September 9, 2024
Good morning! Coming to you this morning from the far Downeast Coast of Maine — where if God had made a prettier place… well, you know the rest. Bluesberries, lobster, spectacular shorelines, a thirteen-foot tide, and just one road.
- According to the World Health Organization, beer is king in the Western Hemisphere when it comes to drinking an alcoholic beverage.
- Fifty-four percent choose beer over wine and/or spirits.
- In Southeast Asia, on the other hand, spirits win hands-down.
- Eighty-nine percent choose spirits over beer (10%) or wine (<1%).
- And where you might expect wine to reign supreme in Europe, it only gets chosen by 31% of beverage-choosers…
- … whereas, on the continent of Africa, 45% of alcohol drinkers choose wine.
- WAY counterintuitive: Throughout the Mediterranean Region (Healthy living = wine + olives + relationships), beer and spirits combined out-pace wine 82% to 15%.
- Fascinating.
- Worldwide, the breakdown is perhaps less surprising: Spirits @45%; Beer @35%; Wine @12%, and “Other”, whatever that means, is 8%.
- When there is talk about needing more vineyards and more grapes, seemingly everywhere, even in Minnesota, apparently there is still considerable market potential. (W.H.O., 2024)
- (Celebrating the Feast of Labour… continued in a sense from last week:)
- Choices made today could revive productivity growth while creating better societal outcomes.
- Embracing the path of accelerated technology adoption with proactive worker redeployment could help Europe achieve an annual productivity growth rate of up to 3% through 2030.
- However, slow adoption would limit that to almost zero, closer to today’s level of productivity growth in Western Europe.
- Slow worker redeployment would leave millions unable to participate productively in the future of work.
- Demand will change for a range of occupations through 2030, including growth in science, technology, engineering, math, and healthcare-related occupations, among others.
- Demand for workers in food services, production work, customer services, sales, and office support —
- — all of which declined over the 2012-2022 period —
- would continue to decline until 2030.
- These jobs involve a high share of repetitive tasks, data collection, and elementary data processing —
- — all activities that automated systems can handle efficiently.
- Up to 30% of hours worked could be automated by 2030… leading to millions of required occupational transitions.
- In addition, demand for social and emotional skills could rise significantly.
- Underlying this increase is higher demand for roles requiring interpersonal empathy and leadership skills.
- These skills are crucial in health care and managerial roles in an evolving economy that demands greater adaptability and flexibility.
- On the other hand, demand for work in which basic cognitive skills predominate is expected to decline significantly over the same period of time.
- Those jobs include office support or customer service roles which are highly susceptible to being automated by artificial intelligence.
- Also among these roles are basic data processing and literacy, numeracy, and communication.
- Forecast: The demand for manual labour will remain about the same, including such skills as construction, plumbing, and electrical.
- Four Priorities for the Immediate Future:
- Understand the Potential of technology
- Plan a Strategic Work Force Shift
- Size the work force and skill needs, recruit new talent, upskill or reskill, redeploy for more value-added
- Prioritize People Development
- Identify, attract, and recruit future artificial intelligence leaders in an anticipated (very) tight market
- Pursue the Executive-Education Journey on Automation Technologies
- Put your own oxygen mask on first!
- Leaders need to undertake their own education journey on automation technologies to maximize their contributions to their organizations during the coming transformation.
- Empower senior managers, role model, create a dedicated road map, and bring all leaders together.
- Advanced new technologies are evolving at a breathtaking pace — leading to higher productivity, growth, and prosperity.
- (All of the above informed by Ellingrud, Hazan, Etc., et al., 2024)
Who is the writer of this poor poem?Is it Yours Truly, or is it Generative Artificial Intelligence?
Taste Sensation
In Maine, clam chowdah bubbles in a pot,
Creamy and thick, with clams that peek out,
Potatoes chunky, swimming with delight,
Steam rises, carrying the scent of the sea.
Bowls are filled, and spoons dive in,
Slurps and smiles around the table,
A feast of the ocean, warm and hearty,
Every bite a taste of coastal joy.
