#1643 - We ALL Complain But…

The age of automation has arrived, and with it comes a mix of convenience, innovation, and a touch of apprehension about the future of our jobs. In this episode, Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros discuss that we are now in a world where algorithms can outperform humans in various tasks, and the workforce is transforming significantly. The rise of automation is a wave that can be ridden with the right mindset and strategies. By being aware of the changes, embracing them, and continuously improving our skill sets, we can create a future that is not only secure but also fulfilling.

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Show notes:
(1:56) Use the complaining to improve
(4:29) The importance of awareness
(7:29) Industrial automation
(9:46) Statistically speaking
(12:51) Meet like-minded people and jumpstart your journey to achieving your dreams while optimizing your life. Join Next Level Group Coaching.
https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/group-coaching/
(14:34) Technology, jobs, and adapting to change
(16:45) Know the future and understand the future
(19:59) Getting left behind: Frustration to fascination to transformation
(24:06) Two types of complaining
(27:45) Outro

🎙️ Hosted by Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

Next Level University is a top-ranked daily podcast for dream chasers and self-improvement lovers. With over 2,100 episodes, we help you level up in life, love, health, and wealth one day at a time. Subscribe for real, honest, no-fluff growth every single day.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:00

Next level nation . Welcome back to another episode of next level university , where we help you level up your life , your love , your Health and your wealth . We hope you enjoyed yesterday's episode , episode number 1642 . It was freestyle Friday . We did a deep Identity dive is what we did yesterday . We were , we went deep yesterday . Today for episode number 1643 .

Speaker 1 0:25

We all complain , but I Am not at the stage in my life where I don't complain about things . Will I ever get to that place ? I don't know . I don't even know if that's a place I aspire to get to . I know it sounds really good where you know if you don't complain , your life completely changes and all that I'm sure it does . I definitely complain far less than I have in the past , but I try to . If I'm complaining about something I can change , use the complaining to help me change something right . If I'm gonna complain about something that I can change , I can also put my energy into actually changing it .

Speaker 1 0:59

But the reason I wanted to do this episode is because I saw something recently and it made me sad that's probably the best way to put it because I Definitely have dealt with it in the past . I definitely would be in this bucket of experience in the past , but I also know it was really hurting me and it would have really hurt me . So I saw a post the other day or or something , on Instagram or whatever platform I was on . That was all about how so many stores are doing self-checkout . Now , every store you go into they kind of have their own self-checkout Whole Foods just put one in recently , the one we go to , target , all of them , they all have their , their kind of their own self-checkout , and there were so many people in the comments saying this is Terrible and how dare they do this and they're stealing people's jobs and and all that stuff . And I have never lost my job due to Automation and due to technology .

Speaker 1 1:57

So I don't , I can't . I can't claim to know what that feels like , but here's where it gets a little muddy . Unfortunately , oftentimes , the people that are complaining about that are also the people who are not focusing on how to avoid Getting left behind because of the thing they're complaining about . And I know I used to . I used to think that way for sure . I used to feel like , well , this thing is terrible and it's affecting all these people , and then , unfortunately , if I didn't do anything about my own circumstances , it probably would have ended up affecting me at some point . It's just this weird thing where it's hard to understand why something is happening if you don't know the thing above it or the thing below it . So the reason it's happening is because technology is speeding up and now it's more Cost-efficient for a store to put in a self-checkout than it is to have someone there . That's , that's a piece of it .

Speaker 1 2:58

But that also means , depending on what your job is , that might be coming for you too . If you're somebody who assemble stuff , technology and robots are probably coming for for you in some way , shape or form . I just don't want you to get Smashed over the head with that awareness . That's really why I wanted to do this episode . I don't want this to be from a judgmental Whatever . I don't want it to be that . I want it to be more from an awareness place of there's a lot of people who know where the future is going , but they don't usually communicate it to everyone . Yeah , unfortunately it's . It's almost like the people who know where the future is going don't really communicate it to the people who get affected most by where the future is going . Yep , and again , alan , you can speak at a higher level than I because you understand AI and you have worked around it . You know it better than I do . But that's really why I wanted to do this episode .

Speaker 1 3:54

I was someone who I worked with my hands . I All the jobs I worked at . I was easily replaceable and if I look back , a lot of the jobs that I had Might not exist . I mean , massachusetts is one of the . I Think there's only like two or three states where you have to have someone pump your gas . New Jersey is one of them . There's there's gas attendance in New Jersey .

