The Most In-Demand Services of 2050
This article was originally published on ScoreNYC.
Every business leader has an eye towards the future. Having a vision for the development of your company, imbued with a keen understanding of the world it inhabits, is consistently invoked by experts as a crucial aspect of leadership, and for good reason. Without an idea of where you’re headed, you’re not going anywhere. So, if you’re an entrepreneur playing the long game, you’d do well to look into one of these growth-ready fields. The future of humankind may well depend on it.
Predicting the future with 100% accuracy will never be possible, so be sure to take any prognostication with a grain of salt. However, from a close look at the trends that are coming to define today’s world, it’s no big leap to see that these fields will see the greatest rise in influence, monetary and otherwise, between today and the year 2050.
Data Analysis
We already look to big data to inform major choices in politics, entertainment, and medicine, so as collection techniques are refined over the years we can certainly expect ever more demand for cutting edge analysis to find the most beneficial needles in our globe-sized haystack. The analysts of the future will likely be charged with finding ways to fight epidemics, build new cities, even end world hunger. No matter what the future implementations may be, businesses, governments, and nonprofits alike will be in the market for high-quality data, and analysts that can make sense of it all promise to be the high-tech oracles of 2050.
Info Security
If you think the information security field is heating up now, just wait until we live in a world where nearly everything we see and touch has some level of Internet connectivity. We’re not quite there yet, but in 2050 our data is likely to be considered an inextricable part of ourselves, subject to all the same rights and privileges that we enjoy as citizens. This means information security will be no different than personal safety, akin to looking both ways before crossing the street. Data defenders will be the safeguard for all that we hold dear, so expect this field to be in huge demand in the coming decades.
Medicine and Eldercare
As medicine has improved throughout the years, average life expectancy has grown to previously unthinkable heights and continues to rise across most demographics. By the middle of the 21st century, chances are that living past 120 years will be the rule rather than a curiosity. For this ever-growing cohort, a well-trained workforce of eldercare specialists will be a necessity, a phenomenon we’re already witnessing in its early stages. For as long as medical progress happens, this will be a need that can only be filled by skilled professionals, and every healthcare business ought to prepare for this future.
Genetic Engineering
So far we’ve only discussed already-prominent fields that are primed to explode in the next few decades, but some of the most momentous future developments are only in their nascent stages at the moment. One such area is genetic engineering, once a science fiction dream that’s become reality since CRISPR gene editing technology was proven usable in human cells in 2013. The potential ethical quandaries of meddling with the human genome are plentiful, and those who know this technology best will have the most influential voices in the future debate. Today’s beginning gene scientist may well be the thought leader of the future, one whose voice will help determine the future of humanity as we know it. For an in-demand service, it doesn’t get much bigger than that.
