Over the course of his writing, rather cleverly, Peter Drucker found a way to coin our past, present and future into distinct societies. At its root, a “society” is a group of people sharing traditions and values, organized as a community. He first introduced the emergence of a “knowledge society” with the arrival of the knowledge worker. From there, Drucker insisted the “knowledge society” was beginning to evolve into an “employee society,” so long as management was able to focus on making the knowledge productive and useful. Drucker then envisioned a day where the created, collective wealth of knowledge would advance into an “entrepreneurial society.”  He felt the “entrepreneurial society” would mark a turning point […]

Athens, Georgia, based restaurant Weaver D’s Delicious Fine Foods was once honored by an American Classics awards to recognize “good, down-home food” and “unmatched hospitality” – for its “spot-on fried chicken, sweet potato casserole, buttermilk cornbread, and … signature squash casserole.” G.P. Dexter Weaver, the legendary owner, wants its service to be known as “automatic for the people”, a term fellow Athens rock band R.E.M. used as an album title.   Wherever one looks researchers are predicting that “automatic for the people” is morphing into something we might coin “automation for the people”.   Researchers at the University of Oxford indicated 47 percent of employees in the U.S. are at risk of losing their jobs due to automation. In Australia, a recent report by the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) suggests 40 percent […]

In 1982, Time magazine declared the personal computer its “Machine of the Year.” Up until then, humans usually had won a “Person of the Year” distinction.   Time publisher John A. Meyers wrote, “Several human candidates might have represented 1982, but none symbolized the past year more richly, or will be viewed by history as more significant, than a machine: the computer.”  Pity those worthy humans who might have been in contention. The year 1982 was the point in history when humans became mere mortals, suffering the ignominy of garnering second place to a machine.   It hasn’t got much better. Some 33 years later, we might suggest 1982’s “Machine of the Year” has now morphed into an omnipresence of […]