Speaker 1 4:19

Is that always gonna be a thing ? I don't know . I have to imagine at some point everything's gonna be you pump your own gas . That wouldn't have been an opportunity for me . That would have stayed forever . So , but I also feel like I probably would have said well , they can't change that . It's not fair for them to change the laws . What am I gonna do ? I Want all the empathy I To come through in this episode . I just don't want you to get stuck , and that's ultimately when we say heart driven , nobs Heart driven . I'm afraid to talk about things like this at times because I don't . I don't want to be villainized . But I also want to make sure that I'm adding value , and sometimes that requires talking about the stuff .

Speaker 2 4:55

That kind of sucks this topic touches my heart so deeply because before Kevin and I teamed up , way back , I worked for a company called Cognix , and Cognix sold industrial automation equipment . Essentially what they sold was what's called machine vision , and machine vision is exactly what it sounds like . Imagine the eyes of a robot . So I Would go into these manufacturing facilities and just picture an ice cream company that you love . I'm not technically publicly supposed to talk about it , so I just don't . I just say picture you're the biggest ice cream company you can think of , that you love this ice cream company . You're probably landing on the one .

Speaker 2 5:34

So I was in this facility and I'll never forget it . There were these people at the end of the line that were checking the cartons To make sure . So if you're on video , I've got a PDL light here , I've got a carton in front of me and the machine vision equipment that I used to sell as a sales engineer on the road Would check that it says PDL light correctly . It would check that the cap was on properly . I also we had this 3d one that would laser scan it and make sure that you can , that it was the right dimensions and all that kind of stuff . So I would go into these manufacturing facilities and I would see these people at the end of the line and they're checking the the cartons of ice cream to make sure they're good . Okay , quality assurance , quality assurance , quality assurance , make sure every carton is is on point . You don't want to go to the grocery store and get the crushed one .

Speaker 2 6:18

And I Remember I left that day getting really sad , similar to what you described at the beginning of this episode , because I knew that I sold equipment that was taking those people's jobs , and I remember thinking like , wow , okay , and this was my thought process . Here I am . I'm in my early 20s , I Make a lot of money , I'm a top 1% earner globally , and this is back when I was in my early 20s , although that's true again , which is cool , but anyways . So I'm sitting there going . These people are Losing their jobs while I'm making a huge commission check , and that's gonna happen with me , with or without me . If it wasn't me working at Cognac , someone else is gonna work in Cognac's . I mean , that's , that's the way it works .

Speaker 2 7:02

There is a huge demand for these companies to automate , because machines don't get sick machines . You know , I used to go into these manufacturing facilities and I would see these images on the wall of the the 70s and 60s and 50s , and sometimes 80s , 90s , and you'd see that the factory had Hundreds , if not thousands , of workers . Back in the day . There was like these pictures , historical pictures on the walls . It was actually really cool , by the way to to see all these companies and all these products behind the scenes and how they're made . That's actually been really . That was a really cool part of working . There is , I would I mean , picture you go into the grocery store . I know where all those products were made . It's not all of them , but a lot of them . Very cool , connecticut has a lot of manufacturing . Who knew that was my territory ?

Speaker 2 7:48

So , anyways , I'm in Connecticut and I'm seeing this happening and I'm kind of freaking out a little bit for for people , because I know I'll be fine , because I'm a computer engineer and computer engineers are in demand . There's , there's never gonna be a shortage for a need for me . I got a message literally earlier this morning for a job they want me to be on the board of directors Paid advisory for a board of directors , and I didn't answer the message and I'm grateful for it , but I did have that moment of . Okay , that's right , that's I'm valued , I appreciate that . But my point is is that and this is the the hardest part of this the people who need the jobs most , those are the jobs that are going away . Yeah , and I don't want this to land improperly , but I do think it's important because we talk about the truth here .

Speaker 2 8:36

So , statistically speaking , the less educated population tends to have more children and tends to have children younger . Statistically speaking please don't villainize me for this , this is just the statistics and you can research it . Statistically speaking , the more educated population Tends to have less children and they tend to wait longer . So you really , and I are gonna have children , but we'll probably only have two or three and we're waiting until our 30s . So , unfortunately , we have a population of less educated people globally having more children Younger , so that population is growing faster than the than the more educated population .

