The future of work is personal.
A radically different perspective. Read more…

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First, what is ‘work’?

Many blogposts rave about the ‘future of work’ … and then try to sell you something.

Disclaimer: This post is not any different - but it does define ‘work’ differently.
‘Work’ is not a job, making money, or doing what the boss wants.

Some people are perfectly happy with this definition - but it misses out on a ton of value.
Let’s first examine why this definition is problematic.

Having artificial ‘company boxes’ around a group of people restricts the free flow of labour and expertise. It also separates people into competing clans that don’t communicate - so they can’t learn from each other. Worse, they waste valuable time and focus on protecting company secrets and ‘capturing’ customers. They invent similar sub-optimal solutions. Software is a good example of this - but it can be applied to any domain.

What if all ‘work’ was personal?

This is not some hippie ideal - but very possible with the current state of technology. The success of Open Source proves it. It is perfectly possible to create a win-win cooperation that on average benefits society more than a ‘some win big time - but most are in a sucky middle/bottom’ competitive market.

Let’s be clear - this doesn’t mean there will be no competition!
Competition is absolutely necessary for the efficient allocation of resources. Only difference: the boundaries. Instead of companies commanding swarms of workers to battle each other to the death for the glory of the CEO and the shareholders - individuals can now compete with each other for meaningful work. What you want to do EQUALS what needs to be done. Unconstrained by company labels - you are free to go where the most interesting work is. In a sense, this is not even competition - but cooperation.

This is chaos!

Yes and no. We can’t completely fit it into our minds. We don’t fully understand it. There’s no one promising us a monthly paycheck and ‘stability’ - so it’s scary. That doesn’t mean it can’t work. Chaos is everywhere - even today. The current way of organizing is also chaos: a game of chess that is played by countless companies simultaneously on many different and interconnected boards. The stock market is not something really smart people understand. No one fully understands it. It is simply a glorified casino people tell lies about so that we keep using it. We make up stories that nicely rationalize what happens. “Lost money? Then your investment strategy wasn’t great.” This is why rich people mostly think they got rich because they’re smart - not because they got lucky. We explain success after the fact: Company X is winning because they have a better strategy. Company Y is going bankrupt because management is corrupt. Company Z is growing like crazy because they have a better product in a booming market. Need advice? Hire a consultant…
If it was that simple … everyone would be a winner!

The truth is : nobody has the answer. How many failures, blood, sweat, and tears are we not seeing? To get one successful company - countless more are wasted and thrown into the bottomless pit of uninteresting losers. A few notable cases are singled out in business schools as examples of ‘how not to do it’. However, no one talks about the total amount of these losses - and how they are distributed. The same goes for individual lives. On average, things are getting better for everyone - but if winning is hard, there must be more losers than winners. No one cares - since we all have hopes of being the winner. We like solutions - not problems. Deep in our heart, we all feel our best choice is to play along in a rigged game. Doesn’t being a millionaire sounds like the ultimate way of solving our problems? Ask a millionaire. In essence it only solves one problem: how to pay for your bills. Disregarding the fact it also creates many other problems - it doesn’t solve your most important problem: how to meaningfully spend your few years on earth… and they are few.

Wishing you all the best!



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