What does your future of work look like?
It's 2034. Has your office completely changed in design? Is your office still there? Are you now managing a team of Boston Dynamic's Robots remotely? Perhaps you now hold 3 positions across 3 continents?
Imaginations aside, our working world is changing.
McKinsey recently forecasted that by 2030, over 100 million workers across eight economies will have to switch positions.
The World Economic Forum's 2024 white paper on digital jobs reiterated this future, stating that between 2024 and 2030 we can expect to see a shift towards the global digitisation of existing jobs by nearly 30%.
Whatever it is, the future of work is fascinating. With change comes opportunity, and we recently caught up with a few of our favourite founders from South Africa already benefiting from opportunities within the future of work.
Murray Clark | Founder & CEO of Neighbourgood
In a sentence, what does Neighbourgood do?
- Neighbourgood offers an all-city passport to living, working spaces and experiences in the world's best lifestyle cities.
Why did you decide to start Neighbourgood?
- Neighbourgood is the evolution of where we would like to see the built environment going. It encompasses a series of values that are important to us as founders which include treating people with kindness, warmth and neighbourly love that makes people feel at home wherever they are. Our all-city product offering means that customers have access to multiple buildings and experiences across the city, rather than just a home or a workspace as well as a community of people who share a common value system. Our mission is to bring GOOD to neighbourhoods and to leave people better than we find them. That's something worth getting up for every day!
What’s been the hardest part of growing Neighbourgood?
- We are a highly operational business so the transition from confirming we have a great product to building a phenomenal team to run it, and constantly managing the consistency of a brand has been what I would say our biggest challenge. People and process.
What are the most significant unsolved problems you observe in The Future of Work, and how is Neighbourgood positioned to address these challenges?
- Cost for freelancers, entrepreneurs and small businesses is an inhibitor. Rent in workspace (of any sort) is high so we wanted to reduce the barrier to entry entirely through the introduction. of our workclub which brings the cost down per active user of our spaces to R990 per month. The membership then gives you access to all of our workclubs city-wide, with free coffee, 24 hours a day at a price that is one-third of our closest competitors.
What’s one other trend you’re seeing, or prediction you have, for The Future of Work this year?
- I see a lot of larger American, and European companies outsourcing their back-end functions to countries like SA, the Philippines and others to help reduce costs. To use property management and hospitality as an example, the entire administrative, sales and reservations function can be run from Cape Town at a significantly lower cost than that of our US counterparts. US Salaries are significantly higher than in countries like SA and we are seeing large companies more and more look to drive remote solutions to core functions that will help employment in countries like SA and others that are quick to pick up on the opportunity.
Rose Elcock| Founder of Pulse
In a sentence, what does Pulse do?
- Our tagline is "tracking your company’s heartbeat," which in a nutshell refers to providing insights into how everybody is doing in your business.
Why did you decide to start Pulse?
- I used to run performance management sessions the way I was taught in university. These sessions were not fulfilling, often confusing people on how they were performing in the eyes of their managers. So I turned the system around, where employees get to say what they are enjoying and what is challenging one week at a time, and the manager offers guidance on their reflections. No more OKRs or KPIs are needed to assess individuals' performance. The biggest win.
What’s been the hardest part of growing Pulse?
- Coming up with the right messaging to position the tool. Pulse is a new way to look at performance management systems, and it has many benefits. Selecting the right wording so that it resonates with my target audience has been an interesting journey. Keeping the language simple and showcasing applied business cases to demonstrate the power of the tool has been the biggest hit.
What are the most significant unsolved problems you observe in The Future of Workspace, and how is Pulse positioned to address these challenges?
- Employment, as we know it, is rapidly changing. We see this with the rise of the gig economy, remote working, and flexible policies to attract talent. How we stay in tune with people in our businesses has to adapt to meet the demands of this changing landscape, and I believe Pulse is the right tool for team members to stay aligned and produce meaningful work.
What’s one other trend you’re seeing, or prediction you have, for The Future of Work?
- I see movements becoming more relevant. For example, in my industry, there are global conferences where HR members from different countries and companies gather to hear the latest trends in the industry. This changes the way we think: our mission is not bound to what a company wants to achieve but rather how we evolve the field as a group of people interested in the same subject. I see more of this happening in the future of work, where we gather to collaborate and think globally about the subjects that matter the most to us.
Tayla Dandridge| Co-Founder & CEO of stub
In a sentence, what does stub do?
- We're building an Accounting & Insights platform for micro businesses and entrepreneurs in Africa.
Why did you decide to start stub?
- We are passionate about entrepreneurs in Africa, seeing them succeed and understanding the impact that their success has on our economy. Alongside that, as a founding team we've spent a lot of time either building businesses or working with small businesses, and there was a shared sentiment that the tools available to entrepreneurs needed to be simplified, enhanced and made more accessible to all.
What’s been the hardest part of growing stub?
- I'm not too sure yet. We're only just getting started so give me 6 months and I'm sure I would have formed a solid opinion on this one.
What are the most significant unsolved problems you observe in The Future of Workspace, and how is stub positioned to address these challenges?
- There are lots of problems in this space that we don't necessarily touch but I think an exciting opportunity for us is the increase in gig workers, side hustlers and entrepreneurs coming on line. They require tools to support the growth & operations of their business, and have previously never been exposed to operating digitally. stub, in the way we design, build and roll out our product is positioned really well to help these entrepreneurs start, grow and thrive.
What’s one other trend you’re seeing, or prediction you have, for The Future of Work?
- Remote work in the digital work force has created great opportunities for contract, freelance and part time workers to provide services cross-border. I think this trend will continue to increase over time allowing more local entrepreneurs to seek opportunities working for overseas companies, diversifying their income streams and allowing them to compete in the global market.
Chris Bruchhausen| Co-Founder & CEO of Strove
In a sentence, what does Strove do?
- Strove is a platform focused on empowering companies to improve their employees' physical and mental well-being.
Why did you decide to start Strove?
- I wanted to build something that I knew would have a truly meaningful and positive impact on people's lives.
What’s been the hardest part of growing Strove?
- Too many things come to mind and there probably won't be enough space to list them all out ;)
What are the most significant unsolved problems you observe in The Future of Workspace, and how is Strove positioned to address these challenges?
- Stress, burnout and feelings of isolation (particularly in hybrid and remote-only work settings) still persist in a meaningful way. We aim to help companies alleviate these issues by providing employees with a platform that promotes healthy lifestyle behaviour and fosters social connections.
What’s one other trend you’re seeing, or prediction you have, for The Future of Work?
- Companies are placing increasingly more emphasis on ensuring they have a robust employee value proposition that demonstrates to both existing and prospective employees that their company has employee health and well-being top of mind.
At Rafiki, we believe the killer-teams of tomorrow will integrate in-house talent with fractional freelancers on a granular, skill-specific basis, empowering companies to move quickly, efficiently scaling resources up or down as and when required to drive growth. Our goal is to streamline the use of time, money, and human capital across the freelance economy.
Our flexible approach to working with teams by integrating fractional talent into in-house teams, or building from the ground up, saves time, money, and derisks operations substantially. Brand design, custom Webflow development, and growth marketing specialists.
Book your intro call with Rafiki today.
Original article here.
