Special Report: Highly-Human Jobs

Special Report: Highly-Human Jobs
Copyright 2012 EraNova Institute
Highly Human Jobs

Richard W. Samson
Copyright 2012 by EraNova Institute All rights reserved Version 1.0 September 26, 2012 Version 1.1 October 2, 2012 Digital copies available from EraNova Institute: www.eranova.com Highly Human Jobs network: HighlyHumanJobs.ning.com Also by Richard W. Samson: Mind Over Technology (EraNova Institute) The Mind Builder (Dutton) Thinking Skills (Dutton) Creative Analysis (Dutton) The Language Ladder (Dutton) Problem Solving Improvement (McGraw Hill) Management by Computer (National Institute of Business Management) Ask for the Moon And Get It (with Percy Ross Putnam) The THINK Program (Innovative Sciences)
CONTENTS
1 - Whats Happening with Jobs, the Economy & Ecology? 2 - How Technology Threatens Jobs 3 - How Technology Threatens the Planet that Supports Civilization & Jobs 4 - The Jobs of Tomorrow You Can Create Now 5 - Highly-Human Strategies for Job Seekers 6 - Highly-Human Strategies for Job Creators 7 - Ways to Leverage Highly-Human Skills 8 - Share Your Situation or Opportunity, Get & Give Support About the Author
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Whats Happening with Jobs, the Economy & Ecology?
If youre looking for a job or a better job, you know its tough. You can knock your head against the wall for months without effect. And even if you do find new work, it may not pay what youd like or excite you much. The bad news: For millions, well-paying, worthwhile and exciting jobs just arent to be found any time soon. And if you wait for the economy or politics to turn around, you may be sadly disappointed. Long-term, jobs arent just going offshore; theyre going off-people, into advanced technology. Also, many jobs today contribute to pollution, climate change, resource depletion, poor health, and mindless consumption -undermining people and planetary health. So getting hired may be a mixed blessing -- a money plus but spiritual minus.
The good news: If you change your mindset, you may have better luck. Instead of trying to FIND a job, CREATE one instead, making sure its in sync with the highly-human trend of future work. Thats the purposeful, satisfying work that technology cant do now or any time soon, if ever. Also, focus on the growing number of green industries and opportunities within traditional organizations; or add green thinking to just about any job or situation. If youre a job creator entrepreneur, business manager, policy maker youd probably like to bring lots of people on board and make the world a better place, but you face three big roadblocks: Roadblock one: Powerful economic forces stand in your way. An uncertain economy makes big bets risky; and hiring people is the biggest, riskiest bet around. Also, your competition is outsourcing, and you figure you must also to survive. Roadblock two: Thanks to advancing technology, most organizations can get along with thinner and thinner staffs. You know this and hesitate to hire live humans only to put them on the street relatively soon. Roadblock three: In the current business paradigm, opportunities to make money are skewed toward products and services of secondary or even negative value to human and planetary health and wellbeing. Youd like to be green or greener, but may find it tough to compete that way. In spite of these impediments, there are new methods for creating worthwhile, socially-positive jobs lots of them economically and in a way that makes you more competitive than ever. Whether youre a job seeker or creator, you need to understand exactly whats going on big picture in the world of work and the world at large.
Why is job creation such a challenge today?

Politicians and pundits blame the economy, government inaction, the other party, Wall Street mismanagement or corporate greed. While these factors play a role, the basic cause lies deeper and is more nuanced. It could be very positive or very negative depending on how we react to it. The cause is rapid technological advancement that is eliminating jobs while harming the planet. There are two key parts to it: First, thanks to visionary thinkers and fast-evolving technology, a large percentage of the work now done by humans will soon be done in part or full by smart technology. The work that remains will require highly-human skills that are too quirky, unpredictable, emotional, or intuitive to program or automate. That means high unemployment could persist, increase, or recur in regular cycles unless we invent lots of new highly-human employment. Second, global warming, pollution, and resource depletion threaten the planets ability to support the plant and animal species that support civilization. If governments and companies start breaking down, ultimately there may be only two types of jobs left: hunting and gathering. Short term, the environmental crisis offers a bright employment prospect: green jobs and green industries within a new economic model that gives top priority to human and planetary health and well-being. Long term, the crisis could precipitate a golden age of sustainable prosperity, but only if we course-correct on a dime. In the next two chapters, well look in more detail at the two parts of this underlying reason for employment uncertainty. # # #
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How Technology Threatens Jobs
Most of the pursuits called jobs today are being absorbed, in whole or part, by ever-smarter technology. This ultimately positive shift -- perturbed by reactionary thinking, greed, negative thinking, and all manner of conflicts -- parallels two major shifts of the past: the first, from agricultural to industrial work, and the second, from industrial to service and technical work. Lets look these two shifts, then at the new wave of change now cresting.
Shift 1: From agricultural to industrial work.

America began as an agricultural country. Most people earned their living directly from the land or in trades and commercial activities tied to the land.
Then the industrial era came on strong, eliminating most farm-based work in favor of new jobs in factories and related industrial venues.
Shift 2: From industrial to service and knowledge work.

