable skills development programs through training centers to help prepare the citizenry for the changes in the nature of work. NGO’s as well as the private sector should step up to help the nation in skills development and training of its constituents and employees.
So as a rejoinder, is there a need to redefine work? Can we truly define what work really is, or can we just describe its future? Perhaps what is important to us now is to understand where the nature and pattern of work are headed, without losing sight of our collective goal for decent work for all of us.
As ILO puts it, “decent work is the heart of social progress”.
-----------------------------------
Reynaldo Lugtu, Jr. teaches management and marketing courses in the MBA Program of De La Salle Professional Schools. He may be e-mailed at rlugtu2002@yahoo.com.
In the recent 95th International Labor Conference in Geneva, Switzerland, the Philippines through then Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas, urged the international community to redefine the meaning of work. She cited that work has been traditionally defined as an activity for which one was paid and that which was done inside national boundaries, effectively excluding OFW’s as well as cooks, maids, and other mundane tasks.
Perhaps work needs to be redefined to account for the shifts that are taking place that shape its very meaning. Indeed, technological change, globalization, and shifts in demographics are affecting patterns and nature of work in developed as well as developing countries.
Advances in digital automation technology will replace more routine work involving processing of information or transactions with individuals. Already we are seeing this trend in the banking sector where Internet banking transactions have steadily increased over the years as more banks adopt such technology, effectively reducing over-the-counter transactions.
In addition, advances in information and communications technology (ICT) are ushering in a new form of working called telecommuting (also called telework). With portable computers, high speed internet connectivity, and ever-present mobile communications devices, many employees today can work almost anywhere, at least part of the time, other than one’s “official work station”. Already IDC, a research firm, is predicting that the global mobile workforce is expected to grow by more than 20 percent in the next four years, with 878 million mobile workers by 2009.
These technological shifts impact the nature of work in two ways. First, as digital automation replace information processing work, more and more work will shift towards those which involve analyzing information, solving problems, and making complex decisions (e.g. managers, salespeople, customer service reps, nurses), aptly referred to by a McKinsey study as “complex interactions”. Second, as more companies adopt a mobile workforce approach, knowledge workers will be more empowered and will be working in a more decentralized setting.
Dovetailing with these technological trends is the impact of globalization on the nature of work. As noted by Thomas Friedman in “The World is Flat”, “there will be an inexorable flow of jobs from developed world to the developing world, as these new jobs regularly become commoditized and more easily tradable..”
Because of well-developed ICT infrastructure and skilled labor force, the Philippines is now a strong contender for business process outsourcing (BPO) sector which includes call centers, medical transcription and animation firms. It will remain to be the most important sector in the next five years, accounting for 1.2 million workers to date. Sadly, what impedes the continuous growth of the BPO industry, specifically the call center sector, is the degeneration in English skills – only three to five agents are hired out of 100!
The nature of work is also being shaped by changing demographics, specifically the changes occurring in the supply side of work. Demographic changes in the developed world such as declining birth rates, aging population, and the emerging Generation X’ers and Y’ers who dislike menial and “dirty” work have spawned a demand for the importation of labor from less developed countries like the Philippines. This is why our country will still supply a significant number of workers – technical workers, nurses, caregivers, and skilled laborers – to the developed world in the coming years.
All these forces - technological change, globalization, demographic shifts – will truly change the kind of and the way we work in the years to come. It is, however, notable that in the preceding discourse, one important issue sticks out like a sore thumb – the need to continually upgrade workers’ skills.
There in more pressure now than ever to constantly upgrade skills and acquire knowledge in the workplace. The rapid “flattening of the world” and technologically changing workplace is driving workers to have skills faster than before. Acquisition and upgrading of skills that help one perform work - such as technical skills, information-handling skills, English-language skills, complex interaction skills and skills for labor required by the developed world - is the responsibility of the individual in order to survive in the coming years.
Ideally, the right skills should be properly distributed between developed and developing countries, so as to achieve what the International Labor Organization (ILO) envisions as “decent work”. According to ILO, “decent work sums up the aspirations of people in their working lives… work that is productive and delivers a fair income, security in the workplace and social protection for families, better prospects for personal development and social integration, freedom for people to express their concerns, organize and participate in the decisions that affect their lives and equality of opportunity and treatment for all women and men.”
However, reality is still far from this vision. As Thomas Friedman observed, “there are fewer and fewer decent jobs for those without a lot of knowledge”. Still a lot of low skilled laborers leave for the Middle East despite the high risks involved. And still many unschooled young women leave the country as “entertainers.”
That is why public policy should be placing education at the top of the national agenda. Bulk of our national budget should be spent on building schools and sustainable skills development programs through training centers to help prepare the citizenry for the changes in the nature of work. NGO’s as well as the private sector should step up to help the nation in skills development and training of its constituents and employees.
So as a rejoinder, is there a need to redefine work? Can we truly define what work really is, or can we just describe its future? Perhaps what is important to us now is to understand where the nature and pattern of work are headed, without losing sight of our collective goal for decent work for all of us.
As ILO puts it, “decent work is the heart of social progress”.
-----------------------------------
Reynaldo Lugtu, Jr. teaches management and marketing courses in the MBA Program of De La Salle Professional Schools. He may be e-mailed at rlugtu2002@yahoo.com.
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