Social Implications


Nicholas Christakis, notable Harvard sociologist, has an interesting view on the changing and more fluid work environment many of us are now experiencing. "It is an atavistic phenomena...it's a throwback...we're going back to home as the center of our lives, like when we were farmers," explains Christakis. The view is shared by many of us living in world where the work life and the home life are blurred. "I started work the other day at 4 A.M., corresponding with my peers in the UK. I later got wrapped up in more situations with remote peers and never actually made it into work. At 1 P.M., my kindergarten daughter comes into my home office and asks, 'Daddy, do you still have a job?' I explained to her that I simply work everywhere, which caused an odd smile."

Technology and connectivity have truly allowed a great many of us to work anywhere and everywhere. Everywhere. At the beach. At the soccer field. After dinner. Before breakfast. Even during professional sports events. As a reader of this book, your position with regard to your "connectedness" falls into one of two camps: It's you, you get it and you do it or, from the sidelines you watch others doing it, perhaps even shaking with fear and praying it's not so. We call this the connectivity divide.

If you have children, you know that they are growing up on the connected side of the divide and bringing that with them into their future work lives. The changes in technology and connectivity are giving us back large packets of time while borrowing our attention during idle moments. We will see our kids more. We will see our spouses more. We will travel for pleasure more. We will indeed be working more as welland on more productive and enriching tasks. Technology is allowing work to be more pervasive and, in return, our lives are less rigid.



    Inescapable Data. Harnessing the Power of Convergence
    Inescapable Data: Harnessing the Power of Convergence (paperback)
    ISBN: 0137026730
    EAN: 2147483647
    Year: 2005
    Pages: 159

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