I started talking about renovating work several months ago. My thoughts at the time were about how we could take a hammer and a crowbar to some of our work processes and build new processes in their place. How could we not only think about our work differently, but fundamentally make changes. My thoughts were most centered on work process automation utilizing work flow tools, AI, machine learning and sometimes old fashioned changes in their process itself.
And while my thoughts were sometimes about knocking down walls, sometimes they were incremental changes. COVID-19 took a wrecking ball to work processes. Suddenly in a matter of days. Some organizations already had plans in place to allow workers easy access to work from home and others only did so a day or so during major snow storms. Now suddenly buildings were emptied.
I’ll be writing more on this topic as the pandemic continues and we move into new phases of work. This much I predict now – Work as we knew it three months ago has fundamentally changed. Will parts of our work ever be the same again? What does that mean for work processes? I also predict many books will be written on the topic. I encourage you to add your thoughts in the comment section.