New Delhi: In his new book Human at Work, published by Penguin, Richard Lobo, Chief People Officer at Tech Mahindra, explains that as long as people are willing to enhance their skill sets, they will remain relevant in the job market.
In an exclusive conversation with ETV Bharat, he discussed how the world of work, the way people work, and the nature of work itself will continue to evolve.
According to Richard Lobo, the shift from commuting to large industrial units, then to operating from structured cabins, and now to working from home has brought its own set of challenges.
"It has become imperative for humans to stay at the forefront of these changes," Lobo said. He also highlighted challenges such as rapid technological advancement, digital transformation, and economic uncertainties, which present both opportunities and threats for the future of work.
As a solution to these challenges, he emphasised the need for companies to ensure team collaboration and foster employee well-being while being inclusive and sustainable.
Job Scenario After Robots
In his book, he advocated that merging humans and machines can give far better results. He said that AI and Robots are definitely going to kill some jobs but they also produce jobs in good numbers.
He said humans are better at making decisions involving ambiguity. "Ambiguous situations require decision-making based on intuition and humans are good at this. Machines are far superior at making decisions that require deductions involving data and logic. Merging the two capabilities of machines and humans makes for a powerful outcome," he asserted.
Lobo gave an example by saying that unfortunately most skills have a limited lifespan and require constant updating.
"In the past, a surgeon could expect the skill he/she acquired during training and medical school to largely remain relevant during his/her practice years. A good surgeon would of course keep themselves updated with new methods, instruments and drugs periodically, but it was an incremental learning approach. Today skills don't last that long because of advancements in technology and knowledge. A surgeon would need to reskill every decade or so. The same holds true for every job," added Lobo.
Focus on Skilling
He advised that to adapt to the rapidly accelerating pace of technological changes, each one of us will have to develop ways to learn and keep our skills current in a systematic, rigorous experimental and long-term way.
"The worry about robots taking away our jobs won't go away entirely as none of us can predict accurately what will happen to our present job in the future. But changing our focus from the job to skill, we will always have new areas for us to work on," he added.
According to him, to be relevant in the jobs one should invest their time in skilling and re-skilling.
