There will be 255 Million Remote Workers by 2030
January 1, 2020
There are 255 million desk jobs globally
Any of them could be done remotely
A majority of them will be by 2030
That doesn't mean that every job will be remote, it means that any job that can be done remotely and isn't service-based or location-dependent, will be. Workers will be given the choice or at least work a part of their week remotely.
The ongoing situation has accelerated remote work 10 years in 5 weeks. Below is a list of predictions of what will happen across the next decade regarding remote work:
1. 🚀 80m Full-time Remote Workers
Before the current situation happened, 20m full-time remote workers were operating from home across the EU and the USA. There were projected to be 33m by 2030.
There will be closer to 80m full-time remote workers by 2030
2. 😋 Remote Work Will Eat the World
Companies who adopted technology 20 years ago replaced every company that didn’t.
Companies who adopt remote work will replace every company that doesn’t.
3. 📍Remote teams will be far more talented
A physical office means you can hire the best person you can afford in a 30-mile radius, disqualifying you from 99.9% of the world’s talent.
Remote teams can hire the best person they can afford on the planet.
4. ⭐Talent will be Redistributed
The most talented people are stipulating remote work as a condition of employment. Companies who don’t provide this won’t be able to attract the best people.
Companies who don’t give this to their existing workers will lose their most talented people to their biggest competitors.
5.🚦Preferences of Workers will Accelerate Change
The smartest people I know personally ALL plan to work remotely in the next decade.
The best companies I know personally *ALL* plan to hire remotely in the next decade.
Remote will be the dominant workplace of the best companies and people.
6. 💰Remote-first will be Far More Cost-Efficient
Office-first companies spend $18,400 on average, per workplace, per person
The best remote setup on the planet costs $2,000 per year, coffee included.
Remote is $16,400 less a year, per team member, or a $16.4m saving per 1,000 workers.
Office-only companies will be economically unviable.
7. 🚨Asynchronous First or There's No Point
Offices are instantaneous gratification adult kids clubs where it’s impossible to focus and do deep work without distraction.
Companies who replicate the office remotely rather than optimizing for the benefits of remote work will fail at remote work.
8. ⌛Metrics of Performance will Change
The only metric bad middle managers use to measure performance is the time spent in the office.
Remote work is about how much work you get done focussing on productivity.
9. 💡 Remote Policies Reflect Company Culture
Remote horror stories exist already. Companies expecting daily video standups to surveil their workers the obvious example. They get confused with availability and productivity.
Remotely, unavailability = productivity. The lack of distractions and space to focus and do deep work is a feature, not a bug. Breaking this leads to lowering productivity.
Companies who don't trust their people will fail at remote work.
10. 😱 Several Things will Kill Companies
Remote work already happened and it's now about catching up. What will kill companies?
- Not going remote
- Going remote badly
- Going remote too slowly
- Replicating office culture remotely
Remote companies will replace every office-first competitors, dominate the 2020s.
11. 🏦 Emergence of a Third Space
Office and Working from Home will be joined by somewhere close by that some people will use.
Supermarkets, local bank branches or certain homes in neighborhoods could emerge as a convenient ubiquitous options.
12. ⚽️ A Renaissance of Hobbies
Remote working will lead to a rise in people participating in hobbies and activities which link them to people in their local community.
This will lead to deeper, more meaningful relationships which help overcome societal issues of loneliness and isolation.
13. 🚜 The Rise of Rural Living
World-class people will move to smaller cities, have a lower cost of living & a higher quality of life.
These regions must innovate quickly to attract that wealth. Better schools, faster internet connections are a must.
14. 🌐 Presence will Become Important
Asynchronous work lets you have the isolation to do deep work but it’s not always required.
Communication solutions which enable presence, like an open mic while gaming, will become more compelling.
15. 👨🔬 Bad Tech will be Developed
Remote will grow so popular so quickly that it will attract people who have no interest in it other than greed — like blockchain/crypto in 2017.