Factory and related industrial jobs, utilizing muscle and manual skills, didnt enjoy their heyday for long. Service work including that requiring specialized knowledge soon overtook it, until today, goods producers seem almost an endangered species.
In both of these shifts, technology moved in to replace human effort or to minimize the need for it. Now were well into shift 3. Technology is moving in to downsize the need for service tasks performed by humans, and that includes the most advanced types of knowledge-based tasks. What? you might say. I can see that low-level service work might be on the way out, but what about knowledge work? I thought that was the career path of the future. Think again!
Shift 3: From service and knowledge work to [what]?

Get ready for the next great occupational downsizing. The world is preparing to minimize the need for humans to perform knowledge work as well as simpler forms of service work.
The basic reason for this projected shift is simple. Just as mechanical technology got complex enough to perform factory work more economically than muscle and manual skill, so electronic technology is fast becoming complex enough to perform know-how work more economically than human brainpower.
Muscle-into-machine was the basic threat to industrial-age livelihoods, and mind-into-machine is the basic threat to information-age livelihoods. CAVEAT: This contention applies to knowledge work in which information or definable know-how is paramount. Future knowledge work that also involves highly-human skills will abound (if we play our cards right). CAVEAT 2: The transfer from mind into technology will follow different timetables in different regional economies. Knowledge work by humans may, for example, continue increasing for a while in China and India while decreasing in the United States and Japan; but eventually automatable knowledge work is likely to decline everywhere. CAVEAT 3: In the near future, high-tech job openings are likely to exceed the supply of qualified applicants in many fields such as computer science, especially in the United States. Technical knowledge work may be a wise career for years to come, but we should be prepared for the sudden maturing AI competition. Honing highly-human skills, in tandem with a tech career, offers a safety net.
Global Mind Transplant

Whats happening in the world today is a vast process of mental transplantation.
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Thanks to electronic advances, many of our mental processes -- from memory to decision making -- are being rapidly transferred into computers, microchips, networks, and mechanical devices of all types. Its happening in a way thats altering jobs, transferring wealth, and changing lives. Current key impacts include - Offshoring of professional and service jobs, a shift made possible by information technology. Automation of more and more tasks -- which might be called offpeopling -- moving us toward a world that runs on automatic. Just as our muscle power was transferred into machinery during the rise of the industrial era, today -- as the information age matures much of our mental power is being transferred into our tools.
Big Impact on Employment

We cant count on yesterdays jobs for tomorrows income. During the rise of the industrial age, farm employment never came back, until now it accounts for less than 2% of the U.S. workforce. Today, thanks to the brain drain of human skills into electronic systems, even the most high-tech jobs are being downsized and restructured rapidly. Theyre not likely to resize and some will disappear entirely. Through corporate offshoring, millions of technical and service jobs are going to low-paid professionals overseas; but thats only temporary -- the first wave of the change. In time the foreign contractors will also lose out, to all-electronic solutions. No matter how little pay Chinese or Pakistani workers are willing to accept, no one can work as cheaply as a chip.
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Electronic intelligence is now performing much of the mental work formerly done by secretaries and middle managers. accountants and governmental administrators. product designers and corporate planners. soldiers and salespeople. farmers and restaurateurs. stockbrokers and bank tellers. doctors and diplomats. drivers of delivery vans and drivers of industry.
Pieces of human mentality have been sucked out of virtually all of us and spewed into networks and chip-enabled devices. To a large extent the human-to-electronic mental transfer is a fait accompli. Many of the things you we used to figure out, organize, or remember are now being figured out, organized, and remembered by silicon-based systems.
No service or knowledge-based occupation is exempt

