Living The Dream

Multi-skilling in modern technologies is the in thing leading to blend of inter-disciplinary career choices

- PROF UJJWAL K CHOWDHURY

Just before the advent of 21st century, between 1995 and 2000, a dominant point of discussion was the Y2K bug. Also called Year 2000 bug or Millennium Bug, it referred to the problem in the coding of computerised systems around the world. The entire economy and IT research went overboard to set it right although there was no major impact. In this process a large number of related studies, careers, professions and jobs emerged.

Then came the Great Recession - the Global Financial Crisis of 2008-2009. It began with the housing market bubble, created by an overwhelming load of mortgage-backed securities that bundled high-risk loans. Reckless lending led to unprecedented numbers of loans in default. The losses led many financial institutions to fail and required huge governmental bailouts. The career impact of this crisis was two pronged - a renewed interest in financial risk analysis, actuarial sciences, financial valuation and analyst; and focus on the micro, small and medium enterprises and bootstrapping start-ups instead of seeking jobs in large or multi-national companies.

A decade later, we are facing another crisis that has far more impact - the worst pandemic in the last century. The world may face 4 to 5 per cent or more contracted economy from the current global volume of $80 trillion. Hence, the focus will be on ‘small is beautiful’, going digital, reducing costs, going local, less trans-border movements, focus on public health and education, technology-enabled services going forward, and lean and mean organisations, which depend on gig and circular economies.. Naturally, the career focus too is unique.

Healthcare