MENLO PARK, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--A new survey of over 1,100 employed US adults ages 18+, conducted online in April by Harris Poll and commissioned by IVP, a premier later-stage venture capital and growth equity firm, paints an optimistic picture of how US employees view technology in their future careers. The results of the survey were unveiled at a roundtable discussion convened by IVP in San Francisco to discuss the future of work with journalists and executives from leading companies including General Assembly, Slack, Sumo Logic, and ZipRecruiter.
“This survey indicates most American employees feel optimistic that technology will help them in their jobs in the future,” said Gina Bauman, SVP of Marketing and Investor Relations at IVP. “In particular, most US employees think technology-related skills will improve their future career prospects, and many are hungry for employers to provide training so they can use new technologies in their jobs.”
The Future of Work: The Role of Technology
The survey looked at how American employees view the role of technology in their jobs in the future - as well as what kind of technology-related skills and training would be useful to their careers. Over half of employed Americans (55%) say there will be significant technology improvements in the next five years to make them more productive in their job. And while there have been headlines about technology automation threatening jobs, only 14% of employed Americans believe their job could be done by a machine within the next five years. Finally, when it comes to artificial intelligence, the future may be now. Roughly 1 in 10 employed Americans (9%) currently use machine learning/artificial intelligence in their job.
Technology-Related Skills Most Useful to US Employees
The survey asked which technology-related skills would help improve American employees’ career potential in the next five years. Nearly one in three employed Americans think data analytics skills (32%) or user-experience and design skills (31%) would help improve their career potential in the next five years. Roughly one in five employed Americans think digital marketing skills (22%) and web development coding skills (21%) would help improve their career potential in the next five years. When it comes to who should provide this training, employers may need to start stepping up. Nearly half of employed Americans (47%) think their employer should provide training so they can use new technologies (e.g., data visualization tools, artificial intelligence, web development coding) in their job.
Key Demographic Differences
The survey looked into differences of opinion on the future of work when it came to age, gender and household income. Roughly two in five employed Americans (38%) overall think they will need ongoing education and/or training to do their job in the next five years, and nearly half (46%) of those aged 55-64 agreed with that statement. Employed American men are more likely than employed American women to think technology-related skills would help improve their career potential in the next five years (73% vs. 57%). Employed Americans with a household income (HHI) of less than $50k are less likely than those with a HHI of $75k+ to say there will be significant technology improvements in the next five years to make them more productive in their job (44% vs. 64%).
"At no point in history has technology created less opportunity, but it does rapidly change the types of work available," said Ian Siegel, CEO and Co-Founder of ZipRecruiter. "380,000 people now make their full-time living building mobile apps. That didn't exist as a job nine years ago. We need to make sure that people have the training to take advantage of the new kinds of jobs being created today."
“The results from the IVP survey reinforce the central role technology plays in how we all work, and as technology evolves will further influence the way we work,” said Shea Kelly, VP of People for Sumo Logic. “One of the ways we’re seeing this trend play out in our own backyard, is the importance and value of data and intelligence. The depth of data and information available today, coupled with the ability to synthesize that data in real-time, is enabling organizations to drive much more informed decision making, both from an operational and strategic perspective.”
“Despite what you may read in the news, this survey illustrates an interesting perception among employed individuals who believe that technology will not replace their job, but rather improve their productivity in their job," said Jake Schwartz, CEO and Co-Founder of global training company General Assembly. "The time is now for employers to empower their employees to succeed within their given career, instead of being deterred by new technologies.”
Methodology
This survey was conducted online within the United States by Harris Poll on behalf of IVP from April 25-27, 2017, among 1,189 employed U.S. adults ages 18 and older. This online survey is not based on a probability sample and therefore no estimate of theoretical sampling error can be calculated. For complete survey methodology, including weighting variables, please contact Jessica Jaffe at jessica.jaffe@sparkpr.com.
About IVP
With $5.4 billion of committed capital, IVP is one of the premier later-stage venture capital and growth equity firms in the United States. Founded in 1980, IVP has invested in over 300 companies, 106 of which have gone public. IVP is one of the top-performing firms in the industry and has a 36-year IRR of 43.2%. IVP specializes in venture growth investments, industry rollups, founder liquidity transactions, and select public market investments. IVP investments include such notable companies as AppDynamics (CSCO), Business Insider (Axel Springer), Buddy Media (CRM), Casper, Compass, Datalogix (ORCL), Domo, Dropbox, Dropcam (GOOG), Fleetmatics (FLTX), GitHub, HomeAway (AWAY), The Honest Company, Kayak (PCLN), Klarna, LegalZoom, LifeLock (LOCK), Marketo (MKTO), Mindbody (MB), MySQL (ORCL), Netflix (NFLX), Omniture (ADBE), Personal Capital, Pure Storage (PSTG), Slack, Snap (SNAP), SoFi, Supercell (SoftBank), Synchronoss (SNCR), Tanium, Twitter (TWTR), Yext (YEXT), and Zynga (ZNGA). For more information, visit www.ivp.com or follow IVP on Twitter: @ivp.