Today trauma is being experienced in all career categories. Low-level mental tasks, like looking up phone numbers, are being transferred into the technosphere first, with higher-level tasks close on their heels. If your income rests on college or grad school laurels, you might feel immune to impact, but youre not. A few examples: Legal profession: Programs that now search legal databases can be augmented to offer advice. Once that happens, would you bother to consult a lawyer on routine issues? Already there are computer templates that let you write your own contracts or create your own will. Medicine: Doctors explain the significance of symptoms and offer health advice. Now, so do many web sites. For example, several departments of
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health post extensive information on Lyme disease detection, prevention, and treatment -- including photos and descriptions of deer ticks and rashes. With such information, many a doctors visit can be avoided. Even TV ads offer information for self-diagnosis, urging us to just ask our doctors for prescriptions. Robotic surgery is coming on strong. Advertising: Ad agency personnel check rates in the various media, place ads, and track response rates. Already computers help perform many of these tasks. Now software exists that generates names for new products, supplementing and supporting but also encroaching on the creativity of copywriters and account executives. Computer programming. What? Wont we always need programmers, as a way to put stuff into electronic systems? Maybe, but the profession is far from exempt from electronic takeover. Programming is one of the hottest areas for automation. Software developers constantly look for ways to get more code out of fewer people. For example, a few years ago researchers at the University of Texas at Dallas created AutoCoder: An Intelligent Assistant for Coding Protocol Data. As higher-level know-how is incorporated into electronic systems, every profession will feel the impact, even thought-intensive ones such as spacecraft engineering or particle physics. Artificial intelligence (AI) development has been proceeding apace in oil exploration, aerospace, health and safety, medical diagnosis, stock market investing, defense, industrial production, and many other areas. One system uses AI to automate the layout of directories and catalogues. There are predictions that smart systems will soon be able to perform library research, digest the data, and present conclusions in written form. Even editors and authors are at risk! Broadly defined, AI includes expert systems, game playing, natural language processing, neural networks, robotics, and other advanced applications. But upscale occupations are affected by ordinary electronics as well as
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sophisticated software. For example, $250,000-a-year radiologists complain that some of their work is being offshored to foreign radiologists who are happy with a tenth the pay. The global Internet allows U.S. hospitals to send electronic versions of X-rays for instant analysis anywhere on the planet. Other medical tasks ripe for offshoring or automation include pathology, patient monitoring, and remote robotic manipulation of microscopes or surgical instruments. CAVEAT: While the mind transference takes place, there will continue to be work in knowledge-intensive occupations for two breeds of professional: 1. Those who innovate to create the electronic replacement of people. An example is doctors who work with designers to perfect robotic systems that eventually dispense with the doctor first for very routine operations (such as cleaning, disinfecting and bandaging simple wounds); and then for more complicated ones. Another example is educators such as the Stanford professors who created Coursera, educating hundreds of thousands of students globally versus just a few hundred locally. 2. Those that combine highly-human skills with their specialty. Such non-programmable skills are part of the shift in employment, a movement from work that can be defined and systematized to work that absolutely requires the human element.
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3
How Technology Threatens the Planet that Supports Civilization & Jobs
Jobs in the future, emerging now and through the rest of the century, are likely to be much different than todays typical jobs. A key reason, already stated, is the tech takeover of quantifiable knowledge work, leaving highlyhuman skills as the only ones people can uniquely supply. A second key reason is the environmental assaults we are inflicting on the natural systems that make civilization possible. If we want to survive, we may have no choice but to highly-humanize. The health of the planet and the welfare of all people must come first, or were goners. Profit goals, as currently defined, must come second. Movements such as natural capitalism re-define profit to include environmental and social gains as well as monetary ones.
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We appear to be entering a chaotic yin-yang period of unprecedented opportunity wedded to the possibility of lethal crisis. Wonderful times may be ahead a golden age of highly-human prosperity and well-being but prospects for a smooth transition recede each year that we postpone necessary reforms. Even the most optimistic experts give us only a decade or so to shape up. Barring an abrupt reversal of our over-consumption, pollution, and resource depletion, we may have to leap a deep, deadly chasm that is very deep and deadly. Dire prospects, well documented, include rising sea levels, disappearance of species, threatened food and water supplies, forced migration of millions, recurring financial crises, resource wars, and more. If were lucky, when things get bad enough, well get smart quick. Then well embark on a crash program to turn things around and create the golden age thats possible. Everyones job will then be to contribute to this turnaround. Highly-human work will come to the fore as the only type thats practical and worthwhile. All of us, especially young people, are well-advised to plan for a difficult, challenging transition starting now. Lets hope for smooth sailing, but equip ourselves for stormy passage. (For job and income strategies in case of hard times, see chapter 5.) # # #
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The Jobs of Tomorrow You Can Create Now
What, exactly, are the jobs of tomorrow that any of us can create right now? Simply stated, theyre jobs involving tasks that electronic systems cant perform now, any time soon, or perhaps ever. At first it may seem as though theres nothing computers cant do better than us, given enough development: You probably cant call to mind all the phone, fax, and email addresses of all your friends and associates, whereas the Internet can remember all that plus Library of Congress with ease. Human data recording is good but slow, not always reliable, and limited in range. Internet-connected cameras, microphones, and monitoring devices can quickly and tirelessly supply accurate input from thousands of miles away.
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Electronic intelligence is great at repetitive tasks such as monitoring chemical processes or managing lab tests. The days of low-paid factory laborers, performing like robots, are numbered; they will be replaced by robotic systems as soon as theyre cheaper. Nothing can beat a good human teacher, but simple instructions, drill, and reminders require only dull persistence; electronic systems are great at that. Admittedly, computers trump us in many mental ways. Electronic systems beat us hands down in defined, structured areas where were weak or get bored. How, then, can we compete in the job market (or task market) as electronic systems get smarter and pervade everything? The answer is clear. Focus on our highly-human skills.
Theyre our secret weapon, extremely powerful and likely to trump electronic agility for decades to come, at least.
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What, at the deepest level, is our human edge?

