Engagement statt Arbeit

Waiting for the next ICE express train back to the Netherlands I recently browsed the train kiosk of Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof. Between all the regular magazines I discovered an unknown one: Der Vordenker. As it appears, Der Vordenker is a new magazine that publishes visions of the future, published by German futorologist Oliver W. Schwarzmann. The number I bought focused on the developments of jobs and education. Schwarzmann describes how the productivity of firm will be less and less dependent upon physical elements, but increasingly production will be a combination of creativity and virtualisation. Products will adapt to specific circumstances or preferences, the author calls this Morphologisches Design. The new Philips Living Colors lamp can be seen as a prelude to these kind of products. This lamp allows you to choose your own colors. In our jobs we will focus less on production, but more on creativity to fulfil the dreams and vision of clients.

Education will also need to change. There is so much knowledge that it is less relevant to be able to reproduce it by heart. The more knowledge is available to persons, the more selective they become in absorbing information. So it's best that if you absorb information, it's relevant to you. Either because you can use it immediately or to serve your passions. Using information is more important than knowing it by heart. Education must become more personal.

While reading this, another article popped into my mind. Fast Company featured a story about Ashley who started the website Whateverlife.com. On this site she publishes templates you can use to spice up your MySpace profile. Just as a hobby, but a direct hit with other teens. And a real magnet to corporations in search of this target group. This 17 year old girls makes a nice year income, higher than mine. I had to suffer years to get my university degree and she bought a house for her mother and sister and runs this website with a couple of teenage girl friends. No MBA degrees, just a passion for design and girlies stuff. Perhaps the web will change things a little bit more quick than we all think at the moment.

EXTRA FIELD-5:jobs, education