From emv@umich.edu Thu Mar 18 18:34:12 1999 Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 14:26:38 -0500 (EST) From: Edward Vielmetti To: vacuum@egroups.com Subject: [vacuum] Responses to "Changing world of work" (long) Welcome to Vacuum! A couple of months ago I relayed a question from Tamar Charney, a producer at Michigan Radio, about the changing world of work. Here are some responses that came in, lightly edited for space, but mostly uncut so you can read what people have to say for themselves. Thanks to David C. Bloom, Judi Clark, Richard Stiennon, Mike O'Connor, Bill Norton, Jessica Hartung, Lou Rosenfeld, Lindsay Marshall, and Ray Peters for their comments, and to Tamar for starting this discussion going. I was struck by how many people have gone through many of the same kinds of work experiences that I have, in that old-fashioned notions of "the job", "the boss" and "the office" are no longer relevant. Even Dilbert looks a little out of date and quaint to a bunch of self-described "unemployable" workers who don't necessarily fit the description of someone who can come in to work at the same time every day and leave when everyone else leaves. The bad news is, if you want one of those 9-5 jobs they're fast disappearing.... This is much longer than a typical Vacuum, but the responses were so interesting I thought you might like to see them too. thanks Edward Vielmetti emv@umich.edu Home office: +1 734 332 7868 (now with answerphone) Vacuum: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~emv/project/vacuum http://egroups.com/list/vacuum ------------ From: Lou Rosenfeld Subject: you *can* fish in the vacuum Hi Tamar Big Thing: I love my job. If I'd been born 50 or maybe even 25 years earlier (I'm 33), I'd probably hate my job. But information technology (IT) has really made a difference. One is that IT-related areas like the Internet (the industry I work in) is just so dang interesting. But more importantly, IT has allowed entrepreneurial/unemployable types like myself to start our own companies; I can't tell what it means to not have to work for a bureacracy any more. And maybe I'm wrong, but I've got to believe that a 1990's Internet-related start-up has a much higher probability of success than a 1950's aerospace or 1900's automotive or telephone start-up. It's also a great feeling to create a corporate culture that doesn't have to follow conventional approaches. It's as if building a company is as creative and artistic an act as sculpture or painting. Maybe even more so, as the company and its surroundings and context are always in flux. Another Big Thing: I love my job. I know I've already said that, but I find that when things aren't going so well at work, I make so much more of it than I have a right to. I've come to expect to enjoy my work so much that I'm inordinately incredulous and frustrated when I'm not feeling that way. I almost feel as if I need to see a psychologist. Wow. Imagine folks from so many other industries feeling the same way about their work. They'd really think I was nuts. Has it ever been this way in other industries at other times? Don't know if these are the sorts of ideas you were looking for, but it was fun to spout off nonetheless. Good luck with the story; I'll listen for it (Tamar or Ed, please let the vacuum list know when it will air). cheers Louis Rosenfeld / lou@argus-inc.com Argus Associates / http://argus-inc.com / 734.913.0010 Information Architecture for the WWW / http://www.ora.com/catalog/infotecture/ --------- From: David C. Bloom Subject: [vacuum] The changing world of work - "fishing in the vacuum" Tamar__ Good topic. Here's three thoughts: FIRST, Priorities have shifted - mine, as well as those around me. WAS: 1) money 2) advancement (title, power, recognition, e.g.) 3) retirement (age, pension, gold watch, e.g.) 4) benefits (company car, medical, dental, e.g.) 5) lifestyle (hours, commute, travel, e.g.) IS: 1) lifestyle (family, flexibility, stress, e.g.) 2) nature of work (competitive skills, cool project, e.g.) 3) people (clients, venders, coworkers, e.g.) 4) values (spiritual, environmental, political impacts, e.g.) 5) money I guess I would qualify as being "obsessed with these type questions." Ed can vouch for me on this. I left the corporate world for good in 1995, after working for several Fortune-500 companies and start-ups. I founded a firm that functions more like a co-op than a company - a "Constellation" of 22 independent contractors. I try to empower those who embrace this lifestyle, and work to support it, rather than the opposite (work first, lifestyle second). Our creed is here: http://factotem.com/values.html SECOND, Economics are stilted. At a holiday family gathering, an in-law I see infrequently asked me which, of all the different things I do, is the most profitable. I told him that my speaking gigs earn me the most money, but that I didn't want to go "on a circuit," just giving presentations all the time. "Why not?" he asked. "And why do anything else, if it makes less money?" THIRD, The very nature of the workforce is dissipating. I know this sounds very George Gilder-y, so let me explain: For the past several hundred (thousand?) years, workers were bound by geography. In order to accomplish anything, a patron had to house her workers, attend to their needs, and provide them with their tools - this was as true of slavery as