We will not have any permanent jobs soon - Your Go-to ... will not have any permanent jobs soon Safe salary, xed working hours, paid holidays - that will soon be over. Many of our

28/01/2018 We will not have permanent jobs soon | NZZ on Sunday

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We will not have any permanent jobs soon

Safe salary, �xed working hours, paid holidays - that will soon

be over. Many of our children will not have a permanent job

anymore. The world of work is changing fundamentally. How

we can prepare for it.

by Anja Burri (text) and Elisa Forster (infographic) / 01/27/2018

Ade open-plan o�ce: The worker of the future is self-employed and workswherever she pleases. On the beach of San Francisco for example. (Image:Farhad J. Parsa / Getty Images)

Karin Frick has one of the most beautiful jobs in Zurich. High

up, on the hill of Rüschlikon on Lake Zurich, surrounded by a

large park, she explores our future. The economist is the top

trend researcher at the Gottlieb-Duttweiler-Institut, she is

employed, receives paid holidays, her retirement is regulated,

and when she is ill, she can stay in bed without �nancial

losses.



Karin Frick - trend researcher at the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute. (Image:Christoph Ruckstuhl / NZZ)

This model, her life plan with all the beautiful securities, she

says, is soon outdated. "The way our labor market is

organized will not last." The likelihood that many of our

children will work very di�erently than we do is high. The

manpower of the future, says Frick, «is independent.»

What she describes is a change that we will not notice until it

is completed. The changes take place every day, in small steps.

As a futurist, Karin Frick works like a detective. She is looking

for clues to these changes. There are many of them, she says.

For example, there are people in their 50s who are struggling

to �nd new jobs in the labor market. "Many of them,

investment advisers, accountants or journalists, for example,

make themselves independent for want of alternatives."

On the other hand, the most successful companies of the

moment, such as Facebook, Amazon, or Google, have a small

workforce in terms of their size, and work with an army of

freelance specialists, such as app developers.

In the US, 55 million people are eitherfully or partially freelancers - 35 percent

of all workers.



Where these companies come from, on the American West

Coast, the debate about self-employed workers is much

further. According to a study, around 55 million people in the

US are either fully or partially freelancers - that is 35 percent

of all employees, and the trend is rising.

In Europe, on average, 15 percent of employees are self-

employed, but these �gures do not include those who are only

partially self-employed. Here, too, the group of self-

employed grows. In France, for example, of the generation of

millennials, those born after 1980, already one in three works

at least partially as a freelancer. In crisis-ridden Greece, every

fourth person is self-employed.

A planet of freelancers

Venkatesh Rao - Consultant and author from Seattle (USA).

One person who thinks the upheavals in the labor market so

far as hardly anyone else is the blogger Venkatesh Rao from

Seattle. He has worked for seven years without a permanent

position. His resume is the remake of the American Dream.

Rao, a programmer from India, came to the US as a doctoral

student. Today he is a 43, consultant and author, writing for

renowned business newspapers such as Forbes Magazine. His

analyzes also inspire CEOs in Silicon Valley. In 20 years, he

says, it is no longer employee careers that are the norm, but

the careers of freelancers.



Recently Rao published a sketch on his blog "Ribbonfarm". It

shows the universe. At the bottom left is the earth, the old

world of work, so to speak. It is the planet of addicts: On it live

people who are still employed by a company - because they

are very specialized.

On Earth, however, are also the losers of the new order, the

day laborers of the self-employed industry, Uber drivers, for

example. They are people who bear all the risks themselves,

work at dumping prices, but are completely dependent on a

brokerage platform or an employer and have to adopt their

rules. The third group that Rao places on Earth are the robots

that will take over part of our previous work in the future.

How technology could change our jobs: virtualtravel designer

It does not take more airplanes to travel to dream beaches.

The sea can also be seen with a virtual reality glasses and even

hear noise. Travel designers also create fantasy worlds that

are only traveled virtually.



Around the earth, the old world of work, other planets make

their rounds - the planets of the self-employed. The closer

they are to the earth, the more dependent are the workers of

companies and clients. Roughly close to the ground, Rao's

model revolves around the "chained up freelancer". Although

they no longer have a boss, they must completely comply with

the wishes of the client.

The planets of the �rst "real" freelancers are just one more

orbit away: they have enough money, good relationships or

such a good reputation that they can also refuse orders.

Farthest away from Earth is the planet that Rao himself is

striving for: creative autonomy. These freelancers are so

�nancially independent that they can try new business ideas

at any time and thus fail.

Franz-Josef Schürmann - Head of Innovation Adecco Group.

