Forget WFH, the future of work has a more pressing issue
The death knell many are sounding for remote work is premature. While high-profile return-to-office mandates continue to grab headlines, the reality is more measured.
Recent data shows over a third of Australians continue to regularly work from home and suggests the push to get everyone back in the office is softening. The physical office is no longer the only workplace but a constellation of digital spaces, devices and cloud-based platforms.
However, beneath the persistent question of where we will work, a deeper one is emerging: what's the personal meaning of work in a world increasingly shaped by AI?
For most, work is a means to an end – paying the rent, putting food on the table, caring for our families. Yet research shows that the majority of us want more from work than just a transactional exchange. We want work to be an end as well as a means.
Meaningful work helps us turn our values into real-world impact for ourselves and others. When are the times you've felt happiest at work? I'll bet it's when you've felt connected – to a cause, your colleagues or your own growth. At its best, work provides us with a shared sense of purpose, identity and community.
Into a decade that's already reshaped how we work, AI has arrived. In its second half, we need to think hard – not just about where we wish to work, but what work means to us. In an age where workplace loneliness is on the rise and correlated with a lack of engagement, what must we safeguard to support our wider flourishing as human beings?
If we want our work to mean something, we'll need to consciously make space for connection and the messy, generative parts of being human.
In considering how AI could change our work, we can look to political philosopher Hannah Arendt who considered activity as a fundamental condition of being human.
She divided activity into three domains: labour, the repetitive tasks that meet our basic needs; work, which creates more lasting artefacts; and action, the space of human interaction where meaning is made through speech, story and shared decisions.
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Perth Now
3 hours ago
- Perth Now
‘No Boomers' super app tackles housing crisis
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Sydney Morning Herald
5 hours ago
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The rich get richer: Australia is at risk of becoming an inheritocracy
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