Speaker 2 9:19

Now here's the problem when it comes to industrial automation and the exponential technology . Technology increases exponentially , jobs for less educated people Decrease exponentially , while the population of uneducated people increases exponentially . So I saw this huge issue in my early 20s and I started freaking out and I started going holy crap , okay , listen , it's gonna happen with or without me , but if you're not a part of the solution , you are a part of the problem , and I do believe that If you're not a part of the solution , you are a part of the problem . So I was a part of the problem . That's my truth . One of the reasons I left Cognix was because of that , and so I decided to start a company . My mid-20s naive self on okay , instead of taking jobs and making money doing that , I'm going to make money equipping people to create a bigger , better , brighter future so they can create their own jobs , and so my whole slogan was what you'll never learn in school but desperately need to know .

Speaker 1 10:23

Not a great way to do speeches in schools . That's not . It doesn't work that way .

Speaker 2 10:29

But my whole business was built on helping people retool and reskill up for lack of better phrasing for their future , and so that's what NLU does . Underneath all of the work that we do is this through line of hey , every episode you've ever listened to if you're new or you're a long-term listener , just think of whatever amount of episodes you've listened to Every single one has an undertone , it has a through line , it has a theme . It's kind of like you watch a show on Netflix and it has a through line and a theme . Not only each episode has a theme , but the whole show has a theme . So each episode for Kevin and I has a theme , but the whole show has a theme too . And the theme underneath all of this is hey , by the way , we believe in you and we believe you can build a bigger , better , better future on your own terms , and we did it , so we know you can do it too . Now , do we think you're going to be a billionaire or blah , blah , blah , I don't know , maybe , but we do know that you can retool now , you can improve yourself now for a bigger , better , better future , and we believe in you . And that's really the undertone of what I started all those years ago , and then Kevin with the Hyperconscious Podcast , and then we teamed up and so the automation , the technology , it's going to continue . It's going to continue exponentially , and I actually think that in some ways that's actually good , because when a new technology comes into the marketplace , it makes the world richer .

Speaker 2 12:00

And I can be I'll try to explain it based on a plow . So imagine , I don't want to go off the rails here . Kev , I know you're like a plow . Where are we going here ? No , no , it's good . So so imagine farming back in the day before there was plows . I don't know if the plow is a great example . Let me give them a better one . Okay , picture farming equipment . Picture like the amazing farming equipment that they now use .

Speaker 2 12:29

I remember reading this back in the early 1900s , 70 plus percent of the US workforce was for agriculture . Now it's less than 3% . Now , the bad part about that is that a lot of people lost their jobs . The good part is that those people hopefully retooled and now can go do something else and we can produce the same amount of food for less labor . And when you can produce more food for less labor , now the world goes less hungry , so to speak . Now , obviously there's politics in that and there's still countries that don't have that , and I'm not getting into any of that .

Speaker 2 13:06

But my point is is that when a new technology arises , like Zoom , it creates opportunity as well as taking away jobs . So Zoom takes away a lot of commuting and a lot of airplane tickets and a lot of that stuff . So during COVID , the airlines struggled because everyone was virtually conferencing with Zoom and Zoom went from 50 million to 500 million users overnight , basically , and so their stock price went through the roof and they did it very well and I think they have a great platform . This is StreamYard , so StreamYard does better now . But what does that take away from ?

Speaker 2 13:42

Okay , so you and I used to commute , we used to use gas , so oil companies . We used to use cars , so car companies . So every new technology takes away from some old , older jobs , older industries , and then pours back into a new industry like StreamYard and Zoom , that kind of thing . And so the last thing I'll say here , to bring it back to our listeners , is the people to Kevin's point that know the future , understand the future , are not always sharing that with the people who really need to know it , and so hopefully , kevin and I can flip that script and share some of the stuff here , because I have mentors that are the on the board of directors on many of these tech companies , particularly robotics companies , and they know that the future is robotics , and so do I . I know that , too , Most people don't , and so they aren't retooling , and that scares me .

Speaker 1 14:35

Yeah , it's a tough thing to talk about because , like you said , you definitely can get villainized for it , but it is . The thought for me is I , if I didn't start the podcast and I wasn't where I am , I don't know what I'd be doing , and a lot of the things that I did to get to where I am today might not exist . If I was a gas station owner and I could just have pumps that people do themselves versus have someone , it would logically it makes sense to say , well , that person's going to be sick and you know , if something happens , I'm going to have to find coverage . And what if they're not nice ? What if they're not good at their job ? What if the people don't like them ? It's , it's it's challenging . It's a very , very challenging thing . It's a very , very challenging thing . I'm blessed that we get to have so many amazing people on our team . I'm so grateful for that , so that's not something that's going to happen here to that degree . But I also understand , because when I remember when chat GPT for those who excuse me of you who don't know you could explain it again better than I , but I know you've been waiting years to talk about AI , so I got to keep a leash on you here .

