Over the course of a career in cases involving injury, I took a tremendous number of depositions (an interactive question and answer, on the record, to preserve testimony). A great many of those were to memorialize the testimony of injured workers. Some were college-educated, and some were not high school graduates. Some had intriguing and interesting stories to tell and others were more mundane.
From some unknown source, I picked up the habit of asking whether the injured worker had education. And there were inevitably the questions about whether she/he could "read, write, and make change." Those were vocational questions that one might expect to potentially become relevant as an injury proceeded through the processes of remediation and amelioration.
If the medical care did not restore full function, there was always the potential that the worker would be unable to return to her/his previous employment. In that event, it might be relevant that the worker sought alternative employment, and thus work history, skills, education, and more were of potential relevance. In the years since I have read a few depositions and know that some lawyers delve deeper into these topics than others.
Read. Can't everyone read? What a question. I found in my practice a fair few could not. They were people in their late 50s and early 60s, and thus in the 1990s that put their dates of birth in the late 1920s, or the 1930s. They testified that they had quit school to work on a farm, to earn a living.
Many had managed to operate extremely complex systems and equipment. They had created and maintained manufacturing processes and equipment. They were bright and often intelligent. But, I met several who could not read beyond the rudimentaries of their own name and various businesses or necessities that they needed to access.
Write. Many of the same answers. Some could write their name, write a check, or sign a birthday card. But some testified that they could not write a letter or otherwise engage in significant written communication.
These two flabbergasted me. I had grown up in a world that involved kids staying in school. I was blessed to be in communities that valued education and fostered performance. That is not to say that all of my schoolmates made good on the opportunities. But for the most part, there was a spirit of completing school in my generation. As a lawyer, I struggled to understand the testimony of these workers who were well-compensated, bright, and yet unable to effectively read or write.
Make change? I may have met someone at some point who denied she/he could do this. However, I do not recall a single one. Regardless of other skills an injured worker might be missing, I recall them all scoffing at, taking offense at times at, the question about making change. Everyone was able to tell if their change was correctly dispensed to them. If it was not unanimity, it was sure close.
This blog has repeatedly explored the evolution of our workplaces. There is a good chance that jobs will change as a result of artificial intelligence, see Intelligence (November 2022). Robots, droids, and more are going to impact the physical requirements of work in various regards, see Strong Back Days are History (February 2017). The fact is that technology is changing the workplace, in some ways it is an evolution and in others, it is a revolution.
So, I found myself in a retail establishment and for whatever reason I did not have my card handy. Everyone these days has a card, whether debit or credit. They are ubiquitous. I am old enough to remember when credit cards were a novelty in the 1970s and people would often express some surprise when they saw one. In the 1980s, debit cards appeared. I still recall a finance professor at Ball State telling us that checkbooks would become obsolete.
He was so out of touch and ancient. We made fun of him after class. What did that antique know? I reflect today and can still remember his face. I cannot recall his name. We thought he was absolutely daft. No checkbooks? Today, when I lecture business law, I have to put up a slideshow picture of a check so that the whole class knows what we are discussing. Obsolete? pretty close. I wish I could apologize to that professor.
I wonder what he would have said about cyber-currency, Venmo, Apple Pay, and the raft of similar methods for passing value from person to person. Think about your life today, how often does currency actually change hands?
Without my card, I was forced to hand the clerk a $20.00 for my $8.22 purchase. The clerk pushed a finger about on a touchscreen and the readout clearly said $11.78. The clerk pulled a $5.00 from the drawer and began counting ones. When the clerk had $8.00 counted out, there was a pause and reconsideration. The money was carefully replaced in the drawer and the process was restarted.
This time, two fives were pulled and then a pause. A single was added, and I thought we were gaining momentum. Then a dime, I was surprised. The dime was dropped back in the drawer and instead, a nickel was picked up. I was a bit worried. The nickel was dropped back and two quarters were picked up. I was wondering if I was being punked.
The clerk looked up from the process, somewhat plaintively, and simply asked "what is 78." I replied "Three of the quarters and three of the pennies." The clerk held up the two quarters, "these?" "Yes, three of those and three of the orangish/reddish ones on the other end there." I got my change and departed. It was a bit surreal.
However, I noticed something else. The quarters were brilliantly silver, and the pennies were likewise new. I wondered as I climbed into the car whether the clerk did not know how to make change, or simply never has to. Handing a customer change used to be a regular and repetitive part of my role in service and retail. It was what we did. But, with the new age of payment options, perhaps this is no longer a relevant skill.
Perhaps there is simply no relevance to the age-old question "can you make change." Or, this person's life experiences did not provide the foundation for this skill despite its potential need. I wonder if I could have gotten away with an extra quarter?
What are the necessary skills of today? What will they be tomorrow? Where are we headed as a workforce, and how can we prepare ourselves. If a skill is generally obsolete, does that mean that not all employees need to possess it? If so, does it mean that someone on staff should nonetheless be able to perform it, just in case the customer who is always right turns out to be wrong?
