The document provides an overview and introduction to trends in the future of work. It discusses how work is changing due to technological, societal, and economic trends. Specifically, it notes that jobs and skills are changing rapidly, the demand for new skills is increasing, and soft skills have become the top skills gap. It also discusses the growth of non-traditional work arrangements like freelancing and on-demand work. Overall, the summary emphasizes that work, learning, life and leisure are converging due to various trends, transforming how companies operate.

1. WORK TRENDS 2019
#WorkTech2019

2. Work Trends 2019
INTRODUCTION
ABOUT US
The Acadian Company is a new firm bringing together research & advisory with venture capital. For the past 7 years, we
have been building and growing one of largest cloud companies in the human capital management market (Cornerstone
OnDemand). During the last 4 years we have been investing in early stage companies through Cornerstone’s corporate
venture capital arm. Notable investments include Rallyteam (acquired by Workday), Workpop (acquired by Cornerstone
OnDemand), Comparably, Portfolium and Koru.
OUR VISION
We believe that work is changing in front of our eyes. The convergence of technological, societal and global economic
trends has created a skills and employment crisis that will transform how companies operate. Work, learn, life and leisure
are converging and the ways companies grow today -- organization structures, physical work spaces, enabling people,
running projects and driving shareholder return -- will dramatically change over the next 10 years.
CONTACT US
Check us out at acadianventures.com or on our blog at medium.com/acadian-insights. Please share any feedback via
email to jason.corsello@acadiancompany.com or on Twitter at @jcorsello.
2
Jason Corsello
Managing Partner
Acadian Company

3. Summary of Contents
1. Let the Good Times Roll! 4
2. The Future of Jobs & the Rise of Workers 18
3. The Robot Takeover 34
4. The New Skills Economy 40
5. Overwhelmed Employees & the Wellness Revolution 48
6. The Diversity Imperative 61
7. Birth of a New Technology Cycle 73
8. The Emergence of WorkTech 84
WORK TRENDS 2019
3

4. Let the Good Times Roll
4

5. Unemployment Well Below 7 Year Average
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
5
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
Dec 2000
3.7%
Oct 2018
3.7%

6. Global Unemployment Has Improved Dramatically in 5 Years
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
6
Source: Countryeconomy.com

7. Poverty Continues to Shrink Globally
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
7
2015
10%
1990
30%
Source: OurWorldinData.org via World Bank

8. Wages Expected to Increase Globally in 2018
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
8
Western Europe
2.3%
Australasia
2.5%
North America
2.8%
Middle East
3.8%
Asia
5.4%
Africa
8.5%
Latin America
6.2%
Eastern Europe
6.0%
Source: Korn Ferry 2017 Salary Forecast

9. CEO Confidence At a 10-Year High
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
9
Source: PwC 21st Annual Global CEO Survey, 2018

10. ...And Optimistic on the Global Economy
10
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
Source: PwC 21st Annual Global CEO Survey, 2018

11. 11
The Rise of China Continues
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
● USA has become the largest global
GDP contributor
● Europe continues to decline in global
impact
● China and India (to a lesser extent)
has emerged as important global
contributors
Source: World Bank (GDP in current $)

12. CEOs Becoming More Cautious on Growth
12
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
Source: PwC 21st Annual Global CEO Survey, 2018

13. Is Technology Advancement Improving Productivity?
13
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

14. Wage Gains Improving but Still Lagging Historically
14
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
Source: Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta; Current Population Survey, Bureau of Labor Statistics

15. When Will the Correction Occur?
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
15
Source: Bloomberg, 2018

16. Geopolitical Uncertainty Increasingly Concerning
LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
16
● Geopolitical uncertainty, populism and
protectionism have increased concerns
over trade wars
● Unemployment combined with the
availability of key skills still presents a risk
to growth
● Terrorism and cyber threats concerns
have been tempered so far this year
Source: PwC, 21st Annual Global CEO Survey

17. With uncertainty a continuum, is your
organization designed to support frequent and
rapid change?
17

18. The Future of Jobs
18

19. Job Openings Are at a 17 Year High
6.6MM Job Openings (6/18)
1.4MM - Professional Services + Finance
1.3MM - Trade/Transportation/Utilities
879K - Leisure/Hospitality
661K - Mining/Construction/Manufacturing
622K - Government
486K - Other
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
19
Source: St. Louis Federal Reserve, FRED

