The royal family looks like it could be breaking up – Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will be moving to Canada. They want to become financially independent and leave many of their royal family duties behind.

It is shocking for many – centuries of tradition are fading away before our eyes.

Hey, it’s 2020 – we are in a new decade. Before it is over, many of us will regularly be using autonomous and even flying cars. It’s an exciting time. Things are changing, The royal family is and they can teach us a heck of a lot about the future of work.

Before we go on, check out our definition of the Future of Work which includes a discussion of AI, ML and digital transformation.

Here is our list:

1. Morale is crucial in the workplace. It is not easy to have great morale – managing people can be a challenge. Still, you need to strive to keep people happy or they will decide to move on to other jobs. In this case, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle sued the British tabloids for “relentless” mistreatment.
2. Institutional knowledge is crucial in the workplace – precisely because of the gig economy and how many see work. They see it as transient. In Silicon Valley, for example, many companies have an average tenure of around 2 years. How do you ensure the knowledge is kept within the organization? Ironically Cisco Quad – the networking giant’s attempt to make a Facebook for the enterprise, focused on this exact issue. Perhaps Microsft, Cisco Teams and Slack are helpful in this regard.
3. Workers are freelancing more than ever – how do you handle this in your organization? Meghan Markle inked a Disney voiceover deal before Megxit for example. What is your organization’s policy on freelancing while working? Is it enforceable? Does it matter if workers have other jobs if they get their primary job done and if so how do you ensure they do get the primary job done? BTW – we think the theme for the next royal gathering will definitely be Frozen. 🙂
4. Prince Harry and Meghan decided to put up their own website – without the knowledge of their UK press team. From this we are reminded the future of work means embracing the latest technology to get things done… In this case, communicate with the world.
5. We also learn that we need to collaborate better internally to meet our final goals together. Going off on your own as you look to evolve your organization or embrace digital transformation, is not smart. In this case, they upset the Queen who has given them 72 hours to reach a Megxit “deal.”
6. The couple plan to move to Canada and this reminds us the Future of Work takes place wherever you are. The couple said jointly, “We intend to step back as ‘senior’ members of the Royal Family and work to become financially independent, while continuing to fully support Her Majesty The Queen.” When you have a good internet connection, you can indeed work from anywhere.
7. Meghan is from the US and Prince Harry from the UK. This reminds us the Future of Work is international. Teams from various continents must work together and be on the same team – regardless of cultural and other differences. This doesn’t seem to be the case here.
8. Perhaps the most important thing we learn from this news is the Future of Work is going to be very different. The same shock workers might experience as AI and robots permeate the workforce is being experienced by the Royal Family as well as many in the world who got used to the centuries-old way of doing things.

If you found this article interesting, we invite you to join us at the world’s only Future of Work Expo collocated with the ITEXPO #TechSuperShow, Feb 11-14, 2020 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

Join others with $8.5B+ in IT buying power who plan 2020 budgets! Including 3,000+ resellers!

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