The Amplification of Ebenezer
The Ghost of Christmas Past
The first night the ghost visited me, I was swept back to the nineties. We peered through a window in my office in Kanata, twenty minutes from my home in Ottawa. When I recovered from the surprise (of having a window in my airless cubicle, not of time travel. I’ve seen plenty of these Christmas Carol gags, I know how they work), I saw the young me, beavering away until late at night by the light of a forty-pound CRT monitor.
In the office I had a collection of books, some that I regularly referred to, others that were more trophies, badges to attest to my technical credibility. At work I had certain tasks, and needed to collect in the office all the tools required. I also had a life to manage, and my hobbies, social activities and personal administration also required tools and information. We watched myself through the ethereal window of my office copying files on to a floppy disk as I got ready to leave for the day, then followed as young me sped home to turn on his PC and copy the files to his hard disk at home. At home I had files and a row of reference texts too. The dictionary and thesaurus well thumbed; the Strunk and White less so (which will surprise none of my readers). At home and on the job some materials were on paper and some were electronic, but neither was particularly portable.
The Ghost of Christmas Present
The next night’s ghost didn’t stay as long. Something about a MeetUp he wanted to look in on later in the evening. Fortunately for his networking we didn’t need to go time-traveling, but we did hop over to see my current office. Visibly, any changes since the 90′s are pretty superficial other than the number and flatness of the monitors. There are few books on the shelf, but they’re mostly the few I actually use, and some by people I know. Back in my office at home the hardware is also faster and flatter. The books there have hardly changed but get little real use any more. It’s faster to tap into Wordnik or MyThesaurus or Grammar Girl if I need to look something up. In both places, the things I use every day are online or in the cloud. Nowadays I’m constantly doing work in my den at home and frequently taking care of personal business in the office. I need my data in both places, so Dropbox is my friend.
The ghost nodded in satisfaction at that. I am working and living in both places, and it’s sometimes hard to say which I do most where. The things I need most are available wherever I am, home, office, airport or coffee shop. I’m as efficient as I can be whatever I’m doing, and I can choose the task at hand for my convenience, without reference to the clock or my location. You don’t have to worry about your work/life balance when it’s all just life.
The Ghost of Christmas Future
Then last night the final ghost popped up and refused to be dismissed. She swept me ten years on to yet another cubicle world, where once again the differences weren’t obvious to look at. But for all that the fabric-covered walls have only changed their colour, the changes in this cubicle were chilling. It seems that a few years from now I will take a job in the headquarters of a big bank. Company policy, backed up by a brutal firewall and strict web filters, has ruled a straight line down the separation I’ve lately been happily blurring. Personal information stays on the outside, company information stays in. My personal phone, now built into glasses, is locked up by security when I arrive at the office, and I’m scanned for electronics before I’m allowed into the elevator. No Dropbox, no Evernote, I can’t even listen to the music I’ve stashed in the cloud.
The ghost’s breathy voice made me shiver: “Security and regulatory oversight is important, but look at the cost. A regimented workforce confined by conventional office spaces and company-provided tools. You could have worked at a startup, where people can work in the manner and with the tools they’re most comfortable.” A bony finger waggled menacingly. “This is only one future. The enterprise doesn’t have to go this way.”
-o-
Amplified Cratchit; Attenuated Scrooge
There have always been exciting pictures of the future painted by those who believe they’re on the leading edge of technology, and often those visions don’t pan out. But more than ever I see emerging new technology trends, tools and modalities that could have a profound effect on the way we work. BYOD, the cloud, continuity across devices, augmented reality, to name a few that are gaining momentum. As these take off they will both enhance personal comfort and satisfaction, and improve our business efficiency and effectiveness. Collaboration tools like Sharepoint and IM chat services have been around for many years; and plenty has been written about companies using Google Hangouts, Box.com, and social networking sites in creative ways. Enabling these with employee’s own smartphones and tablets makes working, and supporting the workers, easier. These innovations bring us closer to dispersed colleagues, ease communication through hierarchical organizations, and reduce the friction and overhead of working with IT tools.
Marina Gorbis in a HBR.org blog talks about “amplified individuals”, people who skillfully combine networking skills with technology to be abundantly productive in creative and nimble ways. Leveraging the current technology directions, such people will be able to turn up the gain even further. To some degree these skills can be learned; and every person and organization can profit by increasing their amplification. But to reap these benefits an organization must be prepared to change the traditional structured modus operandi to something more flexible, and respond to the technical challenges of non-homogenous and socially-enabling systems, not least of which is security.
Nobody says its easy; but the alternative is the “attenuated individual”. Organizations that believe they needn’t change their current ways of working, that fear the loss of their intellectual property, and that are over-concerned about the security of their systems miss the opportunities before them. They try to lock up their data, control the flow of information, constrain the available tools, and limit interactions. The tendency is especially great in regulated industries where procedures are necessarily rigid and protracted, where audits and compliance rules deter communication across the hierarchy and process innovation. These short-sighted limitations inhibit amplification. An individual’s technology-dependent capabilities are reduced, and so is his or her job satisfaction and fulfillment.
This will lead to a bifurcation in the workforce, already in its early stages. Some people will work in a walled off environment, peering out through filtering software; others will be able to find information in unexpected places. Some will be able to use the tools they’re most comfortable with; others will have their company-mandated devices only. Some will talk freely to whoever might have the answers; others must censor themselves or send a message up the chain, using only approved channels that are controlled (and often recorded) by the company.
Dickens’ original story taught us to choose wisely how we balance our lives. Technology in this era confronts us with subtle choices, as it both melds our work and personal lives while it empowers us to be ever more effective. We want to work where we can have the biggest impact; but we need to avoid getting isolated from the things that make us energized, creative and capable. Which kind of environment do you want to create? If the future of your organization depends on creativity and innovation (and I’ll bet it does) do you want your employees to be augmented or attenuated?
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