20. THE FUTURE OF JOBS
20
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, Oct 84, 2018
Note: Dotted area represents recession as determined by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
We Have More Jobs Available than Can be Filled

21. American Teens Aren’t Working
21
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
57.9%
24.6%
Source: Teresa L. Morisi, "Teen labor force participation before and after the Great Recession and beyond," Monthly Labor Review, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, February 2017

22. Hiring Remains Challenging
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
22
Source: Lever, 2018; Note: Data based on 660+ companies with under 200 employee and approximately 1.5M candidates

23. Jobs and Skills are Changing Rapidly
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
23
Most In-Demand Skills
1. Management
2. Sales
3. Communication
4. Marketing
5. Start-ups
6. Python
7. Software development
8. Analytics
9. Cloud computing
10. Retail
Source: LinkedIn, 2018

24. New Markets = New Opportunities for Existing Jobs
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
24
Source: Becker’s Hospital Review, 2018

25. Every Job is Changing
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
25
Experimentation Platform
Director
Automotive Occupant
Packaging Engineer
Crypto Protocol Engineer
Computer Vision Engineer
Design Researcher
Camera Algorithm Engineer
Culinary Product Developer Bioinformaticist
Source: Cornerstone OnDemand, 2018

26. Average Tenure is Dropping
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
26
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

27. Will Companies Replace Government to Regulate Wages?
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
27
Source: Bloomberg, October 2018

28. The On-Demand Workforce Continues to Grow
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
28
30%
CAGR over the
last 4 years
Source: Intuit (2017/2018)

29. 29
Flexibility Has Become Highly Desired
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
Source: Gallup 2017 State of the American Workplace

30. 30
Freelancers to Become the US Workforce Majority in the Next
Decade
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
2027: Expected year
when majority of
workforce is freelancer
Source: Freelancing in America, 2017; Upwork

31. 31
Freelance Workforce Outpacing Total Workforce
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
Source: Freelancing in America, 2017; Upwork

32. Freelancers Update Their Skill More Often
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
32
Source: Freelancing in America, 2017; Upwork

33. Emergence of New Freelancer Marketplaces
THE FUTURE OF JOBS
33

34. The Rise of the Robots
34

35. Automation and the Aging Workforce
35
THE RISE OF THE ROBOTS
● Aging Population has not yet been
correlated with lower GDP per capita
● More rapid adoption of automation
technologies in countries undergoing
more pronounced demographic
changes
Source: National Bureau of Economic Research, July 2018

36. Globally, up to 375 million workers may need to switch jobs
THE RISE OF THE ROBOTS
36
Source: World Economic Forum The Future of Jobs Report 2018

37. Who’s At Risk of Automation?
37
THE RISE OF THE ROBOTS
Source: University of Oxford

38. Machines are Eating the World
38
THE RISE OF THE ROBOTS
Source: Future of Jobs Survey, World Economic Forum, 2018

39. AI is Changing the Skills Needed in the Workforce
39
THE RISE OF THE ROBOTS
Source: Future of Jobs Survey, World Economic Forum, 2018

40. The New Skills Economy
40

41. Over $200 Billion is Spent on Enterprise Learning Today
41
THE NEW SKILLS ECONOMY
Source: TD Market Study, Bersin Corporate Learning Factbooks, Toward Maturity Benchmark Surveys, Sierra-Cedar HR Systems Survey

42. China is Outpacing all Countries in STEM Degrees
THE NEW SKILLS ECONOMY
42
Source: Kleiner Perkins Internet Trends, 2018; USA National Science Foundation analysis of National Bureau of Statistics

43. The Demand for New Skills is Increasing
43
THE NEW SKILLS ECONOMY
Source: Future of Jobs Survey 2018, World Economic Forum