All our highly-human skills emanate from a single core quality. Its the inner entity we treasure and are: our aliveness. In order for electronic systems to compete with us in our highly-human areas, they would have to become aware and alive, like us. If that ever happens, they will in a sense BE us, or be our children, or be a part of us in some kind of bio-electronic blend. We can address such possibilities once weve accomplished the current necessary highly-human transition. Weve got plenty of time before computers come anywhere close to coming alive. Consider what it means to be alive. We see objects, feel breezes, have emotions, develop intentions, and picture possibilities -- all in living color. Thats our big differentiator. Were conscious, vibrant; we glow with living presence and spiritual light. Furthermore, unique among all creations, were meta-conscious or self-aware. We know were alive and can control our thoughts and actions. We possess the magic of reflection; were aware of our awareness and therefore responsible and in charge. We may one day succeed in producing electronic consciousness and even meta-consciousness, but dont count on it happening any time soon. We dont even know yet what our own consciousness is, what its limits and interconnections are, or where it comes from. Some researchers in physics, medicine, psychology and the paranormal speculate that intuitive dimensions of human experience extend far beyond the brain and human body. For example, ESP experiments with people miles apart suggest that thought transfer may be instantaneous and location-independent, like certain phenomena of particle physics. This provides an exponentially greater challenge to AI developers in pursuit of artificial aliveness.
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Consciousness research is one of the hottest new pursuits in science today, and its only in its infancy. But even if we could create artificial consciousness, there is no compelling need to do so. Our machines dont have to be alive to extend our minds spectacularly and do great things for us. The transfer of specialized know-how to our machines is transition enough for the information age. On a practical level right now, our reflective form of awareness permits a number of functions that machines cant attack well if at all. Were great at sensory perception while computers linked to sensors struggle to form composite impressions, and dont really see anything at all. We laugh, feel pleasure and sorrow, love. No competition at all from our machines. We just naturally imagine and dream up new possibilities; electronic systems merely correlate and combine. (Some programs do generate sets of possibilities that may be called ideas, but it takes human sensibility to request, interpret and appreciate them.) Only we make choices based on subjective as well as logical considerations. Computers are limited by logic and fact. Within complex environmental and social contexts, we can easily dream up speculations about why things happened. Electronic intelligence cant even start to guess, though it can induce and deduce within data structures accessible to it. We have social skills. Electronics, no contest. We benefit from epi-normal mental, emotional, and spiritual processes that are vast and only now beginning to be investigated by a few scientists: intuition and hunches, precognition, remote viewing, mind effects on cells and elementary particles, the placebo effect (healing through belief), lucid dreaming (often giving us insights and scientific hypotheses while we sleep), and more.
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We have a subconscious as well as conscious mind, both scarcely understood. Its unclear whether this dynamic duo could be effectively programmed into electronics. Finally, were not only conscious but intermittently metaconsciousness aware of our awareness and therefore in control of it. Trump that, R2D2!
With apologies to Rene Descartes
So where are the millions of highly-human jobs?

Theyre really hard to find. In fact, youd be smart to conclude theyre not to be found at all; theyre to be created. By whom? By you as job seeker. By you as job holder wishing to better your situation. By you as forward-looking entrepreneur or business manager who needs special help and a competitive edge. By and large, highly-human jobs havent made it onto the job boards yet. They havent penetrated the employment mindset yet. Were stuck in the old view of jobs as functional activities, precisely the kind of thing thats ripe for transfer into automatic systems.
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So the job ads we continue to see are for secretary or stock clerk, inventory manager or industrial engineer, financial analyst or flash memory specialist. Competition is keen partly because of the economic environment but more fundamentally because when jobs are viewed as functional, they are also viewed as temporary. Theyre in transition, being upgraded by automated assists, so that over time organizations can make do with fewer secretaries, clerks, managers, engineers, analysts, technical specialists, etc. This is potentially a very good thing, but only if we make a solid shift to jobs defined from the highly-human mindset. Today highly-human skills such as perceptiveness, creativity, responsibility, and social acumen -- are often greatly prized in the workplace, but too often theyre under the radar in the employment process, especially in the beginning stages. Theyre too often a nice-to-have supplement to the hard, process-oriented, knowledge-based job description. Many astute recruiters and hiring managers do look for highly-human qualities in addition to specialized knowledge and experience. It needs to happen much more often. If youre a job seeker, youre lucky if you run across such a recruiter or manager. Youre best advised, though, not to count on it. You need a strategy that gets you the job you want as soon as possible in spite of the odds against you. If the old job-finding process isnt working, maybe you should try a whole new approach: STOP LOOKING FOR A JOB. Instead, CREATE the job you want not just any job, but highly-human work that lets you survive, contribute, and thrive from here on out. # # #
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5
Highly-Human Strategies For Job Seekers
There are three key ways to create the highly-human work you want:
1. Get any job any way you can, then transform it.
It can be deadening to be unemployed for a long period of time. You not only risk losing skills and confidence, but also render yourself temporarily useless to others. In a robust, expanding economy, an extended search may make sense. In an uncertain, transitional economy, however, beware of spinning your wheels within obsolescent machinery. Consider getting yourself hired anywhere theyll take you; then rapidly upgrade your situation. Do this by leveraging your highly-human skills. For example:
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A young college graduate who couldnt find a job in his major, marketing, took a job as a lowly grocery-store checker. He used his social skills friendliness, helpfulness to build relationships with customers, fellow workers, and store management. He used his perception to notice and fix problems, such as loose carts that posed a hazard in the parking lot. Leveraging his sense of responsibility, he arrived at work early and kept his promises and commitments. Soon he was considered indispensable and was kept on when an automated checkout line was installed, eliminating two checker jobs. When a job opened up in the meat department, he applied for it and was accepted. He quickly learned the requisite skills and sought to improve operations. Continuing to be friendly and helpful with customers, he learned that some were interested in grass-fed beef, which the store didnt carry. Leveraging his initiative and creativity, he researched sources, found a good one just a few miles away, and proposed a trial purchase to his boss. This led to a thriving new revenue stream, which caught the attention of higher management in the store chain, which served three states. The young man was gaining a reputation as an up-and-comer. Ironically, he reflected, he just might be making the checker job into the kind of marketing position he originally sought. It doesnt matter what your field, age, or situation are. Leveraging your highly-human skills is the surest route to the work and success you want. If you cant find the job you want, try wanting the job you can get then molding it to your hearts desire.
2. Volunteer, become valuable, then ask for pay.

