This is a bit of a musing. Been at NZ Data Forum today. It’s been great, as someone who works in a NFP, listening to corporates always gives me insights that I can’t get in my tiny bubble.
One speaker in particular caused this musing, but it is something that has been in my mind for ages. The speaker was talking about leveraging sensor data on the busses to work out the most optimal route for *between* routes. Basically they analyze the hell out of the bus when it is on a route, but where the company loses money is getting the bus from the end of one route to the beginning of the next.. Or how to get the bus to the beginning of the route.
The company utilized all the same sensors (GPS, etc) to work out in real time that certain drivers were talking the busses to a further depot at lunch time than necessary. They were proud because in real time they could now radio the bus and stop the driver.
I asked whether they had considered the added productivity of allowing a driver to go to lunch with their friends. This had not occurred to them at all.
I bet it has. There is already talk of self driving busses. I bet this data is what they will use to justify getting the self driving busses. Self driving busses don’t have drivers with friends to go have lunch.
The world is at a weird precarious stage but it’s not anything we haven’t looked at before. I mean I would imagine that when the printing press was launched a heck of a lot of scribes got fired.
I also don’t have any kind of solution. I’m a techy… I’m super excited about new tech and also I feel sad that the world is increasingly becoming harder for the unskilled worker.
I’m trying to train my own children to have an innovative mindset, not about training for a job.
Would love your thoughts on this.
Vivian Chandra 