STAYING RELEVANT

[...]HR has the opportunity to step into the vacuum to start anticipating and preparing for inevitable surprises. [...]many in Silicon Valley in particular argue for some form of automation tax to fund the provision of unconditional basic incomes (UBI) and services (UBS) across society. For HR, this could mean: *Taking the lead role in modelling alternative future workforce strategies. *Educating the workforce on the importance of taking control of their own earning capacity. *Assessing the potential business impact of automation taxes based on different workforce scenarios. *Providing support to help displaced workers access new skills and jobs. *Lobbying governments to conduct early pilots of alternate UBI/UBS models to avoid being caught flat-footed when technological unemployment starts increasing. 3. [...]HR could: * Provide access to simple online platforms for business creation, marketing, networking, financial management, invoicing, accounting and tax submission - enabling founders to focus on the development of their business. * Encourage and support staff to spin out innovation initiatives from within the firm as separate businesses - possibly with financial support. * Provide an incubator space and mentoring support for employees to work up new ideas in their spare time prior to starting out on their own. * Create regular showcases to enable past employees to present their business offerings to potential customers. * Commit to buying a certain amount of goods and services from firms run or managed by past employees. * Providing a panel of executives who could act as ongoing advisers to start-ups for their first few years in business. * Provide crowdsourcing platforms where past employees could trade ideas, requirements and opportunities with each other. * Provide new ventures with a blockchain-based smart contract service so that contract creation and execution can be fully automated against standard rules. 4.