Their lack of understanding of remote work will lead to them replicating the bad parts of the office working remotely.
16. 🤬 Remote Rejection will Be a Real Thing
Certain demographics and generations will reject the transition. Their benefit — that everyone in the office is like them and it’s easier for them to progress — will be their reason.
Companies that don’t transition will be left behind.
17. 🌍 Diversity & Inclusion will be a Massive Benefit
The most diverse and inclusive teams in history will emerge rapidly.
Companies who embrace it have a first-mover advantage to attract great talent globally.
Companies who don’t will lose their best people to their biggest competitors.
18. 🚘 1 Car Households will Become Common
The rise of remote will have tremendous indirect benefits towards slashing pollution
Families will benefit from only needing one car slashing cost of living, potentially cutting commuting a lot.
19. 💰 Private Equity Could Drive Adoption
the hottest trend of the next decade for private equity will see them purchase companies, make them remote-first.
The cost saving in real-estate at scale will be eye-watering. The productivity gains will be the final nail in the coffin for the office.
20. ☠️ The Death of Coworking
The last recession was the beginning of the end for bespoke vanity office.
The next recession will spell the same thing for co-working spaces.
21. 💘 Talent Wars will Be Fought Remotely
Remote work is the perk that is most sought after by workers globally. This will only increase.
Remote-first companies will disrupt every incumbent who doesn’t/isn’t able to make that transition.
22. ✍️ Great Written Communication Will be a Key Skill
the most important skill for workers to cultivate. Reading and understanding also key,
Cultural issues arising from misunderstanding meaning behind the way people write becomes a big issue
23. 😴 Working Too Much will be a Problem
Companies worry that the workers won’t work enough when operating remotely.
The opposite will be true and become a big problem.
Remote workers burning out because they work too much will have to be addressed.
24. 👀 Distraction Avoidance Strategies will be Important
The home office will skyrocket in popularity. A space at home to get away a necessity.
There will be an explosion of people purchasing standalone units in backyards for this.
25. 🌍 There will be 'Global Citizens'
Individuals with no national attachment become ubiquitous.
Challenges of paying people cross border due to compliance and legal issues slowly fade away as the world becomes more borderless.
26. ✈️ Retreat Destinations will become Popular
Global hubs will pop-up that cater to remote teams getaways.
Resort-like escapes with a deep focus on team building, collaboration, planning, and efficiency. Hotels with facilitators /coaches who assist teams for the duration.
27. ❤️ Life-Work Balance will be hugely Important
The rise of remote will lead to people re-prioritizing what is important to them.
Organizing your work around your life will be the first noticeable switch. People realizing they are more than there job will lead to a deeper purpose in other areas.
28. 💹 Fractional Ownership is Interesting
Remote work will make advancement less important/more difficult.
Rather than reward being a better title, fractional ownership could enable workers to be more easily rewarded with ownership of their companies/make the market for equity more liquid.
29. 💩 Bullshit Tasks will be Killed Off
The need to pad out your 8 hour day will evaporate, replaced by clear tasks and responsibilities.
Workers will do what needs to be done rather than wasting their trying to look busy with the rest of the office.
30. 🌏 Opportunity will be Decentralized Globally
Remote work will do more for inequality than anything in history. Workers everywhere will find the best, highest paying job.
The fear that this will depreciate wages will be unfounded as companies will need more talent than exists.
31. ♿️ Jobs will Become more Accessible
Remote work will make work more accessible than it has ever been.
Nothing will stop workers from getting the job they deserve because there will be no obstacles in their way.
32. 🛠️ The Growth of Remote-First Tools
Companies operating remotely now will have created tools every remote team on the planet needs.
@Zapier, @Gitlab, @GitHub, @FirstbaseHQ will spawn Mafias who take these internal tools and create startups around them.
Several $Billion Startups to emerge this way.
