Work Different

CHAPTER 10Sustainability Starts with People

A Future That Works

A recent Mercer study showed that if you're a U.S. resident, there's an 83.2% chance you've seen the musical Hamilton.

Okay, Mercer didn't actually do a Hamilton study—we're too busy with our Les Miz demographic deep dive—but we do know the soundtrack quite well, and one song that's always resonated with us is the closing number, “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story.”

The song's core message is: How do you want to be remembered? When the world‐at‐large examines what you've done with your life, what will their takeaway be? Will your accomplishments from today be honored in 50 years? Did you try to make the world a better place? Did you spend your precious work hours contributing to a firm that made a difference, or did you suck it up and toil away for one whose values were wildly different than your own?

Even though her hubby Alexander was all about finances, Eliza Hamilton didn't sing about this stuff with the business world in mind. But we can most definitely apply her message to the future of work, and we can even sum it up in what we believe is the perfect word: Sustainability.

In their book The Great Narrative, WEF Chairman Klaus Schwab and co‐author Thierry Malleret described sustainability as “[T]he ability to meet our own needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs.”¹ They argued that while natural, human, and social capital are essential for “…the viable development ...