Suppose you cant find even a menial, low-paying job, the fate of millions in todays economy. Should you keep on looking, looking, looking? Maybe.
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The downside, however, is the prospect of perpetual uselessness and despair. You might be better off making yourself useful even without pay. Consider volunteering. It has the upside of utilizing your skills, serving real needs, and building your self-worth. Then add your considerable highly-human skills to your volunteer efforts. Become exceptional, make a real difference. In the process, let it be known youve got to eat, pay the rent, etc. Dont keep your situation a secret, dont let people assume youre a well-off benefactor. If the volunteer organization has paid positions, make sure youre on the top of the candidate list. Also remember, those who run volunteer organizations have connections with wealthy benefactors and corporate contributors; they can recommend you to a wide range of potential employers. A middle-aged woman lost her husband and child in an auto accident. She needed a job to rebuild her fractured life. Formerly a medical transcriptionist, she found slim pickings in the field. Her skills had grown rusty and technology had shrunk the profession. Electronic voice recording, speech-to-text software, and outsourcing to India had streamlined operations and she did not see how she might contribute. She applied for jobs as medical assistant, office manager, secretary, customer-service agent, and many other positions without results. After six frustrating months, she volunteered to serve in the food pantry of a local church. Depressed and robotic at first, she gradually focused on her clients, and her spirits improved. It dawned on her that those who came for bread, milk or eggs were often worse off than she was. She started asking about their situations and listened intently, non-judgmentally. Compassion welled up in her, she took on more responsibility, invited more destitute people to come, and
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asked church and community members to contribute more food and money. More than they needed food, her clients needed an understanding ear, she concluded. She offered hers as much as she could and organized support groups for expanded communication and compassion. She also conscripted some of the clients to work in the pantry, expanding the operation while building their esteem. She made sure the churchs pastor knew of her need for income, and impressed with her efforts he began asking around. One of his flock, a psychologist, ran a family counseling service. He needed an assistant who was good at listening and facilitating communication between disturbed individuals. The woman got the job and continued her pantry work on evenings and weekends. Her fractured life was starting to feel whole again.
3. Simply find a need and fill it with your services or new business.
Cut out the middleman. Rather than working for someone who serves customers or clients, go directly to the customers or clients. Set aside your job search if its taking too long. Find something people need that you can supply, and start supplying it for a price. Another way to look at this strategy is to consider it a multi-faceted job search. Instead of looking for a single employer, look for many. Think of yourself as mico-searching for miniature jobs rather than endlessly trying to land that big one. If you have an entrepreneurial bent, this strategy could be your cup of tea. If youre more comfortable as a traditional employee, try it if all else fails.
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An east-coast engineer took early retirement from AT&T. He had a good separation package but needed additional income. Jobs that suited him were few and far between, so he put on his thinking cap. What could he do to make money other than work for someone? He reflected that friends often called him when they had problems with their personal computers and home networks. Skilled in that area, he wondered there might be a business in it. He let it be known that he was available for by-phone or in-person service calls, and a profitable stream of clients developed. Almost by definition, those who find a need and fill it leverage multiple highly-human skills: observation, hypothesizing, creativity, decision making, planning, social skills, and responsibility. These skills surround and amplify the value of the technical skills that may sooner or later be automated. The technical knowledge of the engineer was essential to his business, but so were his highly-human skills. For example, it later dawned on him that most of his daytime clients were women, and that trustworthiness was a must if they were to let any strange man into the house. His business absolutely depended upon his spotless reputation for responsibility and ethical conduct.
Two other actions that can help

