3 ms·

I'm just waiting for the first robots that can sand and plaint interior rooms/walls. There is a crazy amount of wall square footage in offices/commercial/malls

I'm just waiting for the first robots that can sand and plaint interior rooms/walls. There is a crazy amount of wall square footage in offices/commercial/malls/hallways etc where a robot traveling on a mobile linear beam can totally do the work. As somebody that spend some amount of time every week hiring, one of the biggest issues is not automation but the workforce itself. Finding people that are willing to show up and do jobs is just a major problem. Companies want to hire but the candidates that show up at the door can often be barely employable. All the millenials want work from home jobs with executive pay. The idea of starting in the back sweeping the floors (no matter your education but to show work ethic and flexibility) is gone. The working world will get harder over the years. The "raised like a delicate flower" to "love their job" are in serious trouble in the future. Putting food on the table takes time and effort. It's called "work" not "play" for a reason.

tomp 13y ago
I'm just waiting for the first robots that can put food on the table on their own.
kasey_junk 13y ago
I really doubt your company actually pays someone full time to sweep the floors. More probably, you've outsourced this to a specialist company that only sweeps floors (well they probably buff them, vacuum them, etc.). That company has no reason to promote people beyond the cleaning floor job as that is their main business & curtailing HR costs is probably their biggest driver to profit. So in the best case they keep workers who can't find better jobs at low cost at the same position for years, and in the worst case they actually "sub-contract" those positions out to companies that exploit illegal immigrants, who have a near limitless supply of under payed workers to cycle through. So forgive me, if instead of reading your comment as a jab against overly entitled "millenials" and instead read it for what it is, companies reaping what they sow. If companies wanted employees who will start on the ground floor and work up, they should foster an environment where that can actually happen rather than treating their employees with a cavalier mercenary attitude, and getting huffy when their employee pool reacts in kind.
- stormqloud 13y ago
  Actually I do employ somebody to "sweep the floors" fulltime. Some random service doesn;t take any amount of care of interest in the job. You are far better off to pay somebody to do it and be invested in the task with a sense of pride then to employ a random cleaning company and whatever worker they happen to send that week. What I do find is that employee's think hiring is like being on a talent show. Clearly you have never done any hiring. Once you get out of tech you'll be lucky if 50% of workers show up for work the day after they have been hired. Fully 10% of workers will be hired, you will arrange a day to start work and they won;t even show up. You'll never hear from them again. Companies can spend time training people over and over. Millenials expect to be promoted in 6 months and be constantly feted for their work. Hopefully one day you can own a company and spend your time training workers to have them leave when they become competent.
  - kasey_junk 13y ago
    You are in a huge minority of companies that actually expect to hire someone to clean floors and move up. If it works for you (which it sounds like it doesn't) that's great, but it doesn't change the standard hiring practices in current businesses which is the opposite of that. I've never been responsible for hiring outside of the technology sector, that said, I've been responsible for hiring, and have hired across a variety of age groups and have noticed no trend among any of them for who works harder/more efficiently/etc. Employee retention is most certainly a hard job, but it isn't because of the age of my employees, it's because I strive to hire really good ones. For what it's worth, I put this question to my wife who hires in a non-tech small business setting, and she has also never experienced specific problems with millennials that don't exist in other age groups. Perhaps it is your hiring practices that are at issue not who you are hiring?
normloman 13y ago
And when's the last time your company promoted the floor sweeper to something related to your core business? Probably never. And that's why candidates don't waste their time.
bcoates 13y ago
The future belongs to companies that realize exactly how little the average worker cares about "work". I can get driven to work by a nice guy in a clean car for $11 instead of a surly driver in a grotty $25 taxi (who probably has a great work ethic), because the UberX driver is trying to support his unjob lifestyle instead of being good at being an employee.
lordCarbonFiber 13y ago
I'm sorry but calling it "work" as if doing something mentally fulfilling is a dirty word and implying that employees need (or even want) to work intellectually meaningless work is just ridiculous. A young person (your dreaded millennial) with valuable skills is not magically worth only menial labor by virtue of their age or your own entitlement. The quickest way to destroy a valuable creative mind is to throw it at menial work for minimal pay. So, a great method if you want job security if you're already at the top; however, worthless if you innovation or technical progress.
eli_gottlieb 13y ago
You're waiting for robots to take the jobs so you can tell those damn kids to get off their butts and work harder? Do you really not perceive the logical contradiction here?

