March 30, 2011
Karie Willyerd is former Chief Learning Officer for Sun Microsystems and co-author of The 2020 Workplace (Harper Collins, May, 2010). Most recently, she was a founder of Jambok, a social business platform that unlocks knowledge, expertise and ideas to make the workplace smarter.
Q: Your book, The 2020 Workplace, addresses the changing face of organizations. What do you think will be the most influential factor to shape tomorrow’s workplace?
In just two years, Millennials—also called Gen Y—will make up over 45% of the workforce. When you think about their expectations for work, and their styles of how they communicate, I think we’re all in for a big shift. They are a generation who built resumes to get into college, send over 3,000 texts a month, and keep multiple instant message sessions open on their phone all the time. With information doubling every two years, according to Berkeley, they know they need to reach out to their networks to collaborate, keep current, and watch each others’ backs. Expect them to bring that working style to the office.
Q: What should companies do today to get ready for the new paradigm?
The biggest shift will be cultural. Baby Boomers still hold the reins of leadership. If leaders think that the best approach is just to ensure those Millennials learn how things are supposed to be done, I think that’s a recipe for disaster. A major role for leaders is communication, so leaders must learn new modes of communicating. Companies must start to adopt social technologies for use inside the workplace. Fortunately there are some very good options when it comes to providing social technologies inside the enterprise that can deliver strong security.
Q: How can learning leaders use measurement to plan for the changing workplace?
Results matter, and so measuring the factors that impact results will always be important. In the case of social technologies, IDC estimates that the average knowledge worker now spends somewhere between 15% and 20% of their time looking for information. As work becomes more complex, as we get inundated with email and everything else, we need to figure out a way to make it easier for people to find the information and the people they need when they need them. Improvements in productivity can, as you know, really drive competitive edge.
Q: What role will measurement have in the future workplace?
I believe the next generation of workers is one of the most socially responsible workforces to date. As a result, I believe there will be more focus on what is sometimes called the triple bottom line, or the 3 “P’s”—people, profits, and planet. We’ve shied away from reporting publicly in quantitative ways about our people and planet results. However, I think that firms that can grapple with those difficult-to-measure topics and be public about it will have an edge in attracting the best talent of the next generation.
Q: Tell us a little about your latest venture, Jambok .
Jambok, which is a social learning platform, has been my first entrepreneurial experience. In 2010 I left Sun, where I had been the Chief Learning Officer, and with some colleagues, started up this platform which makes it super easy for anyone to author, distribute, and discover information. Think of it as a kind of YouTube for the enterprise, but with authoring tools to capture your voiceover on presentations, videos, etc. Only 10 months later, we were acquired by SuccessFactors, so I am now responsible for Learning & Social Adoption at SuccessFactors, a business execution software company. I’m totally jazzed about joining forces with SuccessFactors to expand on our vision of social learning.