I really like his analogy about last century's education system being like a train - where we all get on at the same time, travel at the same speed and arrive at the same destination at the same time. Nowadays, our education should be more like getting on a plane, with far more freedom. This led me to dig out an article I wrote a while back about changes in the workplace. I've included it below.

Changes in the Workplace

The futurists tell us that we are on the verge of a revolution – indeed, there is evidence to suggest that it already under way. The advent of more powerful technologies and of faster communications has opened up the world in a way we have never known before. Knowledge is becoming power, information is becoming currency. Economies are beginning to emerge that would have been ridiculous ten or even five years ago. The struggle to be part of the .com society has already brought about huge changes in the way the world operates. Fortunes are made and lost in minutes; companies spring into existence and disappear without trace in the space of weeks or even days. Trade and commerce occur in global markets that never close. The changes in the workplace are radical and probably irreversible.
My father worked in the machine shop of a factory that made refrigeration equipment. He stood at the same machine, doing the same job for twenty-three years. He never re-trained or up-skilled. Professional Development was never an option for him. In all my working life, I have been constantly exposed to significant and worthwhile Professional Development opportunities. I admire my father greatly because I know he hated every mind-numbing day of it. But, he had a family to support, no skills that were of value in an industrial economy and no real way of escaping. Eventually, the few workplace skills he had became outdated and he was made redundant – never to work again. I am in my late thirties and am now in my fourth career (not my fourth job – my fourth career). Before becoming an educational consultant I was a classroom teacher. Before that, I worked as a technical specialist for a biotechnology company and before that I worked as a research scientist.
My situation is not uncommon. Today, many people experience radical career changes. Some through choice, others through necessity. For our students, it will be a way of life. Looking through the professional section of the employment pages of the newspapers reveals a new way of working. Contracting and sub-contracting have been around for a long time among tradespeople, but the nineties has brought us the portfolio workers, who work for a variety of employers. Home-based textiles workers are a classic example of this. The new millennium takes us into the era of the problem-solver. Companies advertise for trouble-shooters to come in for a specific project and then leave.
For example; let’s say I am a database engineer. Company X is looking for a way to allow its regional sales outlets to manage their inventories and run their stock control remotely. I will bring my experience to your company for that specific task and when it’s done, I’ll leave. Company Y has just established a Web presence and needs to be able to document Internet transactions. I will go to work for them on a well-defined project and then leave. I bring a unique and valuable skill-set that will solve their problem. When I am finished, I will go to a different place and solve someone else’s. As the information economy picks up speed, this type of contracting will become more and more common. I don’t have to come to your office to solve your problems any more. I can solve them from home – even if my home is distant from your office. Distance means very little to me in the global workplace. Nor does time. I can work during the day if I want to, during the night if I choose to and both day and night if I have to! I can concentrate on one project at a time or I can juggle several different tasks at once. My employers do not know about the other work in my portfolio, nor would they care. All that matters is getting the project complete on time and within budget. The pattern of work is changing – so is the pattern of income. For contract workers, the days of regular income are gone. This can be both exciting and scary.
For those of us who stay with mainstream employment, the very nature of work is changing. Looking through the employment section of the newspaper, one sees all the usual and traditional occupations, but new types of work are appearing. Occupations like data architects and knowledge management officers. Especially now that the commercial world has woken up to the power of such a medium. Web sites aren’t for looking at any more – they are for buying, selling, transacting and interacting. As examples of the explosion of transaction based web sites, one need only look to the banks. It is now possible to conduct just about all non-cash transactions via the Internet. One can pay bills, schedule transactions, transfer funds, all with a few mouse clicks. However, in the race to facilitate e-tailing, it is possible to overdo things. Boo.com was a perfect example. High-start up costs coupled with technical problems with a complex web-site that not all browsers could handle led to a cash-burn out before they even got off the ground properly.
The roller-coaster ride of the NASDAQ index, the emergence and rapid disappearance of high-tech, .com stocks should tell us that newer doesn’t necessarily mean better and that the flexible will be in the best position to flourish.

Cheers,

DrJim