Work is changing quickly. The way we talk about it isn't
What's actually changing in the corporate world, and what it means for you
A lot of what we’re being told about work right now doesn’t hold up under scrutiny - particularly when it comes to corporate and white collar work.
We’ve reduced complex, structural changes to simple and often heated debates that are easy to argue about, but harder to act on. Office versus home; AI versus job security; flexibility versus productivity.
These are important conversations, but they’re also incomplete. Right now they tend to focus on what’s visible (the impact on individuals), while the underlying mechanics stay largely unexamined.
Meanwhile, people are trying to make real decisions about their careers based on incomplete information and the debates they’re hearing in the public domain.
The problem is not where you work
The work from home debate is a good example.
We’ve framed it as a question of location, as if performance is determined by whether someone is sitting at a desk in an office or at a table at home. This is simply not the case.
We don’t all work the same way, or need the same conditions to do our best work. Some people, like me, need quiet and stillness; others need collaboration and energy. Most need a mix that changes depending on the work they’re doing.
For a lot of organisations, the push back to the office has been framed about collaboration and performance, but there are also underlying concerns about visibility and control. It’s also about what leaders feel comfortable managing.
That’s a different conversation about trust, and whether employers have trust in their employees to do the right thing. And going one layer deeper - if employers don’t trust their employees to do the right thing, why are they hiring them in the first place and then retaining them in the workforce, rather than managing their performance?
Until that’s addressed, changing location won’t fix anything.
The AI conversation is running ahead of reality
At the same time, we’re being told that AI is about to fundamentally reshape the workforce. I believe it will, over time.
We’re already seeing tech companies like Oracle and Amazon laying staff off, and blaming AI for it. However, there’s a real question around what’s really driving those layoffs. Are the roles really being replaced like-for-like by AI, or are companies taking the opportunity to cut costs and redirect that budget into speculative AI investments, in the hope they pay off?
While it’s difficult to make any sweeping statements on this, the evidence suggests that the gap between what AI is promising and what’s actually working inside organisations is still pretty significant.
Most companies are still figuring out how to use AI properly, and the vast majority of AI pilot projects are failing. The workflows aren’t fully there, and the outputs still rely heavily on human judgement. In other words, they’re just not scaling into something usable.
Yet we’re already seeing decisions being made as if the capability is mature, with little to no public accountability for those decisions, which impact numerous lives. Not only in terms of those who have lost their jobs, but also the remaining team members who have to take on more work to pick up the slack, because AI isn’t capable of operating at the level of the worker who has been replaced.
Meanwhile, work might get faster, at least temporarily, but it doesn’t necessarily get better. The company loses capability and context gets lost. Shareholders might be happy with the numbers presented at the next quarterly update, but I don’t think they’re going to like the longer-term story.
Flexibility has been reduced to a policy tweak
We also need to continue the conversation around flexible work.
Several years ago, we were talking about how work was going to evolve to fit around people’s lives. Flexibility was meant to open up access for people who couldn’t operate within rigid, office-based structures.
In many organisations, it’s been reduced to a single day at home - if at option is even offered at all.
For people with caring responsibilities, for people managing complex lives or disabilities, or for people whose energy and focus don’t follow a standard pattern, that gap determines whether work is sustainable or not.
Individuals shouldn’t have to solve structural issues
A lot of this gets pushed back onto individuals to solve. We’re told to work it out ourselves, adapt faster or find something else to pay the bills.
However, many of the tensions people are feeling are not personal failings. And when so many people are feeling it at once, it’s reasonable to conclude this is the result of systems that have not kept up with how people actually live and work.
The friction often becomes visible at particular moments and life stages:
When children start school and the structure of the day no longer aligns with corporate roles.
When flexibility becomes something you have to negotiate rather than something built into the design of work.
When there’s significant change ahead in the workforce, but no one is telling you what’s really likely to happen.
People feel like they’re struggling to keep up, when in reality they are operating inside systems that weren’t really built for them.
Why I’m launching Track Changes On
I spent years in senior corporate roles. I left to start my own consulting business, because the reality of corporate life no longer worked for me. With some distance, I’ve had an opportunity to look at what’s going in in that world with an impartial eye, and I can see there are some very deep flaws in what we’re being told and how we’re expected to operate.
I also work with a number of corporate clients on projects involving brand, change, AI adoption and culture, so I’m exposed to these discussions every day. I think a lot about how organisations communicate, how they adopt new technologies and how they structure work.
I know from first-hand experience there is often a gap between the narrative and the reality, and that it’s employees who are likely to suffer most because of that gap. This is why I’m going to try to fill in some of the blanks.
I’m building a place to go deeper on what’s happening at work and what it means for you. That includes:
How AI is being used in practice, not just what’s being promised.
How corporate structures are changing, and where we need more visibility and accountability.
What flexibility actually looks like inside organisations.
What to pay attention to if you’re starting to question your own path inside the corporate world.
Ultimately I want to help you make sense of the environment you’re operating in, so you can make better decisions as you navigate it.
If you’re starting to question things
If you’re starting to feel like there’s a gap between what you’re experiencing and what you’re being told, that’s probably not your imagination. You may also be feeling like corporate work no longer fits the shape of your life. You’re definitely not alone there.
If you’re trying to work out whether to stay, change roles, or do something else entirely, we should find strength in numbers. Many are walking the same path as you right now, and many have gone before you. I was one of them.
In my experience, most people don’t talk about what they’re feeling that openly. We tend to sit with our dissatisfaction, or make moves behind the scenes. I think it’s time we have more frank and open discussions about what’s really going on in corporate life, and what people are feeling right now.
Track Changes On is here to host those conversations. Subscribe to join the discussion and support my work.