33. 🤹♀️ People will have Multiple Jobs
The gig/freelance economy will evolve. Remote work allows workers to have multiple employers.
The difference in terms of reliability and consistency will be huge, eradicating doubt, lead to better conditions for workers.
34. 📈 Remote Jobs will Catch up With Demand
There won’t be enough remote jobs for at least the next 5 years. World-class people will drive the change.
They will demand more remote opportunities and realize the influence they have to make their companies give it to them
35. 💾 Remote Infrastructure will Empower the Growth
The focus on the sexy won’t change any time soon.
There is a missing half of remote work that’s neglected because it’s difficult, boring, and unsexy.
It will be the most critical. Until that’s solved remote teams won’t scale globally easily.
36. 🎴No Code Skills will be a Superpower
No Code Tools will grows to dominate creation. @webflow, @figmadesign, amongst others will democratize access unlike ever before.
Remote workers who have an area of expertise and one of these broad skills will be superhuman producers inside their companies.
37. 🤗 Social Contact will Change
Loneliness, disconnection will be neither improved or worsened by remote work.
Some people’s main social contact comes at work, with people decided by their bosses hiring policy.
Remote work must lead to deeper more meaningful relationships with friends/family.
38. 🧘♂️You will be able to Focus on Health & Wellbeing
A lack of commute will give workers 25 extra days a year to do other things.
Workers will exploit the freedom they have to organize things more freely in their day. Afternoon runs, morning meditation, 2 things a lot of people I know now do.
39. 👶 We will become more Connected with Family
Hearing your child’s first laugh, seeing their first steps won’t just be in the memory of one parent.
Being there, feeling like your children know you. Dropping them at school each day. Small things that remote gives.
40. 🎫 Visa Issues will Become Less of a Problem
The problem with workers having to leave a job due to the expiry of their visas will no longer exist.
Companies won’t accept losing their best people simply because their right to be in a specific country expires.
Remote will be an easy option.
41. 🌎 Workers Everywhere Will Benefit
Great for developing countries. International companies will access to talent globally.
Access to opportunity will be decentralized.
42. 👑 Job Titles Will Become Less Important
What your job title is will become more irrelevant as remote work becomes more prominent.
What you do, what you're capable of, the tools you can wield will enable you to do jobs that break you free from the shackles of a title.
43. 🛠️ Certain Tools Will Become Universal
A global workforce that understands and the same SAAS products means technical debt for training = $0.
Companies add another seat to SaaS platform and worker uses the same tool they would use if they were in an office or with a differentcompany.
44. 👴 Older Workers Will Benefit From it Most
Boomers may be standing in the way of the remote work revolution happening quickly, believe least in its benefits and lack the trust for it to emerge.
Ironically, remote work will allow them to work far more easily later in life.
45. ⚠️ Disaster Continuity Strategy
Covid-19 has highlighted the lack of capacity most companies have for remote work.
This will be viewed as an existential threat to businesses and every board will push their companies towards developing a strategy to cope with any future situation immediately.
Remote work will become a core competency of every large industry on the planet.
Why Now?
Remote work is the biggest workplace revolution in history and nothing will deliver a higher quality of life increase in the next decade than this. Workers having more flexibility to decide their work schedule, able to operate when they are most productive rather than a fixed day, enables a far better future of work than the one we currently experience. Organizing work around your life is a huge transition with major implications. Gone is the requirement to beg your bosses permission to go to an appointment, it is the ability to drop and pick your child up from work every day with time in the afternoon to go for your recharging run.
Being handcuffed to an office and expected to live in a high cost of living city with a low quality of life is a remnant of the industrial revolution. The devolution of offices into almost factory-like conditions as distraction factory adult kids clubs is complete. The office has become the worst place on the planet to get the isolation and focus you need to do deep work.
Make no mistake, remote work is exploding to prominence right now. We are living through the inflection point today. Shortly, workers will realize their power and influence to demand remote work.
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