it is of industrial employment. In order to do business, a patron (company, institution, whatever) had to make this huge investment in the means of production. This is no longer the case. Anachronisms such as "corporate loyalty" and "lifetime employment" have been replaced by a new individualism - which can manifest itself as autonomy or as greed. Marx was wrong, but the workers still won. Folks like Ed and I regularly work on geographically-dispersed "Virtual Teams" (often linked by information technology), all working together toward a common goal, but seldom - if ever! - actually meeting face-to-face. Under this "dissipated workforce" model, the patron need only hang out her shingle and her currency to attract workers (or ready-made Teams) to her project. Her barriers to enter new markets are lower, and the workers themselves are more competitive, serving, as they do, many masters. Ultimately, each worker serves herself. Ideally the workers and the patrons become interchangable. Hope this helps. __David David C. Bloom http://www.i-gift.com i-gift@factotem.com Fast, convenient, secure, flexible, personalized gift certificates ---------- From: Judi Clark Subject: Re: [vacuum] The changing world of work - "fishing in the vacuum" Hi Ed and Tamar, I had more than a few comments on this subject, but will try to limit myself to the bigger and/or more amusing ones. Please allow my rambling with the promise to make better sense of it later. Ed said: > I know that my work life has changed a whole lot in the last ten years. > The boundaries between at-work and not-at-work have blurred quite a bit, > especially now that I'm telecommuting 2000 miles & have a work system set > up in the study. Some of the early frantic pace is gone; I'm not in > operations any more, so the whole company won't come to a screeching halt > if I do something wrong. My life has been focused one way or another on teaching people about the Internet, and helping them implement various plans using it, for a good dozen years now. Long ago did the line between life and work disappear for me. I don't suppose it helped that I've been mostly single for half that time, but that's another fractal issue that rings for me and a dozen or so of my uppity women friends. Because we work on the Internet and have some technical expertise, does that make us geeks? Most of us have a social focus--we're teaching, sharing, fixing, helping... kinda like Englebart's dream: invent the things that help people work together. Yeah, and his dream made a lot of other people very rich... didn't do that much (yet) for the social side. Ok, so this is really about the social/technology focus: I'm no longer fond of what I've been doing for the last five years, but what I want to do doesn't pay (yet). It's a social thing. I want to be paid to help people see and know things. People look at my resume and don't have a clue how to respond--it's all over the map, hard to put me in a little box. HR departments can't deal with it at all. So am I stuck being a "consultant" in that wierd void of the occasionally employed? > There's a lot of trendy stuff out there (I think of reading "Fast > Company") about how we are all supposed to be "free agents" or > "mercenaries" in our work, skip any sense of loyalty to an employer since > they are going to dump us anyway when we're not needed. Having stuck out > two companies until the bitter end I guess I don't have that attitude > built into me very well. It does seem to be increasingly important not to > get pigeonholed as the expert in one thing or another lest you get > automated out of existence when there's no longer any need for that > expertise. Hey, loyalty? I have some for anyone who pays me, but it seems to glow in a very small space when they're done learning from me and there's a big guy company in the wings ready to charge hundreds of times what my proposal was for and sure, they'll do a bang up job of just what I proposed... Doesn't help that I'm a free agent meaning I'm a company of one, so all changes impact greatly. Yeah, I tried being a company once, but I found employees 1) only wanted to do things that were fun, their way, 2) didn't want to do the same things for very long, 3) didn't want to help change the direction of their work, and 4) cost me a #$(&*%$ fortune in money and admistrative headaches. I doubt I'll do that again. > Job hunting continues to change. In my job as an internal consulting > inside a big company, it can feel as though I am hunting for work all the > time, though the people I'm working for are co-workers not employers. For > people who are changing employers, it seems like the role of social > networks are even more amplified with the Internet playing a role in > spreading the word discreetly that you are out there on the job market. My social network is the one thing that keeps me afloat. All my friends tell me interesting things, teach me stuff I don't know, help me temper my wild idealism, and give me faith in myself. I tend to think I'm always on a tightrope, wanting to play with all the toys they're exploring, but knowing all those toys are owned by big companies that can't wait to exploit their resources. Ok, I'm more of a privacy zealot than most, but the translation is that people don't work with things they don't know about and guess what, this is a vast land of rules unknown. I don't know if you