Hi

Welcome to the future. It’s arrived and it’s digital and it means that nearly everything we thought was true and took for granted has changed – forever.

It crept up on us facilitated by an invisible virus; we knew it was coming but not at lightening speed. Ten years of change have been compressed into two.

Outdated fixed thinking no longer quite works like it used to. Like:

• Commuting
• Having face to face meetings
• Working in an office
• Command and control structures
• 9 to 5 workdays
• One source of income
• Work is local

A short couple of years ago bosses had trust issues. They thought that unless supervised every co-worker and employee would spend all day on social media and having coffees.

They underestimated the morality of their workers; they could actually trust them to get work done! And guess what? Workers were actually more productive, motivated and engaged.

Who’d have thought?

I had my own experience of this 20 years ago when I became a solopreneur working from my home office; Minus commuting and interruptions I got more done in less time largely because I worked when I was most productive and where I wanted to. And on what I wanted to do.

Here is my take on what the future of business and work looks like:

• Business is now global and not just local. The opportunities and market size have gone from finite to infinite.
• We can work from anywhere in the world, locally and remotely.
• Free and low-cost technology platforms are the norm.
• High-speed internet enhances video and audio communication.
• We can pay people and businesses from payment systems that didn’t exist before.
• We do business with people we have never met.
• Side hustles and multiple sources of income reduce business risk.
• We sell goods we never see, created by someone else on outsourced platform we trust.
• We contract with a workforce we’ve never met all over the globe.
• Our teams across remote locations collaborate via technology we can’t comprehend.
• Digital business visas are offered to travellers who bring innovation and IP to countries that see the future.
• The reinvention of how we live and work pushes the edges of what we can imagine.

And it creates huge potential for those ready and able to embrace it.

Noel Guilford

PS As just one example, accountants and bookkeepers - my profession - are no longer limited to just working for clients within travelling distance. The UK, at the very least, is their marketplace. If you'd like to explore how you can use technology to expand your market reach I'd love to chat with you here.