Annual HR Directors' Retreat 2017: The changing face of work
Past HR Network event
26-27 April 2017
As always, we are keen to hear any feedback delegates may have from our events. Please contact Emma Stewart-Rigby.
Event resources
A history of the future of work
Stephen Bevan, Head of HR Research Development, IES and Honorary Professor, Lancaster University
Working futures: When technology collides with culture?
Stephen Bevan, Head of HR Research Development, IES and Honorary Professor, Lancaster University
The future of work
Ian Brinkley, Interim Chief Economist, CIPD and Associate, The Work Foundation
Change and challenge for future workforces
Marc Meryon, Partner, Eversheds Sutherland
Work... but not as we know it
Penny Tamkin, Director, Employer Research and Consultancy, IES
The retreat considered...
...the ways that innovation (digitisation, automation, smart drugs); demographic change; and changes to working practices and employment models are likely to require us to rethink recruitment, organisation and job design, retraining, performance metrics, reward strategy, productivity, remote working, trust, culture and managerial capability.
Speakers
Ian Brinkley, Interim Chief Economist, CIPD and Associate, The Work Foundation
Alison Carter, Principal Research Fellow, IES
Marc Meryon, Partner, Eversheds Sutherland
Stephen Bevan, Head of HR Research Development, IES and Honorary Professor, Lancaster University
Penny Tamkin, Director, Employer Research and Consultancy, IES
Event details
There is no shortage of breathy journalistic commentary on the ‘End of Work’ or the ‘Uberisation of Jobs’ at the moment. Indeed, if the more apocalyptic forecasts about the impact of technological innovation are to be believed, then almost half of all jobs will be destroyed by the 'March of the Robots' by the middle of the century. But the impact of technology is only one of the factors which will change the nature of work in the next decade or two, with workforce ageing and other demographic factors combining with more prosaic changes to outsourcing practices and measures to deliver sustainable improvements to labour productivity.
The reality is that the changing face of work for most organisations will be shaped by the gradual intensification of current trends rather than a spontaneous revolution triggered by a single event. This does not mean, however, that we cannot learn about and prepare for these changes in advance so that we can prepare and adapt in advance.
The headlines about the number of jobs likely to be destroyed by automation can mask a more subtle story about the ways that many more jobs - and the skills needed to perform them - will be fundamentally different in the future and that most of us are ill-prepared for the consequences. This focus on job content is less newsworthy than the 'mass job loss' story but is likely to have more far-reaching and immediate consequences.
Although the 'Jobs Armageddon' scenario may be a distant threat, the solutions to the immediate challenges of the changing nature of work probably lie much closer to home and this event will help you work out where your organisation is already adapting well or where you might need to think again.
