If you are a worker or future worker, it doesn't hurt to get a little bit of understanding about how the folks who are interviewing you, offering you jobs and managing you, are thinking and going to be thinking.  (Graphic source - Bersin, Deloitte Consulting LLP, 2018)

As you know I've been sharing trends on workplace practices that new college grads and emerging professionals should know about.  However, the rate of change today, means that this information is not just relevant for these two groups.  It's relevant for everyone!!

This list of 7 Workplace Disrupters were on the agenda at IMPACT2018, an annual get together of HR leaders talking and learning about the future of people management in evolving workplaces.   The theme for this year's gathering was: The Rise of the Individual in the Future of Work. 

The 7 Workplace Disrupters that are forcing us how to think about workplace practices are listed below.  This list is not to be feared of course, but to be acknowledged as the current realities through which we must navigate our professional lives.

The 7 Workplace Disrupters

• Technology is everywhere.

• Artificial Intelligence (AI), Cognitive Computing and Robotics is new to the list of trends that are impacting HR practice of recruitment and selection of job candidates.

• There is a tsunami of data that HR offices (and organizations) are increasingly using to help make decisions.

• Jobs are vulnerable to automation.

• Diversity and generational changes are a factor in today's workplaces.

• There is an explosion in contingent work (The numbers of part-timers, freelancers and independent contractors is on the rise).

• Average length of time in a job is about 4.5 years and skills are basically "expiring" more quickly.