Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal use, posting to other lists, or for classroom use is hereby granted provided that copies include this notice. Since the late 1980s, three workplace trends have emerged in the United States that are already having a profound impact on American workers. The social contract that promised job security in exchange for employee loyalty has been broken.
American companies continue to downsize, restructure, and lay off thousands of workers.
New technology is making it possible to perform many jobs anywhere. These teams have no traditional boss or supervisor. Team members take on responsibility for planning, organizing, staffing, scheduling, directing, monitoring, and controlling their own work. Perhaps more importantly, these teams are increasingly linked, via global networks or just the internet, with instantaneous and unrestricted flow of information within and between teams and team members. These trends have enormous social, economic, and political implications.