ENGR802:

Lesson 4: Globalization and the Impact on Communication & Knowledge Sharing

Drivers of the Future Landscape and Future Work Skills

Globalization is changing the landscape of how business is conducted, including where our offices are located, where our co-workers and team members are stationed, how we communicate with our co-workers/team members, and how we share knowledge. Researchers at the Institute for the Future (Davies et al., 2011) investigated drivers that were most likely to reshape the future landscape. From their work they identified six drivers that were most important and relevant to future work skills.

Six drivers of change that are most relevant to future work skills (adapted from Davies et al., 2011):

1. Extreme longevity: Increasing global lifespans change the nature of careers and learning.
2. Rise of smart machines and systems: Workplace automation nudges human workers out of rote, repetitive tasks.
3. Computational world: Massive increase in sensors and processing power make the world a programmable system.
4. New media ecology: New communication tools require new media literacy beyond text.
5. Superstructed organizations: Social technologies drive new forms of production and value creation.
6. Globally connected world: Increased global interconnectivity puts diversity and adaptability at the center of organizational operations. (Davies et al., 2011)

Through this research, the Institute for the Future also identified ten skills that would be critical for success in the workforce; each skill is tied to the six disruptive forces previously described. Figure 4.1 represents the relationships between the six disruptive drivers and the 10 skills needed for future success. Within the figure, each skill is color coded to match one or more drivers.

Future Work Skills Include (adapted from Davies et al., 2011):

1. Sense-Making: The ability to determine the deeper meaning or significance of what is being expressed.
2. Social Intelligence: The ability to connect to others in a deep and direct way, to sense and stimulate reactions and desired interactions.
3. Novel & Adaptive Thinking: Proficiency at thinking and coming up with solutions and responses beyond that which is rote or rule-based.
4. Cross-cultural competency: The ability to operate in different cultural settings.
5. Computational Thinking: The ability to translate vast amounts of data into abstract concepts and to understand data-based reasoning.
6. New-Media Literacy: The ability to critically assess and develop content that uses new media forms and to leverage them for persuasive communication.
7. Transdisciplinarity: Literacy in and ability to understand concepts across multiple disciplines.
8. Design Mindset: The ability to represent and develop tasks and work processes for desired outcomes.
9. Cognitive Load Management: The ability to discriminate and filter information for importance, and to understand how to maximize cognitive functioning using a variety of tools and techniques.
10. Virtual Collaboration: The ability to work productively, drive engagement, and demonstrate presence as a member of a virtual team. (Davies et al., 2011)

To be successful in the emerging global landscape, engineers need all ten of these skills. This course is part of the Engineering Leadership and Innovation Management graduate program that, as a whole, is focused on developing all ten of these skills. Although this course may touch on all of these to some extent, it focuses more heavily on social intelligence, cross-cultural competency, and the ability to work on virtual teams in a globally-connected world.

Within organizations, diversity is increasingly seen as a driver of innovation. Diverse teams can include a combination of individuals of different disciplines, skills, ages, and thinking and working styles and approaches. With increasing diversity and global dispersion, it is more important than ever for employees to identify and communicate shared values, goals, and priorities, and build relationships to work together effectively on cross-cultural virtual teams. To be an effective communicator, you will need to understand barriers to communication when working on diverse intercultural teams as well as barriers to effective virtual team communication and knowledge sharing.