Succeeding at any of the above strategies, especially number 3, will be easier if you also adapt to these key possibilities: hard times due to social breakdown due to the environmental crisis; and the erosion of traditional money as the main medium of exchange. Prepare for the environmental crisis that threatens the planet. Wonderful times may be ahead, as stated in chapter 3, but its smart to plan for the worst. How?
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Get ready for the probable need to shift into survival mode. If, miraculously, we manage a smooth transition, youll be stronger and more prepared to build a better tomorrow. Hone your highly-human skills with a vengeance. Those who do, and do so early, will be best prepared to survive hard times. Guns and food stashes will protect you less than creativity, purpose, compassion, and a network of like-minded friends and exchange partners. Put money in its place. Dont assume that the prevailing currency is the only acceptable means of compensation or the only possible medium of exchange. The days of single, monopolistic currencies may be numbered, to be superseded by multiple, parallel currencies or exchange media, consistent with information-age technology and highly-human interactivity. Work, especially highly-human work, is easier to get if youre flexible about how youre paid. Be open to various forms of barter and emerging exchange media such as the Bitcoin digital currency. Also, cut unnecessary or counterproductive expenses to the bone. Spending beyond your means only invites poverty and debt, twin destroyers of freedom and opportunity. There are signs that the global economy may morph into a highlyhuman economy in which free exchange gradually displaces money-mediated exchange and unbridled greed is tamed at last. Right now, though, its next to impossible to get along without money. But even today it may make sense to split ones economic activity into two parts: perhaps 70% to 90% money-based and 10% to 30% free (giving and getting for nothing but goodwill). If the prospect of moneyless interchange seems far-fetched, consider how people act in extreme times. A few loot and pillage, but most band together in common cause; and the rules of work and economies change.
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For example, when the World Trade Center towers collapsed, the firefighters, police officers, and volunteers didnt punch time clocks. They just moved in, helped, served, and saved. And when they got hungry, they didnt need money. Food just showed up. Free. To charge for it would have been obscene. A hard transition, if it comes, could accelerate the shift toward free forms of exchange. What about the challenge of moving up to highly-human behavior during hard times? Wont that be next to impossible? For some, perhaps. For others, it might happen quite naturally. Although hardship and stress invite discouragement and misery, spiritual leaders have shown the way to highlyhuman transcendence. So have millions of ordinary people who have emerged, during crisis, as heroes through compassion, commitment, and love. Bottom line: Whether we enter the new era roughly or smoothly, honing our highly-human skills is the way to go. # # #
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6
Highly-Human Strategies for Job Creators
Whether youre a big-business manager or lone entrepreneur, government policy maker or non-profit administrator, a two-fold approach is called for. The two branches may at first seem at odds with one another: Strategy 1: Offload everything you can from people to technology. Strategy 2: Make your operation extraordinary by employing people to exercise their highly-human skills. It does little good, long term, to have people keep on doing things that computers, online systems, automated machinery, and tech-efficient suppliers can do better and cheaper. You only hold people back from their highly-human future and slow your organizations growth. On the other hand, organizations thrive through creativity, concern for customers, determination, a sense of mission, and the common bond of shared effort magic qualities beyond the scope of mechanical efficiency or even bottom-line economics.
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Pursue strategy 1 and strategy 2 simultaneously. They dont have to fight one another. They can reinforce each other. Humanize while you systematize. The trick is to Help employees take on new highly-human tasks while freeing them from boring responsibilities that can be systematized. Create new jobs that are highly-human from the get-go. One emerging field with high potential is human-machine symbiosis, also called augmented intelligence (AI of a different sort). Unlike artificial intelligence, it does not seek to replace human thinking but to support it for quicker, better analysis, creativity, and decision making. The electronic part of the new AI does what computer systems do best manipulate large databases and present raw conclusions, options, or scenarios and leaves to people what they do best: direction, task setting, judgments, and final decisions to people. Theres no doubt about whos in charge. A few high-tech firms, offering the augmented-intelligence systems, are likely to grow and prosper. Other organizations yours, perhaps may profit from using the systems to empower your technical and management personnel. Why should you make your operation more highly-human? Creating much-needed jobs is one reason. Another is giving your organization a boost, possibly big one. Opportunities abound. Consider that - Operations populated by people who are super-alert, quick to diagnose problems, and electric in their actions can run rings around competitors populated by the dulled-down employees so typical today. Hyper-innovation could break out all over the place. Outfits populated by highly creative, communicative, inspired, sociallyresponsible teams have always been the high flyers. Now many will fly higher by revving up their human and technological engines simultaneously. Fortunes will be made in new enterprises that affordably give customers access to real people in conjunction with smooth
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technology. The public is sick of automated customer-support systems with no human help to be found, of stores without knowledgeable personnel, of having to drive miles for things that used to be in the neighborhood. A pendulum swing is long overdue, except the swing will not be backward but forward, to enterprises that are tech-rich as well as people-rich. To make jobs in your operation more highly-human, follow the same principles offered for job seekers, in the previous chapter and the next. If youre a policy maker, your opportunity is to provide legislation and policies to smooth the transition to highly-human enterprises and jobs. Stop propping up obsolescent industrial practices that only slow the transition to a thriving new economy. Support training in highly-human job skills as well as high-tech ones (remembering that human technical knowledge will continue to be needed and prized for some time). Provide incentives for organizations that lead the way to the winning new business model: the best of the human combined with the best of advanced technology, and in support of our sustainable future. # # #
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Ways to Leverage Highly-Human Skills
For job seekers and creators alike, its important to realize that any job can be made into a highly-human one, or any business opportunity into a highly-human one, simply by Conceding to electronic system the skills they perform better than people. Shifting your or your co-workers unique human qualities into overdrive. Remember how people and electronic systems compare. Theyre better at the structured, definable, repeatable stuff. Were better at the out-of-theblue creative, emotional, visionary, responsible, joyful, awake, and in-livingcolor conscious stuff.
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Make hay with the highly-human strengths as suggested here:
1. Basic Thinking Skills & Symbolism