can read between the lines here to see my main points (did I have any?), but if you have questions, just send me a note. Perhaps a little more personal than the thick brushes I could have used to paint the pictures with... judi ----------- From: Richard Stiennon Subject: Re: [vacuum] The changing world of work - "fishing in the vacuum" Hi Tamar: I have a couple of thoughts on the changing work world. Thanks mostly to email there has been a marked change. My first experience was when I was managing an engineering staff that was designing car seats for GM in australia. The project started in Michigan but transitioned to Australia. I kept track of my engineer in Australia almost completely through email. The 16 hour time difference meant he had to call me at home if we wanted to talk. At the same time I was traveling to Germany for BMW. I could "globe trot" without losing control of my projects. I am currently at PricewaterhouseCoopers. The entire organization is run through a Lotus Notes interface. We have a scheduling database online to let everyone know how to contact us. When we travel we plug in as soon as we get to our hotel. When we are at a client there is always at least one phone line so we can attend to everyday business while downloading information or tools we need to perform our work. I have other thoughts but this has been the most dramatic impact on the work arena I find myself in. Cheers! -Richard Stiennon -------------------------------------------------------------- Richard Stiennon 248.723.8456 richard@isiah.com Isiah.com Cell: 810-450-9669 www.i-gift.com Fax: 313-731-0123 Now Featuring The Somerset Collection --------------------------------------------------------------- -------- Date: Wed, 06 Jan 1999 09:21:40 -0800 From: William B. Norton Subject: Re: [vacuum] The changing world of work - "fishing in the vacuum" I would say the strongest trend I see is that people change jobs but operate within the same circles with different affiliations on their nametags. This inspires peple to be loyal to their friends and colleagues because they will be in the circle forever, while the company affiliaion may not be. The circles are of different dimensions too. For some of us lucky enough to do the public speaking circuit, the circle of contacts provides us with a fairly rich network of contacts. The point is that relationships in our industry are between people, not companies. Bill --------------- From: Jessica Hartung Subject: The changing world of work An interesting coincidence that I received your question today. This is what I wrote last night: It is as if there are two business worlds out there--the one we have known for years and see in the news. Its about financial success, market domination, often boring, menial, and sometimes demeaning labor performed for a pointy-haired boss right out of Dilbert. Yet whenever people talk about corporations as if they were monsters--plundering our resources and concerned only about the bottom line at the expense of personal integrity and ethics (you get a lot of that around Boulder) I shake myself, as if to say, "Wait a minute,. are you going to let them talk about you that way?" I am a businessperson, and I don't belong lumped in with that. Such a view of business doesn't take into account the transformation I've been seeing in the way business looks at people, itself, and its purpose. More and more people are writing books, giving lectures, selling audio tapes and actually living with a certain kind of spirituality in their business. Now, I don't mean religion. I mean that they are in touch with their motives. They see their work not as defining who they are, nor as separate from who they are, but they see their work as an integrated part of their life. A part of their purpose. A means to help them become who they want to be. The world of business where people experience personal growth and spiritual growth amidst the many challenges and opportunities that a business can provide--this is the business world I am proud to be a part of . ## Tamar, you should know that I used to be a manager for MEDSTAT in AA, and then I moved to Boulder, CO. I remained working for them for 21/2 years, eventually managing a department of 28 people remotely. Since then, I have started working independently as a management consultant. Last year, I started a business venture called Business Growth which is focused on creating opportunities for professional, personal, and profitable growth by helping individuals to define and live their dreams. Our first public event is Jan 22 where I am bringing together about 25 like-minded professionals for a conscious celebration of the New Year. I am excited about the potential for many of us to become liberated from some of our old ways of thinking about work which weren't very helpful to people, much less the companies they worked for. On the other hand, I sometimes feel like a whisper in the wind--perhaps my ideas aren't "businessy" enough to stand up in the hard world of profit and losses. Mostly, however, when I see the wealth of information that has already been produced in this area, and realize that it is not any sort of "new" idea, but in fact, a very old one, then I come back to center and can move forward again. It is hard to be a pioneer--some people always think you are crazy. In my opinion , the new way of work is to be consciously