You’ve been fired by a robot
Photo by Amanda Dalbjörn on Unsplash
“80% of the stock market is now on autopilot” (NBC)
We live our lives trying to create things that are valuable to others. Such as valuable companies. The best of them get listed. And then robots will buy & sell shares to other robots, without any human intervention. Robots will decide if your company will rise or fall. Or if you need to fire or hire people.
If you work for a listed company, like most people out there, and you’ve just lost your job, don't hold it against your boss, it was probably a robot who got your fired.
We spend most of our waking hours working for a corporation that defines success based on the market value of the company, which is largely decided by robots.
If you think about it, our entire sense of self-worth is decided by bots.
Makes you think.
Maybe it’s time to reevaluate how we, humans, define success.
Working for a financially-sustainable business is important. But investing most of your life working 9 to 5 for a company whose only (true) mission is to create more value for shareholders, is pretty sad. It’s even sadder when you get to realize it when you’ve already been doing it for 10 or 20 years.
The 20th century was the century of the Corporation.
The 21st will be the century of the Social Enterprise.
It’s time for your company to do some soul-searching. And answer to that big “Why”. It’s not “What” your company is doing. It’s “Why” it’s doing it. Not the bullshit vision-mission-values you see everywhere on the walls in the corporate headquarters.
The Real thing.
Find that “Why”.
And live by it.
Adrian Docea
Heraldist co-founder | Innovation Director