The basic processes or micro elements of thought may be broken down into six types. These correspond to elements in the world, for we interact with reality only through the minds window. The six elemental processes are: Thing making or reification (we notice an apple, say). Qualification (the apple is red). Classification (the apple is a fruit). Structure analysis (the apple has skin, seeds, pulp). Operation analysis (the apple grew and will be eaten). Analogy (your child is the apple of your eye).
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An awareness trilogy -- sensation, emotion, and logic -- plays a role within each of these six elements. Sensation (we see, hear, and touch). Emotion (we feel angry, afraid, jealous, happy). Logic (we notice relationships of size, number, order, and causation). To employ the six elemental processes and the awareness trilogy, we utilize symbols. For example, words like apple, red, seed, and before; and numbers as well as diagrams and scientific notation. The key way to raise our consciousness with regard to symbols is to become more aware of their basic characteristic, ambiguity. That is, any symbol can mean a number of different things and shift meaning with ease. For example, apple can refer to a piece of the fruit, an entire apple tree, the flesh of the fruit (minus seeds and stem), the flavor which might be imparted to a cookie or soft drink, and so on. Unconsciously for the most part, our minds pursue the six elemental processes, the awareness trilogy, and symbolism. If we want to become more highly-human, we need to become more aware of these atomic-level mental processes and intentionally invoke them from time to time. In particular, we need to pay more attention to neglected areas of our aliveness, such as our emotions -- currently so severely repressed we scarcely realize theres a problem. Our other highly-human skills -- the macro skills, from creativity to responsibility -- all owe their existence to our micro-level or atomic mentality, just as organisms owe their existence to atoms. These macrolevel skills include conscious monitoring and control, hypothesizing, creativity and imagination, subjective decision making, social skills, and responsibility. (This report does not attempt to enhance the micro-skills. Many educational and training programs are available to do that.)
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THE MACRO SKILLS 2. Conscious Monitoring & Control

We keep our eyes and ears open so were alert to whats happening, particularly problems and opportunities. Then, when appropriate, we use our hands or speech to intercede -prevent a mishap, seize an opportunity, or make an adjustment. For example, lets say you grow apples and youre looking for ways to increase your income. You keep alert, constantly observing and thinking. One day, you notice a child eating candy-coated popcorn. Hmmm. Suppose the candy apple had not yet been invented. On the spot you visualize a candy-coated apple, and youre off on a new line of business. As you develop the business, you of course keep on with your conscious monitoring. For example, you watch your pots of caramel candy and turn down the heat before they boil over. Or you notice in the newspaper that theres going to be a craft fair in town; you ask a co-worker to set up a stand to sell your candy apples there. Perception comes naturally; so do speech and the use of our hands. But skill at monitoring and control varies widely. The better we get at it, the more we make the world correspond to our desires.
3. Hypothesizing
As with creativity, hypothesizing involves a mental leap, but the leap is toward what already exists rather than whats new. When were hypothesizing, were looking for an explanation for a problem, for a state of affairs, or for a condition of nature.
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For example, Newton asked why apples fell to the ground as they did, and came up with the theory of gravity. In your candy-apple venture, you might similarly look for explanations: My candy apples arent selling as well as they did last summer. How come? Is there a new competitor I dont know about? Have customer tastes changed? Is it the weather? Is there a problem with the packaging? Or what? The better we investigate, perceive, and analyze, the surer we are to find out whats going on and make the right conclusions or adjustments. In science and engineering, the better we analyze, the more knowledge we gain and the more power we give to society.
4. Creativity & Imagination

We invent new things in our minds. Then we may let them remain fantasies, or fashion them in reality like the Wright brothers constructing the first airplane. Your original aha, visualizing a candy-coated apple, was of course an exercise of creativity. (It happened to employ the basic thinking skill of analogy: candy coating is to popcorn as candy coating is to apple.) You also employ creativity throughout the evolution of your business, dreaming up new options, possibilities, variations, and solutions. For example, suppose the reason your candy-apple sales are down is that a nearby apple grower has also gone into the business. Putting on your creativity hat you might develop a variety of candy-apple flavors: chocolate mint, coffee vanilla, etc. Do you also grow strawberries? Maybe you could dip them in caramel or chocolate. The more attention we give to fashioning new possibilities, the more impact we have on our incomes, lives, and all aspects of evolving reality.
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5. Subjective Decision Making

After using creativity to develop two or more possibilities, we clarify what were after and then choose one of the possibilities. For example, suppose you had not yet come up with the candy-apple business and were considering alternative ways of marketing your apple crop. I want to make the most money I could sell the apples as they are, make them into apple sauce and then sell that, or make them into candy apples and then sell them in local stores. Which is the way to go? Later you would also of course use decision making to determine which new flavors of candy apple to introduce, or which marketing avenues to explore. The better we clarify what were after and analyze the criteria of choice, the better we do in business and life.
6. Social Skills
We interact productively with other people and get them to interact productively with one another. Social skills include leadership, responding to leadership, motivating others, listening, speaking, reading body language, organizing, conveying a vision, and inspiring enthusiasm. For example, you join a local service club to keep in touch. You learn from a fellow member that her church is looking for a good fundraiser. You figure a candy apple sale would be ideal, but you dont offer to sell your apples to the church. Instead, in a friendly way, you offer to donate 100 candy apples and to provide additional ones, if needed, at cost. You win appreciation for your generosity and also gain valuable public awareness for your product. The more we hone our social skills, the more friends we make and the more positive activity we generate in others.
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7. Responsibility
Responsibility is the crowning realization of integrated, well-functioning self-consciousness. In a state of responsibility, were conscious and we know it. But theres more. Our awareness is maturely wide and includes other people as well as ourselves, ultimately all of humanity. Love and other values exist where there is responsibility, and we aim for goals that are ethical. For example, someone else in town starts to make and sell candy apples. You start dreaming up devious, not exactly legal plots for putting that person out of business, but catch yourself. Surviving in that manner isnt worth it, you figure, and there could be retaliation. So you focus on ways to compete better by improving your product, service, and retail relationships. The more we hone our responsibility, the better we feel about ourselves; and the healthier we make our community, industry, and society. Responsible behavior often sets us back temporarily, but offers the only path to our central goal: becoming more alive, connected, and powerful. During earlier periods of history, it made sense to hone metaconsciousness. The best people did it, from Socrates to St. Paul, Leonardo to Ben Franklin. It makes particular sense now. Soon our lesser skills wont be needed. Electronic systems will supply the bulk of the - Facts and codified knowledge that we now retrieve from biological memory. Routine types of decision making, analysis, and number crunching such as we now perform with spreadsheets. Performance of tasks that call for observation and manipulation, such as driving a truck, assembling parts, operating a cash register, or drilling kids on Spanish. Developing our highly-human qualities has become our best career path, educational opportunity, and way to fulfill us as individuals -- not to
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mention an imperative for our survival. And it can be used to generate enormous new wealth.
The overall skill and reason for work