In the middle of Zurich, in the noble Seefeld district, lies the

headquarters of the world's largest personnel service

provider, the Adecco Group. Here Franz-Josef Schürmann,

member of the executive board and head of innovation,

observes the developments of the worldwide labor market.

The times are very good, yes, exciting even. He also speaks of

the "megatrend of freelancers". Technological progress

makes it possible for private individuals to take on

assignments that previously required a professional

infrastructure.



The 3-D printers are likely to accelerate this development

even further. For example, tools can be manufactured in the

future. In this way, agile small companies and working models

are emerging at a rapid pace, not only in the West, but in the

future also for countries such as India, the Philippines and

many African countries - huge markets with hundreds of

millions of young workers. Thanks to smartphones, most of

them today have access to education and information, says

Schürmann. They are all potential freelancers.

The Internet makes it possible to connect workers around the

world with potential clients. Financial specialists,

programmers, designers or translators: Many of them already

worked independently. The model is worthwhile today,

especially for knowledge-intensive professions. Schürmann is

convinced that the upheavals will a�ect more and more jobs,

including engineers, who today hardly work as freelancers.



The Adecco Group wants to bene�t from these changes.

Because the self-employed are a new, lucrative customer

group. Especially those who are in Rao's Universe already a

little way away from Earth. A year ago, the group committed

two young Frenchmen to present their business idea: they

proposed working with Microsoft to launch an online

marketplace for highly quali�ed freelancers. At the moment

only for the French job market, but this year the site will start

in other countries.

High-tech caretaker

This janitor needs only a smartphone for his work. Repairs or

cleaning jobs are done by robots for him. And sensors report

when water is leaking or the ventilation is getting out.



Yoss, that's the name of the platform, has been online since

November. Each week, 200 new workers make a pro�le, on

average, the orders that Yoss mediates, take about three

months. Freelancers and employers will only be admitted after

a review. Anyone who completes an order through Yoss is paid

directly by the platform, can claim social bene�ts and seek

advice - for example, about the possibilities of retirement

provision.

In the past, companies moved entire business units to Eastern

Europe or Asia. Today, they also have the opportunity to

outsource work to people around the world. "Crowdworking"

is the name of the system that allows companies to split their

projects into small jobs and to award them to freelancers via

the internet. Whether they are sitting in a living room in

Zurich or on a beach in Thailand, during the day or at night,

working in a suit or in pajamas, the clients do not care.

Until now, crowdworking was a niche in which helpers could

earn a sack money for simple tasks. For freelancers that are in

Rao's universe as day laborers on Earth. For highly quali�ed

this did not seem appropriate. Crowdworkers are now testing

software and mobile phones, designing packaging or

advertising campaigns, doing market research, writing

computer programs, and developing products - even for big

companies like Airbus, Coca-Cola, or organizations like

Greenpeace.

Connected researchers



Thanks to a chip in the brain, the scientist of tomorrow can

join in a so-called hive-mind. It is a network that connects the

thoughts of researchers and thus generates a broader

knowledge.

Such a Crowdworker is Ramona Herrmann. She gave the Swiss

Army knife a new face. Three monkeys can be seen, who cover

their mouths, ears and eyes. Victorinox launched the knife in

2016. It is already Herrmann's second design for the Swiss

company. The 42-year-old graphic designer works in a small

village near Karlsruhe. Their connection to Victorinox is only

the Internet, more precisely the crowdworking platform

Jovoto. In both tenders Herrmann prevailed against over 1000

competitors.



In Switzerland, not only Victorinox designs design orders on

Jovoto, also candy manufacturer Ricola has been looking for a

new packaging design in this way. Even the SBB recently used

the site to generate ideas on how to make their stations more

enjoyable. Within a very short time, 50 proposals for furniture

systems and seating were received from 30 di�erent

countries. If the railway company had put out a classic ideas

competition, it would never have been that fast for so many

international proposals.

It has never been easier and cheaper forcompanies to get good manpower and

ideas from around the world.

It has never been easier and cheaper for companies to get good

manpower and ideas from around the world. You can respond

more quickly to orders thanks to the virtual reserve

community, with a huge, global talent pool at your disposal.

Crowdworkers do a lot of what ordinary employees do. Only -

and that's the whole point - they are not that: normally

employed. They can work, how and when they want to - they

are on their own with the Pension Fund, when they become

unemployed, they do not get any money, and they do not

automatically have accident insurance. In other words, clients

have no social obligations to them.

In many industrialized countries, a dispute has arisen over

this type of self-employed working for placement platforms.

Courts need to check that crowdworkers are not much more

clerks. The unions criticize Crowdworking platforms

promoted not freelance, but the bogus self-employment.