44. Soft Skills Have Become the #1 Skills Gap
THE NEW SKILLS ECONOMY
44
Source: LinkedIn, 2018

45. 45
New Specializations Driving Online Learning
Most Popular Courses in 2017 (Coursera)
Machine Learning – Stanford University
Neural Networks and Deep Learning – deeplearning.ai
Learning How to Learn: Powerful Mental Tools to Help You Master
Tough Subjects – University of California, San Diego
Introduction to Mathematical Thinking – Stanford University
Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Technologies – Princeton University
Programming for Everybody (Getting Started with Python) –
University of Michigan
Algorithms, Part I – Princeton University
English for Career Development – University of Pennsylvania
Neural Networks for Machine Learning – University of Toronto
Financial Markets – Yale University
THE NEW SKILLS ECONOMY
6M
33M
Source: Coursera

46. Upskilling - Education as a Benefit
46
Disney Aspire Education Investment
Program
Disney cover 100% of tuition up front
● Earn a high school diploma
● Get a college or master's
degree
● Learn a trade
● Improve your English
Walmart Education Benefits
Walmart subsidized program
● 100% company funded high
school diploma
● $1 a day for college degree
● Continuous professional
development
THE NEW SKILLS ECONOMY
Lyft Education Perks
Program designed for “gig” workers
● Tuition discounts
● Education coach
● On-demand courses

47. Enterprise “Edu-tainment”
THE NEW SKILLS ECONOMY
47

48. The Overwhelmed Employee
48

49. Workforce Stress is Becoming a Runaway Train
● Work is the #1 source of stress according to WebMD
● Toxic workplace environments account for 120,000 excess
deaths per year in the US making workplaces the 5th
leading cause of death
● At least 1 million people in China currently die from
overwork each year
● The European Agency for Safety and Health at work estimates
stress accounts for 60 percent of all lost days in the
workplace
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
49

50. 50
Nearly 2/3rds of Employees are Stressed
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
65%
Source: Deloitte Burnout Survey, 2018

51. Cost of Health Benefits Have Grown 60% Over the Last Decade
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
51
Source: Kaiser/HERT Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Benefits, 2007-2017

52. 52
Full Employment Does Little to Impact Household Debt
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
Source: Federal Reserve Bank of New York Consumer Credit Panel/Equifax

53. 53
Personal Savings Dropping While Debt Increasing
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
Source: St. Louis Federal Reserve FRED Database, US Federal Reserve Bank

54. Student Debt Continues to Grow Out of Control
54
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
Source: Federal Reserve Bank of New York Consumer Credit Panel / Equifax

55. Student Debt is Spiraling Out of Control
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
55
Source: Bloomberg, 2018

56. 56
Half of the Full-time Employees Work Over 50 Hours
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
Source: Gallup 2014 Work and Education Poll

57. Do Employees Really Leave Managers?
57
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
Source: Deloitte Burnout Survey, 2018

58. Managing Employee Engagement is Evolving
58
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
Source: Gartner Group, 2018

59. New Technologies Impacting Health & Wellness
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
59
Financial Stress Coaching & Mentoring Stress & Addiction
Mental Health Burnout Personalized Benefits

60. Employees Are Becoming More Outspoken
THE OVERWHELMED EMPLOYEE
60

61. The Diversity Imperative
61

62. Diverse Companies Win
62
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
22%
Women-led
companies that are
venture funded
58%
Return on Equity
improvement with strong
female leadership
Sources: Center for Venture Research; MSCI Women on Boards, 2015

63. Female Still Not Strongly Represented as CEO or in the Board
63
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
Source: Factset, 2018

64. Gender “Un-equity”
64
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
Source: Carta: The Gap Table: Analyzing the gender gap in equity, 17 Sep 2018

65. We Have a Reason to be Optimistic
65
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
Source: Brookings Institute; Schanzenbach, Boddy, Mumford and Nantz, 2016

66. Wage Gains by Gender
66
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
Sources:

67. Only 35% of STEM bachelor degrees are earned by women
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
67
Source: ServiceNow, 2017

68. The Rise of Women in Technology
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
68
Source: Wikipedia, as of Oct 1, 2018

69. Girls Outperform Boys including STEM Subjects
69
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
Source: Nature Communications, ISSN 2041-1723 (online), 2018

70. Women Are Better than Men at Most Soft Skills
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
70
Source: Pew Research Center,, 2018

