Affiliation:
Department of H.S.S., & School of Business
Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, India
Short bio:
Nachiketa Tripathi received his doctorate in Social Psychology from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur and is presently working at the Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati as a Professor of Psychology and Management. He has nearly 30 years of teaching and research experience and has published his research work in reputed journals. Additionally, he has presented his research at several international conferences, including the APA convention, ICP, ICAP, and ECP. Prof. Tripathi has supervised several doctoral dissertations and also supervised master’s and undergraduate dissertations. He serves on the selection committee for faculty positions at several IITs. Furthermore, he is an associate editor of the Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal (published by Springer US) and serves on the editorial board of Psychological Studies and the South Asian Journal of HRM (Sage). Prof. Tripathi is also the President of the National Academy of Psychology (India).
Title:
The Future of Work: Trends, Challenges, and Leadership Perspectives in a Changing Global Economy
Abstract:
A decade of rising populism and receding trust in social, political, and psychological institutions have led to new trends in the global economy and society. Continuous technological disruptions and globalization have made the future of work arrive faster. This future is accelerated by the rise of the digital economy and digital behaviors such as remote working and learning, occupational transitions and gig work, income polarizations, and worker health and safety. Moreover, amplification of disinformation and misinformation through media and the recent rise of ‘my country first’ in global politics can potentially impact long-term choices for the economy and society. These potential impacts span a variety of areas, including perspectives on efficiency compared to resilience, the direction capitalism is heading, the concentration of business activities and residential life, strategies for industry, our methods for addressing universal challenges that necessitate worldwide and united efforts—like pandemic and climate change—and the function of governmental bodies and organizations. Over two decades, extensive and advanced economies have generally shifted responsibility from institutions to individuals, and there is a potential for a long-term shift in how institutions today support people. From within a psychological tradition, an exploration of prefiguring new forms of organizing work results in growing research on moral disengagement and the dark triad (psychopathology, Machiavellism, narcissism) at one end and the bright triad (ethical mindedness, kindness, and compassion) of leadership behavior at the other. Therefore, we engage in a perspective-taking process of conceptualizing a world from another person’s point of view. This process can generate affective states through interpersonal interactions such as “empathic concern” for different perspectives—feelings of compassion and care in difficult circumstances—as well as cognitive and social reactions reflecting judgments of and adjustments to other perspectives. Perspectivetaking is a more cognitive, goal-directed intellectual process, empathy is an emotional response that affectively connects people, making helping more likely. A perspective that considers both between-person and within-person aspects of leadership informs a continuum of the dark triad and bright triad of leadership behaviors. However, we do not take a dark triad ‘bad’ vs. bright triad ‘good’ approach to this keynote address; instead, we respond to the usefulness and perceptions of both triads in the leaders and their followers, together with implications for the organization and society at large. The address aims to leverage collaborations across ethics, social psychology, economics, and entrepreneurship into the future of business and how it can and should work at its best.