Newsletter Volume 29 Issue 5, May 2017
From The Editor
“The Community Colleges Australia New Work Mindset report is based on the analysis of 4.2 million job advertisements between 2012 and 2015.”
The above quote is from a report which may help to address some of the argument about what Commonwealth Budget 2017 means for community Vocational Education and Training (VET) providers. It identifies “7 new job clusters to help young people navigate the new work order”, with examples of early career occupations in each job cluster. See below, New Jobs From Big Data. See also Events below for the Parramatta re-run of the popular 6th April and 17th May Creating New Jobs in ICT joint ACS NSW/QESP event.
Our April Issue article, Policymakers ‘flying blind’ into the future of work, which was based on a new study from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM), showing that for the US workforce “Information technology, artificial intelligence and robotics will affect almost all occupations.” This raised the question “Will a robot take away my job?” Some reassurance comes in a May 17, 2017 ScienceDaily article based on Materials provided by Yale University. This research shows that “Artificial intelligence doesn’t have to be super-sophisticated to make a difference in people’s lives, according to a new study. Even ‘dumb AI’ can help human groups.” See below, Building a better ‘bot’: Artificial intelligence helps human groups.
“The minister responsible for this decision to abolish the dysfunctional Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit in the UK, Oliver Letwin, has since called it “a terrible mistake”. The Cameron government reinstated the unit in 2012.”
The above quote is from an 11.05.2017 article in The Mandarin, which notes that “The decade and a half of varied experiences with setting up and running delivery units means it’s possible to examine the success factors, which UK’s Institute for Government has done in a new report.” Yes, the article does include Australian lessons learned. See below, Getting results: six factors for a successful delivery unit for an extract and link to the original.
“The internet of things, artificial intelligence, networked production, smart homes – these are the magic words of digital transformation. While the big technology companies are already equipping their products and production with artificial intelligence, some medium-sized companies are not succumbing to its spell — yet. Scientists report in a new article how they help companies implement Industry 4.0.”
This quote is from May 17, 2017 ScienceDaily article based on Materials provided by Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. See below, Guidelines for implementation of industry 4.0.
Current Issue
Articles in the current Issue cover:
New Jobs From Big Data
“it is clear that conversation about work needs to progress beyond the 1000+ occupations that comprise the economy.”
Building a better ‘bot’: Artificial intelligence helps human groups
“Much of the current conversation about artificial intelligence has to do with whether AI is a substitute for human beings. We believe the conversation should be about AI as a complement to human beings,”
Getting results: six factors for a successful delivery unit
“I very often found, even at the very end, that the small team in the Implementation Unit who were very clear-minded — and we hired people who were specifically very clear-minded — could do more in a few weeks than a whole Department had done in a year to get straight why something was going wrong. … it is actually necessary to get some data and find out what exactly is going on.”
Guidelines for implementation of industry 4.0
“ Most of the small and medium-sized companies consider the increasing use of digital technology an opportunity, but where to start? Now, guidelines co-developed by researchers of KIT show them the way into Industry 4.0.”
QESP Blog
New skills or more in-depth experience? This question comes to a head in our latest blog, a thought provoking one minute video which went viral on social media, see A Delicate Balance
Events
A re-run of the popular Creating New Jobs in ICT joint ACS NSW/QESP event will be held in Parramatta on Thursday 6th July for members in that area who were unable to attend the 6th April and 17th May Sydney events. The venue will be the ProGalore Parramatta Office or the Western Sydney University Parramatta City campus at 169 Macquarie Street (to be confirmed.) Further details will be available on the QESP website.
Quotes
Quote of the Day
It’s supposed to be automatic, but actually you have to push this button. – John Brunner
Quote from Yesteryear
The effort of using machines to mimic the human mind has always struck me as rather silly. I would rather use them to mimic something better. – Edsger Dijkstra
Ted Smillie
QESP Chair