I’m not that old, but as an “elder millenial” I am, at times, nostalgic for the simpler, slower times before smartphones happened and our relationship with technology changed so dramatically (for better and worse).
I grew up in Nova Scotia in the 80s and 90s, many of those years without cable TV. I remember my parents renting a VCR from Video Difference for my sister’s 10th birthday so we could watch a movie. It was a big deal.
When I was 9 I asked my parents for a computer for Christmas. I loved reading (and still do) and wanted to be a writer when I grew up and so, obviously, I needed a computer. I did not get a computer. I did, however, get a very old Underwood Typewriter which, while missing the mark entirely for 9-year-old me, is, in retrospect, actually quite charming and thoughtful in its own way.
At any rate, we did eventually get a second-hand Tandy 2000 which I thought was amazing. It required a giant floppy disk to run anything and another one to run a program. We had a writing program and a Jeopardy game (it was so hard!). It wasn’t until junior high that we got our first “modern” computer and dial-up internet started becoming available. We were the teenagers who used ICQ and then MSN messenger, livejournal, MySpace, and so forth. We still spent most of our time doing things in real life (sports, band practice, part-time jobs, hanging out at the mall, etc), we passed handwritten notes in class, watched MuchMusic (and Street Cents, obviously), and called people on landline phones.
Technology has fundamentally changed the university experience over the last several decades. I distinctly remember how difficult it was to check emails and sign up for my university classes in the early 2000s. I had to book a computer at the local library to access the internet to do this and it was painfully slow.
The 2001 university experience looked a lot different than it does today but when is the last time you really thought about it? Personally, it’s been a while since I’ve thought about how much more friction and effort was required to do basically anything back then and how much faster and easier a lot of things are now.
Forget about smartphones – most people didn’t have a cell phone, period. I went to the computer lab to check my email. I wrote papers by hand before typing and printing them (again, in the computer lab). Then I physically dropped them into my professor’s mailbox outside their office.
If I needed a research article, I went to the library, searched the catalogue, found the journal in the stacks, and either read it there or photocopied the pages I needed. Occasionally, it was actually hard to find an article because somebody else was using the only copy. And, every citation had to be typed manually. My version of Zoterro was a shoebox full of index cards with handwritten citations and notes about each reference.
Looking back, it is amazing how much time these routine tasks required. Today, many of those same tasks take seconds. We can search thousands of articles instantly. Reference managers organize our citations (thank goodness!). We collaborate online with colleagues around the world. AI can now summarize information, organize ideas, create rubrics, and answer questions almost as quickly as we ask it to. The productivity gains we have achieved through technology are remarkable.
So why do so many knowledge workers feel busier than ever?
This is the question I keep coming back to.
If technology has made us so much more efficient, why does it feel like we have less time instead of more?
I think it is because technology has changed the nature of work. Yes, many tasks that once took hours now take minutes. At the same time, technology has created entirely new work and more of it. We answer more emails because people can write more emails faster. We attend more meetings because virtual meetings are easy to schedule. We are constantly learning new software, new systems, and now, new AI tools. Peer review (generally speaking) is a hot mess because the volume of submissions keeps increasing while the pool of potential reviewers has not.
The pace of change has accelerated much faster than most of us can realistically adapt to it. As knowledge workers, we are surrounded by an endless firehose of information, decisions, tools, and opportunities. Collaboration, thoughtful scholarship, and teaching and learning take time, mental energy, and patience. Those are all limited resources.
In theory, the time we save through technology should give us more time for deep thinking, creativity, family, rest, and meaningful work. But does it? Imagine comparing a week of work in 2001 versus a week of work now. How much more work are we doing now? (A lot) And why haven’t we banked the time savings of increased productivity and given everyone a 4-day work week (or less)?
More importantly, where exactly are we headed? Just because we can do something doesn’t mean we should. Instead of thinking of technology as a way to replace as much human labour as possible, I’m interested in exploring how we can redesign work and life in ways that help people contribute in meaningful ways to society and live a good life.
I’m interested to know, what’s one thing that would make your work or life better by not having to do it?
Emily Read, PhD, RN 