No political solutions

Politicians have to react, they have to rethink social networks,

say those who, like Venkatesh Rao or Karin Frick, expect a

change in our working world. It needs better solutions for the

retirement of self-employed, in the event that they become



unemployed or ill. Ideas such as an unconditional basic

income for all are still far from being a majority. "Of course

there will be winners and losers," says Venkatesh Rao.

His model of dependent and independent self-employed is a

good grid to cope with changes in the labor market. Just

because someone works as a freelancer does not mean that he

is free. Anyone who has to be dictated by Internet platforms

dumping wages can not live well, at least in western

industrialized countries.

Tele-surgeon

This doctor operates over an Internet connection by

controlling robots, perhaps from another continent. At some

point, he may be operating his patients on another planet.

Measured by the o�cial �gures, not much is noticeable in

Germany about these upheavals on the job market. According

to the Federal Statistical O�ce, 12 per cent of workers in

Switzerland are self-employed - the rate has been fairly stable

for years. So is Switzerland a kind of island? No, says

economist Luc Zobrist. He examined how our jobs are

changing for the Deloitte consultancy. In Switzerland, the

freelancer has no de�nition for the entire profession, he says.



Employees who incidentally completed orders for other

companies, were missing in the statistics. That does not mean

that they do not exist. Deloitte Switzerland has therefore

commissioned a representative survey. One in four people said

they had completed at least one job as a freelancer in the past

12 months. "Many people are just trying out what it would be

like to be independent," says Zobrist. This group will continue

to grow.

GM Astronaut

With gene therapy methods, the genetic material of

astronauts is changed so much that their bodies are less

susceptible. On cosmic radiation, for example, which can be

carcinogenic.

How can we prepare for such a future, how should we prepare

our children for it? The good thing, says Venkatesh Rao, is

that in the universe of the self-employed the cards would be

reshu�ed. Old certainties such as training at an elite

university lose value. He himself would never invest so much

time in a doctoral thesis. "Instead of studying for �ve years, I



would shorten my education and learn something new again

and again." Lifelong. The manpower of the future, says Rao,

"must constantly reinvent itself."

That also sounds exhausting. The good news is that more and

more schools are prepared for such demands. Project learning,

where students develop new knowledge for themselves, or

competence-based education, which focuses on the

application of knowledge, also aims to: enable children to be

able to think independently. More important than stubborn

memorization, Venkatesh Rao says, is curiosity and creativity.

Stephan Sigrist - founder of the Zurich think tank Wire.

Stephan Sigrist, 42, founded his own company because "he

did not �nd a place that suited his idea of how to deal with the

future". The think-tank Wire in Zurich has existed for ten

years now. The digital economy is one of her specialties. The

structural change of banks and insurance companies is in full

swing, says Sigrist. He distinguishes two types of self-

employed: In addition to entrepreneurs who realize their own

business idea, there will be more freelancers who outsource

their previous work. As self-employed, they carried out tasks

similar to those previously employed as permanent employees

in a company.

This already works for graphic designers or software

developers today. According to Sigrist, this "model will spread

and lead banks, insurance companies or consulting companies



to set clear tasks for freelancers". From the company's point

of view, this reduces costs and increases �exibility. Sigrist's

prognosis is less radical than Venkatesh Rao's: this model also

has its limits, he says.

Nano-Koch

With the help of nanoparticles dishes can be re�ned. For

example, fries are made that contain less fat and salt, but taste

just as good as the unhealthy models.

"Employees who contribute to the uniqueness of a product

with their expertise do not want to share it with competitors

in the job market." Con�dence, identi�cation, and loyalty to a

business played a key role in many industries. "That's why

we'll see even longer models in which employees commit

themselves to companies in the long term."

Quite exhausting

Ramona Herrmann, the designer of Sackmesser, has opted for

the other way. She set up her own business after her three-

year parental leave and founded her agency Denkdi�erent. She

could not live on the money she earns on the crowdfunding



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platform Jovoto, it's an additional source of income for her.

Jovoto o�ers her the chance to work for global brands. The

two Victorinox bag knives have brought her a total of 4,500

euros.

Over the last �ve years she has applied for 104 projects and

uploaded a total of 285 ideas and designs to Jovoto. In the end

she was �nancially rewarded for 35 of her submissions. The

independent Art Director lives primarily from direct jobs,

which she receives in the analogue world through her own

company. Sometimes her everyday life is exhausting, she says.

"But this model is my best chance to reconcile work and

family." The �exible working hours allowed her to spend as

much time as possible with her child.

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We will not have any permanent jobs soon - Your Go-to ... will not have any permanent jobs soon Safe salary, xed working hours, paid holidays - that will soon be over. Many of our