Speaker 1 15:39

It's , it's something that it's . It's magical . You put in a prompt , it'll spit out . If you say , give me 15 ideas for social media content , it'll give you 15 ideas with hashtags and all this amazing stuff . And in the very beginning I villainized that . I was like that's , that's dumb , I'm never going to do that . I don't want to use that . I feel like that's cheating , I feel like that's shortcuts . Well , eventually it gets to the place where everybody's using that and it becomes a detriment for you to at least at least try it , or not to try it . You don't have to make your life about it , but you can use it . I'm sure in the beginning people didn't want to order from Amazon because they said , well , this two day shipping thing is stupid . Whatever , I don't know the the stats , but most people order from Amazon now .

Speaker 2 16:23

Yeah , because it's very convenient . Netflix , the blockbuster thing , yeah yeah , netflix yeah .

Speaker 1 16:28

Nobody's going to go to a store and rent a movie anymore .

Speaker 2 16:30

Yeah , that was going to happen . I think when we feed it , they're on their way out too . That's something . I would agree , because now you can stream them quicker , yeah , and it's cheaper , and it's cheaper and you're from the comfort of your own home . So there's benefits , but there's always a con to every pro .

Speaker 1 16:44

Well , and that's the thing is , a lot of people don't necessarily see the , the con , they see the pro , and that's really what I just want to make sure that you're not part of the con . You mean the opposite . No , I mean a lot of people who are . If your job doesn't get affected by it , you might not even notice it , you might not be thinking , you might be thinking oh , this self checkout thing is pretty cool , even though five years ago those were people there . You just might , it might slip your consciousness .

Speaker 1 17:13

I just want to make sure that at least you're aware of the changes that are coming , because I wasn't . I had no idea AI and all that . I had no clue any of this was going to be the way it is . Five years ago , not a clue . So I feel a responsibility to do an episode on this , even though , again , it always scares me to do episodes on on stuff like this , because I don't want yeah , I don't want to get villainized for it . But if that's the price for raising your awareness a little bit on something like that , like this , then I would say I would say it's worth it .

Speaker 2 17:46

I think hard truths are empowering if you deliver them in a way that's effective and you and you use them to . You mentioned at the beginning and you and I were talking earlier today when you can transform frustration into fascination . So okay , I lost my job , I'm frustrated . Okay , now I'm fascinated . Okay , so let's , let's do some research . Oh , it looks like a lot of people like me are losing their jobs in grocery stores . Okay , interesting . Well , now that fascination gets turned into transformation , I'm going to go back to school , I'm going to get my associate's degree in management and I want to be a general manager of a grocery store instead of someone who's at the register .

Speaker 2 18:33

Their adversities are coming . These things are gonna happen to all of us , no matter what . No matter what , there's gonna be adversities that come . The question becomes can you turn that frustration into fascination and then that fascination into transformation and what's underneath ? That is what we talk about at NLU all the time . I can never talk enough about this is self-belief . If you have high self-belief , you will innovate . You'll find a way to improve yourself or transform yourself or find a new way to be relevant in the marketplace . Here's a good example . Let's say you lost your job and you were at the cash register . Here's one that's never going away for a long time . I don't want to say never , but it's not going away for a long time . Get good at social media .

Speaker 2 19:21

You want to get really good at social media . You know how many people need social media . Even grocery stores now need a social media presence .

Speaker 1 19:30

Or it's just okay how many . You have X amount of years in customer service . You've been talking to people for a long , long , long time . There's always gonna be some level of job in customer service . It's just different customer service . So even if you just stay within what you've been doing , I used to write that on my resume when I left the gas station . I said I have years of customer service experience . I do . I've been talking to people for eight hours a day and ensuring a positive experience with people for a long time . That carries over into other things .

Speaker 2 19:59

It carries over into every business basically ever , because every business needs to have a good customer experience .

Speaker 1 20:05

I think that's a good way to categorize it If you're doing something and that thing is on the verge of getting replaced . Unfortunately , there's probably other things within that bucket that you can do that maybe you just haven't thought of yet because you didn't have the necessity to do it .

