The robot overlords we have been waiting for haven’t arrived yet. The conflict between human jobs and robotic automation is still in its infancy. The most important asset, technology or otherwise, companies have is their employees. Robots, automation, video conferencing, and cloud solutions are being used by employees every day but their tools aren’t replacing people.
The truth is that technology is a productivity tool. Technology helps make employees be more productive. It does this by eliminating repetitive, menial, and trivial tasks. Technology tools help us schedule meetings, move data from one application to another, and automate some of our simple communication. These enhancements allow employees to spend more time on more creative and “human” tasks such as touching base with customers, designing marketing, or improving business processes. For the foreseeable future companies should be looking at technology as a way to free their employees from the day-to-day to allow them to be more creative.
