The technology that has made work better

Collaboration, transparency, and flexibility in the workplace.

Image created via Midjourney

I was listening to an episode of Ezra Klein's podcast in which he interviewed Gloria Mark, a professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine. Mark noted that in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, people spent about 30% of the workday at their desks (as tracked by researchers). In 2019, she did a study and found that today's workers spend nearly 90% of their time at their desks. She went on to talk about the impacts of technology, in particular, on our attention span and feelings of stress and overwhelm. Technology has grabbed us and forced us to stay at our computers (or phones) as a necessary component of getting work done.

I'm still gathering my thoughts on this. On the one hand, technology has made my preferred way of working (remote work) possible. On the other hand, I've noticed the grip it has on my life and, particularly, on how I communicate with people.

I'll probably dive into the drawbacks later. But as someone who has now been in the workforce for more than 20 years, I want to reflect on the profound ways technology has impacted how work gets done.