tomp 13y ago

I'm just waiting for the first robots that can put food on the table on their own.

kasey_junk 13y ago

I really doubt your company actually pays someone full time to sweep the floors. More probably, you've outsourced this to a specialist company that only sweeps floors (well they probably buff them, vacuum them, etc.). That company has no reason to promote people beyond the cleaning floor job as that is their main business & curtailing HR costs is probably their biggest driver to profit. So in the best case they keep workers who can't find better jobs at low cost at the same position for years, and in the worst case they actually "sub-contract" those positions out to companies that exploit illegal immigrants, who have a near limitless supply of under payed workers to cycle through. So forgive me, if instead of reading your comment as a jab against overly entitled "millenials" and instead read it for what it is, companies reaping what they sow. If companies wanted employees who will start on the ground floor and work up, they should foster an environment where that can actually happen rather than treating their employees with a cavalier mercenary attitude, and getting huffy when their employee pool reacts in kind.

stormqloud 13y ago
Actually I do employ somebody to "sweep the floors" fulltime. Some random service doesn;t take any amount of care of interest in the job. You are far better off to pay somebody to do it and be invested in the task with a sense of pride then to employ a random cleaning company and whatever worker they happen to send that week. What I do find is that employee's think hiring is like being on a talent show. Clearly you have never done any hiring. Once you get out of tech you'll be lucky if 50% of workers show up for work the day after they have been hired. Fully 10% of workers will be hired, you will arrange a day to start work and they won;t even show up. You'll never hear from them again. Companies can spend time training people over and over. Millenials expect to be promoted in 6 months and be constantly feted for their work. Hopefully one day you can own a company and spend your time training workers to have them leave when they become competent.
- kasey_junk 13y ago
  You are in a huge minority of companies that actually expect to hire someone to clean floors and move up. If it works for you (which it sounds like it doesn't) that's great, but it doesn't change the standard hiring practices in current businesses which is the opposite of that. I've never been responsible for hiring outside of the technology sector, that said, I've been responsible for hiring, and have hired across a variety of age groups and have noticed no trend among any of them for who works harder/more efficiently/etc. Employee retention is most certainly a hard job, but it isn't because of the age of my employees, it's because I strive to hire really good ones. For what it's worth, I put this question to my wife who hires in a non-tech small business setting, and she has also never experienced specific problems with millennials that don't exist in other age groups. Perhaps it is your hiring practices that are at issue not who you are hiring?

normloman 13y ago

And when's the last time your company promoted the floor sweeper to something related to your core business? Probably never. And that's why candidates don't waste their time.

bcoates 13y ago

The future belongs to companies that realize exactly how little the average worker cares about "work". I can get driven to work by a nice guy in a clean car for $11 instead of a surly driver in a grotty $25 taxi (who probably has a great work ethic), because the UberX driver is trying to support his unjob lifestyle instead of being good at being an employee.

lordCarbonFiber 13y ago

I'm sorry but calling it "work" as if doing something mentally fulfilling is a dirty word and implying that employees need (or even want) to work intellectually meaningless work is just ridiculous. A young person (your dreaded millennial) with valuable skills is not magically worth only menial labor by virtue of their age or your own entitlement. The quickest way to destroy a valuable creative mind is to throw it at menial work for minimal pay. So, a great method if you want job security if you're already at the top; however, worthless if you innovation or technical progress.

eli_gottlieb 13y ago

You're waiting for robots to take the jobs so you can tell those damn kids to get off their butts and work harder? Do you really not perceive the logical contradiction here?