What will you do if a robot has taken over your job?

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This is an interesting thought. There is a high possibility that robot can easily take over people job. I'm a software developer. I've built different applications and I know for the fact that one of the application that I built took away the job of more than 50 people. The team was doing so many manual tasks and I built an application to automate the manual efforts by the team. After the successful deployment of the application, nearly 100 associates who were doing the manual thing were either moved to a different role or they where asked to look for a different job. This is nothing new and recently we have been seeing many lay offs happening in many MNC companies all over the world. The companies are currently focusing more on recruiting people with specific skills instead of experience. 

There are few things that someone can do to overcome a situation where a Robot takes away their job. 

Keep yourselves updated

I have seen many people inside my company struggling to adapt to new technologies. The world is moving so fast. There are new technologies emerging everywhere and the top companies have already started utilizing it. In order to be of value in the market both the companies as well as the associates in the company should always be updated and ready to take up new challenges and adapt to the changes. For example Blockchain technology is something that is emerging now and only few companies have got their hands on it. Some of my team mates in my company don't even know what it is all about. Last week there was a serious debate going on about whether Bitcoin is a scam or not. I felt pity for their ignorance and stayed away from the conversation. 

Self analysis

Every individual who is working today should definitely do a self analysis to understand how the team is progressing and what will be their road map. Suddenly when management takes a decision to shut down the team because their contributions were already taken care by Robots, it should not be a big surprise for them. It is important to do a self analysis about their skills to know if they will be able to survive the market if at all they are sent out by the company. People with good skills can survive any change in the organization. But it is definitely the individual's responsibility to acquire the right skill. If you are good in a skill that is not in the current trend then it will not add any value to the job that you are doing. A person who is expert in SQL programming will not add any value to a company that already stopped using SQL programming and moved to No SQL solutions. 

I actually did a self analysis. Not just for me but for my team as well. I manage a development team in my company and the amount of user stories that we have been developing are reducing gradually. In order to understand if my job and my team member's job are intact, I did a self analysis with the stake holders to understand how long the project with go. I identified that we still have a road map for nearly 2 years and we will be able to drag the project even  beyond that if I do some innovation in the product. I feel every individual should do this self analysis to know their stands and to be clear on how safe they are with their current job. 

Become someone who create Robots

Many companies have started a something called Robotic Process Automation (RPA) where they identify the pain areas in the process and they automate it with the help of RPA tools. This is happening everywhere and people have started losing their jobs because many manual processes are becoming automated. There is no wonder that automation is going to be the future and we have to understand the importance of it. It can be a physical Robot that will automate things or it will be a virtual Robotic application that will make the tasks easier for us. If you are someone who is capable of creating such Robots, then you will definitely have a great future and you need not worry about you job for the next few years. 

I can confidently say that I will be able to survive in the market even if my current job is replaced by a Robot (Which cannot be by the way). I spend a lot of time even today in updating my skills. Even if the IT industry is going to fail me, I'll be able to take up any non IT sector and do a living. 

Being the best person in your job

In another perspective, even though you belong to a team which is currently doing lots of manual things and you soon expect your job to be replaced by Robots. I would still say that you be the best person in what you are doing. Ignore the fact that Robots will take away your job. If you are skillful and you are good in what you are doing, there will definitely be a place for you wherever you go. Of course you should also be someone who is ready to adapt easily to changes. For a flight it may be good to run in a runway instead of just simply standing there. But a flight is not designed to simply run in the runway. It should soon hit the skies and fly to reach the destination. 

If a company decides that they have to send 10 out of 20 people home because the job is likely to be replaced by robots, if you are the best person in the job that you are doing, then you will definitely be considered to be among the 10. But that becomes an alarm for you. Based on this experience you can do a self analysis and look forward to update your skills. 

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