산업화 시대가 저물고 있다.
이제는 당연하게 받아들여지고 있는, 그러나 개인의 실질적인 선택에서는 여전히 받아들여지지 않는 사실.
대한민국의 뉴스에서는 수출을 통한 경상수지 지표를 여전히 자주 거론한다. 수출이 신기록을 세울때마다 우리는 해야할 일을 다한 듯한 느낌을 받기도 한다.
아래 Seth Godin이 말하고 있는 것은 우리에게도 ‘실질적인 진실’로 받아들여지고 있을까? 우리나라는 앞으로도 제조업에서의 경쟁력을 지속적으로 강화해야만 하는 것일까? 아마도 그건 전략의 옳고 그름이 아니라 확실한 선택 + 제대로된 추진력의 문제가 될 것이다.
회사와 산업은 그렇다치고 개인의 삶은 어떻게 바라보아야 할까?
개인적으로는 확연히 ‘산업 시대 중심의 인재’에게 지속적으로 어려움이 닥칠 것이라는 Seth Godin의 말에 동의한다.
여전히 개인은 조직내에서의 생활을 하며 (내 개인적 생각으로) 70~80%는 자신과 딱 맞는 일이 아니라고 생각하면서도 그만두지 못한다. 아니, 그만두는 것이 문제가 아니라 다른 무언가를 본격적으로 모색하지도 않는다.
어디까지나 이 이슈는 개인의 선택의 문제이다. 어느쪽이 좋다 나쁘다 말을 할 수 없다. 하지만 자신에게 한번뿐인 인생을 어떻게 살것인가에 관련해서 한번쯤 읽고 생각하는 시간을 갖는 것도 좋지 않을까 생각한다.
Seth Goin의 블로그 글 일부를 번역해 보았다.
The industrial age, the one that started with the industrial revolution, is fading away. It is no longer the growth engine of the economy and it seems absurd to imagine that great pay for replaceable work is on the horizon.
산업혁명으로 시작된 산업화 시대는 사라져가고 있다. 산업은 더 이상 경제의 성장 동력이 될수 없고 언제든 교체가능한 노동에서 높은 급여란 어불성설이다.
This represents a significant discontinuity, a life-changing disappointment for hard-working people who are hoping for stability but are unlikely to get it.
이는 명확히 불연속성을 보여주고 있다. 안정을 바라지만 결국 안정을 얻기 힘든 육체 노동자에게 실망을 안겨주는, 삶을 통째로 바꿔버리는 실망을 안겨다 줄수 있다.
…the revolution of connection, creates all sorts of new productivity and new opportunities. … Most of the wealth created by this revolution doesn't look like a job, not a full time one anyway……
연결의 혁명은 온갖 새로운 종류의 생산성과 기회를 가져다 준다. 이 혁명을 통해 창출되는 대부분의 부는 (기존의) 직장처럼 보이지도 않고 하루종일 일하는 형태도 아니다.
When everyone has a laptop and connection to the world, then everyone owns a factory. Instead of coming together physically, we have the ability to come together virtually, to earn attention, to connect labor and resources, to deliver value.
누구나 컴퓨터를 갖고 세상과 연결될 수 있을 때, 누구나 공장을 갖게 되는 셈이다. 물리적으로 모이는 대신에 가상으로 모일 수 있고, 주목을 끌 수 있으며, 노동력과 자원을 연결해 가치를 창출할 수 있다.
Stressful? Of course it is. No one is trained in how to do this, in how to initiate, to visualize, to solve interesting problems and then deliver. Some see the new work as a hodgepodge of little proj
짜증나는 일이라고? 당연히 그렇다. 누구도 이런 것에 대해 훈련 받지도 않았고, 어떻게 시작할지도, 꿈을 꿀지도, 문제를 풀고 전달하는 행위중 어떤 것도 배우지 못했다.
(source : Seth Godin’s blog) http://sethgodin.typepad.com/
The forever recession (and the coming revolution)
There are actually two recessions:
The first is the cyclical one, the one that inevitably comes and then inevitably goes. There's plenty of evidence that intervention can shorten it, and also indications that overdoing a response to it is a waste or even harmful.
The other recession, though, the one with the loss of "good factory jobs" and systemic unemployment--I fear that this recession is here forever.
Why do we believe that jobs where we are paid really good money to do work that can be systemized, written in a manual and/or exported are going to come back ever? The internet has squeezed inefficiencies out of many systems, and the ability to move work around, coordinate activity and digitize data all combine to eliminate a wide swath of the jobs the industrial age created.
There's a race to the bottom, one where communities fight to suspend labor and environmental rules in order to become the world's cheapest supplier. The problem with the race to the bottom is that you might win...
Factories were at the center of the industrial age. Buildings where workers came together to efficiently craft cars, pottery, insurance policies and organ transplants--these are job-centric activities, places where local inefficiencies are trumped by the gains from mass production and interchangeable parts. If local labor costs the industrialist more, he has to pay it, because what choice does he have?
No longer. If it can be systemized, it will be. If the pressured middleman can find a cheaper source, she will. If the unaffiliated consumer can save a nickel by clicking over here or over there, then that's what's going to happen.
It was the inefficiency caused by geography that permitted local workers to earn a better wage, and it was the inefficiency of imperfect communication that allowed companies to charge higher prices.
The industrial age, the one that started with the industrial revolution, is fading away. It is no longer the growth engine of the economy and it seems absurd to imagine that great pay for replaceable work is on the horizon.
This represents a significant discontinuity, a life-changing disappointment for hard-working people who are hoping for stability but are unlikely to get it. It's a recession, the recession of a hundred years of the growth of the industrial complex.
I'm not a pessimist, though, because the new revolution, the revolution of connection, creates all sorts of new productivity and new opportunities. Not for repetitive factory work, though, not for the sort of thing ADP measures. Most of the wealth created by this revolution doesn't look like a job, not a full time one anyway.
When everyone has a laptop and connection to the world, then everyone owns a factory. Instead of coming together physically, we have the ability to come together virtually, to earn attention, to connect labor and resources, to deliver value.
Stressful? Of course it is. No one is trained in how to do this, in how to initiate, to visualize, to solve interesting problems and then deliver. Some see the new work as a hodgepodge of little projects, a pale imitation of a 'real' job. Others realize that this is a platform for a kind of art, a far more level playing field in which owning a factory isn't a birthright for a tiny minority but something that hundreds of millions of people have the chance to do.
Gears are going to be shifted regardless. In one direction is lowered expectations and plenty of burger flipping... in the other is a race to the top, in which individuals who are awaiting instructions begin to give them instead.
The future feels a lot more like marketing--it's impromptu, it's based on innovation and inspiration, and it involves connections between and among people--and a lot less like factory work, in which you do what you did yesterday, but faster and cheaper.
This means we may need to change our expectations, change our training and change how we engage with the future. Still, it's better than fighting for a status quo that is no longer. The good news is clear: every forever recession is followed by a lifetime of growth from the next thing...
Job creation is a false idol. The future is about gigs and assets and art and an ever-shifting series of partnerships and projects. It will change the fabric of our society along the way. No one is demanding that we like the change, but the sooner we see it and set out to become an irreplaceable linchpin, the faster the pain will fade, as we get down to the work that needs to be (and now can be) done.
This revolution is at least as big as the last one, and the last one changed everything.



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