Let’s Transform Work!: Recommendations and Proposals from the Commission on the Work of the Future

Summary

Just a few years ago it would have been impossible to put together a text in the same way as the present publication was compiled. Countless meetings and telephone conversations would have been necessary in order for all the authors to discuss and agree on the various drafts. Today, thanks to modern information and communications technologies, we can work together on texts regardless of geographical distance, access all the necessary data, compare the various versions of documents and make all the stages in the writing and editing process visible. However, it is not only the drafting and editing of books or other texts that today rely as a matter of course on the use of digital technologies and collaboration in virtual networks. These forms of digital working have long since gained entry into the whole of economic life and affect the daily lives of us all. This has not only radically changed work routines and ways of working together but has also given rise to new work tasks and completely new business models. When the Hans Böckler Foundation set up the ‘Commission on the Work of the Future’ in 2015, it was clear that the task facing the new body would not be an easy one. Its 32 members, drawn from the supervisory boards and works councils of large companies, the creative economy, trade unions, government ministries and various areas of academic research, were asked to reach agreement on the change in the world of work and, in doing so, to focus in particular on two questions. Firstly, what will the work of the future look like? And secondly, what are the new challenges facing employment policy makers?