All the highly-human skills, together, add up to one thing. And that one thing is the very reason for work on any purposeful activity. Its the electric state of aliveness that may best be signified by the word happiness. So it makes sense to focus on happiness as the overall skill we seek to perfect, and as very goal of work. Whats the secret to this superaliveness? Stop pursuing happiness; experience it instead. The framers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence may have led us astray (if we treat happiness as a long-term goal). The purpose of a free society should not be to chase a distant bliss that may forever elude us. It makes more sense to be happy and fulfilled RIGHT NOW, as Benjamin Franklin clearly was. He enjoyed working, innovating, solving problems, helping others. His daily delight was evident in his smile, writings, clever inventions, animated social and political activities and antics. Youll be most successful in finding or creating highly-human work, regardless of circumstances, if you emulate Franklin: Manage to find pleasure each and every day, whether working, jobseeking, or engaging in personal activities. Make other people happier each and every day, in person, on the phone, online, professionally or personally. Simple techniques for doing this include o Being technically proficient, the best at what you do. o Listening attentively to what they want. o Living up to what you promise them. o Doing more than they expect. o Being happy and upbeat in dealing with them.
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Remember that making customers, a boss, or co-workers happy is the ultimate name of the game. Those who do it best are most in demand and most secure as well as most fulfilled.
# # #
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8
Share Your Situation or Opportunity, Get & Give Support
Go to the Highly-Human Jobs site, http://highlyhumanjobs.ning.com, and register to share ideas, plans, concerns, approaches, roadblocks and successes on Honing highly-human skills. Converting a regular job into highly-human one. Creating or finding work that leverages highly-human qualities. Creating highly-human jobs for others. Building competitive advantage by highly-humanizing your organization. Supporting legislation and policies favoring the transition to highlyhuman work and the budding highly-human economy.
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Features planned for the site include A list of highly-human job and entrepreneurial categories with guidelines for creating opportunities. A highly-human jobs and entrepreneurship board for posting or finding opportunities. Links to existing directories of green and highly-human companies, institutions, and initiatives. Additions planned for new versions of this report, and an eventual book, include A section on the ultimate focus of work: constant development of better humans, alongside constant development of better technology. Examples of individuals, organizations, and policy makers applying the highly-human principles successfully.
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About the Author

Richard W. Samson is Director of the EraNova Institute and has served as consultant to IBM, AT&T and other large organizations. He has created several websites and social networks including - Highly Human Jobs (HighlyHumanJobs.ning.com), a network supporting this report and the highly-human economy. SuperLife (superlife.ws), a network for companies and individuals building a better, sustainable society. The Personal PR Forum (pprforum.ning.com), a site providing public relations advice and services for professional and business people. The Long Term Care Insurance Guild (LTCguild.com), a network embracing local chapters in various states. Samson was instrumental in creating the 3 in 4 Need More campaign now run by the non-profit 3in4 Association (www.3in4needmore.com). This campaign works in conjunction with state and federal government as well as major insurance and healthcare companies. Focusing on mental as well as physical improvement, he is the author of several books including "Mind Over Technology" and "The Mind Builder." In 2005 he foresaw the current employment crisis and offered strategies for resolving it, in an article appearing in The Futurist magazine, Hyperjobs: The New Higher-Level Work and How to Grow Into It. His article Riding
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the Life Extension Wave was the cover story of the December, 2011, issue of National Underwriter Life & Health, the leading industry journal. In 2005 he originated and popularized the terms hyperjobs, hyperhuman jobs, and hyper-human economy. In 2012 he introduced highlyhuman as a more accessible term to describe the new work and economic system. He has also used the terms meta and super as synonyms for hyper and highly. He is the originator of the term off-peopling to describe the job-shifting trend that parallels offshoring. Richard W. Samson is also known as Dick Samson, especially on the Internet. # # # NOTE: Much of the content of this report has been drawn from the book Mind Over Technology by Richard W. Samson
Please support our work by respecting the copyright! Thank you for not distributing unauthorized copies.
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