doing what we are drawn to do in our hearts, and to have organizations, individuals, and a society that supports that. Please feel free to get in touch if you are interested in further discussion about this. Regards, -- Jessica Hartung hartung@earthnet.net 303-516-9806 Voice/Fax 303-257-4686 Mobile -------------- From: Terry Gliedt Subject: Re: [vacuum] The changing world of work - "fishing in the vacuum" I started in this new work world only ~6 years ago when I left IBM after 20+ years. It was a big period of transisiton for IBM. After several years of layouts (sorry, the PC term is "downsizing"), IBM offered me their last "golden parachute" and I left. Like Ed, I find myself more prone to stability and being loyal to a company. I don't actually think it's the company so much, but the social network provided by the work environment. I was very lucky at IBM that my work environment was always very flexible, stimulating and fun - so it was easy to be loyal. Since then I've run through a series of jobs and have joined the world of telecommuters and an industry where the norm seems to be to leave after 6-12 months for a higher salary. Maybe I'm getting old, but it's not a life that appeals to me much. Mind you, this is not a "wish I'd stayed at IBM", cause that world is also changed. IBMers are no longer lifers either. I think they stay a bit longer than 12 months on average, but I don't know anyone there who expects to put in 30 years anymore. I have to wonder if this attitude by of a completely temporary work force by both employers and employees is good for anyone. Seems today if you stay more than three years anywhere, people wonder about you. That's an exaggeration, I know, but that much unfortunately. I've always thought my real value in a large organization was the relationships I developed. I can get things done within the organization because of my network - the relationships I've built with various people. So when some organizational structure needs "bending", I can reach out and get it done. You can't really do that in only 12 months. It takes time to build trust and to get to know people. Working alone at home isn't all so great either. It's great to work at my own pace, my own time, but it's very hard to establish and enforce boundaries. In a world where you are only a phone call away, you are always on 24 hour call. I hate the phone. I detest pagers and cell phones. Sure they are convenient at times, but not worth the social price. My ideal phone is one that only dials out and cannot ring. To establish boundaries for me at home took some time and a lot of hassle by my family, but it was well worth it. I "go" to work, by going to my work area. Even if I'm wandering around the house, everyone knows I'm not necessarily available, so they respect that. When I'm done, I leave work and change clothes (maybe change tee shirts or something) and then everyone knows, "I'm home". I have a work phone which is largely only answered during work hours and people know not to call at home. It took a year to figure this out and I must say, it would not have happened if I'd been single. No question, I would have become a closet hacker and been much the worse for the lifestyle. Still, even after establishing boundaries, it wasn't very satisfying. So far my best compromise has been scheduled work hours (which can be changed) at a real office where others come in too along with copious time working at home. This seems to give me the most satisfying and effective work environment. Right now I'm back in a 5+day/week very conventional office job. There's a structure I'd just as soon not have, but it's less irksome than I remember from earlier days. Funny that. Not quite sure why I've answered you post in this manner. Guess it was just something I had to say to someone. Thanks for listening :-) -- ================================================================ Terry Gliedt tpg@hps.com http://www.hps.com/~tpg/ Software Toolsmiths Solving Software Development Problems ------------- From: Edward Vielmetti To: Terry Gliedt > When I'm done, I leave work and change > clothes (maybe change tee shirts or something) and then everyone knows, "I'm > home". Thanks Terry. I appreciate the ideas about how to create boundaries between home and work, since the lack of an easy dividing line means for me that I don't always know whether I'm "on" or I'm "off". I do know that my home office is woefully inadequate to the task of separating one from the other, something I keep meaning to fix but don't seem to ever get around to doing. Maybe I'll put on my employee badge when I'm working at home :) Ed ---------- From: Mike O'Connor Subject: Re: [vacuum] The changing world of work - "fishing in the vacuum" Tamar, Cc:ing Ed, In my ways, my job is similar to Ed's. I telecommute out of home for a Silicon Valley company that some people have heard of. Much of what he described applies to me (except for the 'sticking at a company until the bitter end' -- I've switched jobs every 2-3 years :) ). Anyways, one of the things I'd like to highlight for you is remote management. This isn't unique to the computer field. More and more, downsizing and mergers implies "having a bunch of people report to bosses who are far away". In my case, a couple jobs back, my boss was tens of miles away. My last boss was several hundred miles away in Montreal. My current boss is