71. Married Women Have Become More Educated than Spouses
71
THE DIVERSITY IMPERATIVE
25.3
24.5
Source: Decennial Census and American Community Survey, 2015

72. If you do not have a defined diversity &
inclusion strategy today you will lose the war
for talent tomorrow!
72

73. Birth of a New Technology Cycle
73

74. We Are Witnessing the Birth of the Next Technology Cycle
74
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
Computing
Cloud
Data
Intelligence
PC
2000 2010 2030
GUI
Social
Mobile
Digital
Assistants
Assisted
Intelligence
Blockchain
Augmented
Reality
APIs
20201990

75. Public Cloud Adoption Continues to Grow
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
75
58%
72%
Source: Gartner Group

76. Online Video Viewing to Exceed 1 Hour Per Day
76
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
Source: Zenith Online Video Forecasts, 2017, 2018

77. Data Driven Personalization
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
77
Company
Linkedin
Talent Insights
Team
Glint
People Success Platform
Individual
Cornerstone OnDemand
Learning Experience Platform

78. Messaging in the Age of Chat
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
78
Source: Statista, 2018

79. 79
Slack’s Hypergrowth in the Enterprise
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
Slack Benefits
● 32% Decline in Email Usage
● 24% Reduction in Employee
Onboarding Time
● 23% Faster Time to Market
for Development Teams
● 23% Decline in Meetings
● 10% Rise in Employee
Satisfaction
Source: Slack, 2018

80. 80
Platform & Integrations Key to Slack’s Success
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
Slack Platform Launch
160+ Apps
Slack App Directory
1000+ Apps
Small
Teams
Global
Enterprise
Source: Slack, 2018

81. Virtual Meetings we Actually Enjoy
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
81
Zoom Benefits
● 85% Improved Collaboration
● 71% Improved Productivity
● 62% Supported Flexible Work
Schedule
● 58% Built Trust Among Remote
Workers
● 58% Reduced Meeting Times
● 48% Removed Company Silos
● 72 Net Promoter Score
Source: Zoom Video Communications,, 2018

82. The Return of Custom Applications
82
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
Source: Work-Bench 2018 Enterprise Almanac

83. We Should All Be Watching AI Closely
BIRTH OF A NEW TECHNOLOGY CYCLE
83
Bias
Internal Data
(proprietary)
+
External Data
(proprietary)
+
External Data
(public)
Company
“Aggregated &
Anonymized”
+
Individual
“Privacy
Settings”
Bias
Bias
Bias
Bias
Bias
Recommendations
+
Insights
+
Benchmarks
+
Automated
Decisions
Bias
Bias
Bias
Bias
Bias
Bias
DATA “MLP” Personalization

84. The Emergence of WorkTech
84

85. From #HRTech to #WorkTech
#HRTech
#WorkTech
Process & Automation AI (Augmented
Intelligence)
HR as power users Employee as
power users
Focus on individuals Focus on teams
Performance-based Skills-driven
Back office systems Workforce-centric 85
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH

86. Traditional Hierarchies Are Disappearing
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
86
employees
experience
expert
teams
company
departments
platform
OLD
NEW

87. Our Life is Wasting Away on Work Email!
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
87
The average worker
spends 28%of their
work week on email,
more than 11 hours
a week!
Source: frontapp.com, 2018

88. The 4Ps of Work
88
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
Promotion
Price
Place
Product
People
Productivity
Performance
Progression
Purpose
Prosperity
Marketing Work

89. The 5 Ps of Work
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
89
Performance
Can I work collaboratively
to accomplish a task, goal,
objective or project?
Productivity
Are we efficient and
effective in time
management and the
integration of work and life?
Progression
Does the company
personalize individual
growth to include skills
development career growth
and pay progression?
Prosperity
Is the company proactive in
supporting health, career
AND financial wellness?
Purpose

90. Technology is Driving the Future of Work
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
90
Source: The Acadian Company, 2018

91. Made in USA No Longer Applies
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
91
Source: The Acadian Company, 2018

92. The Lingering HCM Giants - Consumer Meets Enterprise
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
92

93. New Entrants to the Future of Work
THE EMERGENCE OF WORKTECH
93
Staffing Learning Payroll

94. Experimentation is key to innovation!
94

95. Thank You!
95
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