How Your Children Will be Affected by Offshoring and Automation.

Yesterday I was asked what I was doing with regards to my children’s education and offshoring.

It came down to two parts:-

1. What does a person do when they leave school if all the desk jobs are gone?
2. How can we look after our children considering the above?

Let’s add some context. At ShareSource, we think that any task done at a desk and on a computer can be done anywhere in the world. That means that if you are working at a desk then your job can be offshored to another country. You are, in fact, competing globally. In the developed world we are comparatively expensive and in future most companies will have the work done offshore. It is simple demand and supply side economics. (Consider manufacturing – it’s services’ turn now.)

So, back to our children. If they can’t have those nice desk jobs what are they going to do?

Firstly, who knows what will happen over the next ten years and what new jobs will exist? Were there ‘big data specialists’ two years ago? This gives me hope.

Secondly, work that requires you to be face to face or interact with others will never be easily replicated.

We think two skills will be more important than ever:-

• people skills – engaging with clients is key, as is managing teams.
• cross cultural understanding.

The days of sitting at a desk for ten years, hiding, are over. New workers will have to learn how to engage.

From my perspective, if my children don’t want to be face to face doctors, I’ll go for working on people skills first.

Some ideas:-

1.  get your children talking to people (yes, even those introverts.)
2.  get them to manage others (preferably offshore people.)
3.  introduce them to as many cultures as possible.
4.  make them aware that they are now competing on a global scale.

Don’t give up or put your head in the sand, for their sake, please.

[author][author_image timthumb=’on’]http://newdev.sharesource.com.au/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/1475404_orig.jpg[/author_image] [author_info]Brendon is a driven business owner who looks for his teams to consistently delight their customers. He has started and developed a number of businesses that help companies and individuals get to grips with the global marketplace and the opportunities that come from a connected world.[/author_info] [/author]