a few thousand miles away in Silicon Valley -- I've met him once since I started a new job in my company six months ago. While it may seem like a joyride to not have a local boss around, and there are many perks, it's not all fun and games. Managers tend to subconsciously treat your needs and wishes like a second-class employee since they don't have you in their face all the time. They don't necessarily know how to manage an employee if the employee needs managing, if they're not some autonomous entity that can operate independent of all management. From birth, folks learn about how to lead and follow based on parents, teachers, and local influences, and the subtleties of personal presence can get lost in email messages or concall. I've seen others get lackluster reviews because they were in the field and their boss didn't know what they were doing despite numerous status reports -- they didn't weigh in as much as the local employee who is seen working. And if you have employees that are scattered across timezones, you'll always hit a person's lunch hour when you schedule a meeting. I hope I'm characterizing this properly -- I do have some biases I'm trying to compensate for. Holler if you have any questions. -- Michael J. O'Connor | WWW: http://dojo.mi.org/~mjo/ | Email: mjo@dojo.mi.org InterNIC WHOIS: MJO | (has my PGP & Geek Code info) | Phone: +1 248-848-4481 =--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--= "Greed is good." -Gordon Gecko ------------------- From: Lindsay.Marshall@newcastle.ac.uk Subject: Work Tamar, in response to your request via Ed.... 1) This is a UK perspective so it may well describe different experience. 2) I work in a University so it probably doesn't count as real work anyway! The commonest thing I hear (and fell myself) is that everyone has far more work to do and less free time. There is an awful lot more adminstration to do these - this is caused by the rise of a totally out of proportion managerial class who justify their pointless existence and overblown, undeserved salaries by endlessly assessing people and re-organising fincancial flows. The rise of assessment and the hunt for "quality" is a particular bugbear of mine that has raised its ugly head in the last few years. I have nothing against assessment or quality pre se, but I do feel very strongly about the measurement culture that has been imposed on people rather than a true quality based culture. My experience of quality assessment is that it is the equivalent of people checking that your ruler is indeed 12 inches long rather than checking that you know how to use a ruler. The assessment is usually carried out by people who are uniquely unqualified for the job as well. The results are arbitrary and pretty useless, so of course the next time round they change the rules so that you have to spend ages getting to grips with the new stuff. (30cm rulers....) There is also an obsession with re-organisation (which always fails to achieve anything so has to be done over and over again) and the introduction of "systems" that dont help but eat money in consultancy fees and upgrades. There is no value placed on company loyalty or experience it seems to me. I work at home most nights now and of course being able to dial in to work means that I am closer so have less excuse for not doing it. My wife who works in regional government experiences the same - no free time, too much paperwork, stupid assessment exercises. There is a change in the student body as well. Once students studied computing because they were interested in it, now they think it is a route to a job and have no interest in the subject at all - so they do badly and are hard to teach. Mind you, most of them do get jobs... Maybe I am just getting old. I may send you more rant if I think of anything else. L. -- http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Lindsay --------------- From: Raymond Peters Subject: "fishing in the vacuum" Dear Tamar, The recent work change involving digital technology that I've experienced is reading x-rays on a computer screen. Although I've been familiar with computer-screen radiology for some time, it felt a bit weird doing it for real patients. I felt paranoid that I would not see something that I would have otherwise. There are a number of things you can do to the picture such as changing contrast and brightness and inverting the picture so that bones are black and lungs are white. Theoretically these might improve interpretation, but I doubt by much. The human eye and brain can do a pretty good job of interpreting the information presented. The digital pictures are available faster than developed films so theoretically a patient gets faster service. In the medical field doctors tend to be behind the rest of the world in putting computers to work making our jobs easier or making our service better. I do see more doctors who carry a laptop to work and hook it up in the back office. But I don't see those doctors using the computers very often. Doctors are way behind their contemporaries in banking, finance, engineering, and even medical billing. Take care. Ray ------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ eGroups Spotlight: "Vediculture" - Disuss the world's ancient Vedic culture. http://offers.egroups.com/click/242/0 eGroup home: http://www.eGroups.com/list/vacuum Free Web-based e-mail groups by eGroups.com