Speaker 2 20:23

There's global marketplace . Now , too , you can sign up for Upwork . You can do .

Speaker 1 20:28

Uber EAs , you can drive Uber .

Speaker 2 20:30

There's a lot of other jobs that are getting created by technology as well .

Speaker 1 20:33

You can dog sit .

Speaker 2 20:34

You can do all kinds of stuff . You can work from home .

Speaker 1 20:38

There's a lot of people now that are working from home . If you're a stay-at-home parent , you can work from home potentially . I'm sure that's probably not easy if you're juggling work and children . But if we can focus more and I know it sounds like again it's one of those I don't want this to sound like the fortune cookie thing but if we can focus more on the opportunity than the sadness that created the opportunity , you're probably going to be in a better place Ultimately . That's why I wanted to do that . We all complain , but we all complain . But those of us who understand what we're complaining about usually are in better shape . If we can use the frustration that we're complaining about to Alan's point to get curious about something , to be some extra necessity at the end of the day , I think that's positive . That would be my next love .

Speaker 2 21:23

When COVID happened , Kev , myself and a buddy of ours , Mark Metry , we sat down and we said , okay , how are we going to come out of this stronger than we went in ? We sat down and we all wrote in our notebooks what we're going to change , because we knew that everything was going virtual and we needed to find a way to still podcast virtually without you and I commuting to see each other . And so after that , we innovated a lot of things .

Speaker 2 21:47

We developed the business and we adapted , and so I think that's the main through line here . But the very last thing I'll share is this there's two types of complaining . There's complaining to complain , and then the second type is the type I recommend , which is complaining frustrations , to try to get to the root cause of whatever the thing is complaining to understand , I think complaining can bring . And again , so let's say I'm with Emilia and I say you know , I'm really annoyed or frustrated . I did this earlier today .

Speaker 2 22:20

Her alarm keeps going off on her phone and we have her phone , our chargers are like across the house , and so in the morning I'm doing my journaling and her alarm will keep going off , and I would . I complained a little bit like sweetheart that that keeps happening . She's like I'm sorry , my watch keeps dying . I said can we solve this ? How can we solve this ? And so we ended up . So I complained a little bit and she not negative , not toxic , I just complained a little bit about that . I'm like listen , that's happened probably once a week for the last couple of months . Can we please fix that ?

Speaker 2 22:50

And so now we came up with a solution , and the solution is now we're going to use Alexa for our alarms , and the downside of that is now I'm if I'm not up ahead of her , it's going to wake me up too , which is why she was using her watch , but I said that's better than me being interrupted while journaling each morning , so let's just transfer to that . So the point is is that when you complain , you can find solutions when you find the root cause of the problem , and so complaining is constructive in all honesty , if it's not just complaining to complain , and I really do believe that . I think that the whole world gets better when we all innovate through understanding how to get better , through complaining and through frustration , understanding and deep conversations about these things I mean . Otherwise , nothing ever improves .

Speaker 1 23:36

Yeah , I think complaining is venting , that's all . Venting is Like hey , can I vent ? All you're saying is hey , can I complain about something without judgment for a short period of time ?

Speaker 2 23:44

I gotta get it out Without you looking at me any differently . You gotta get it out , otherwise you suppress it and then you're all bottled up , yeah you gotta get it out .

Speaker 1 23:52

If you are someone who is afraid of what we talked about today , reach out to Alan , because Alan can help you with this better than anyone . He understands all of that stuff . So reach out to Alan . If you need help , you can reach out to me . I can't promise I'm going to be able to help you very much , because I don't really understand how the world's going to change in the next 10 years . Not as well as Alan . But yeah , reach out . If you have not yet got your tickets to next level , live 2024 , please do so . If you're listening to this episode , we are seven days out , so pretty much six days out for ticket purchasing . Link will be in the show notes . We'd love to have you . I went to the venue the other day . It is more beautiful than I remember the mountains . It's beautiful . It's a beautiful spot . You're going to love it . If you're in person , you'll love it virtual too , I promise . So link will be in the show notes . We'd love to have you there .

Speaker 2 24:36

Also , if you want to read next level books with next level people and , by the way , self-education is definitely the way to stay marketable in the future the books that we read are not just books for fun . They're books that help you improve yourself and develop your skills the skills that are going to be needed in the future . So , if you want to read next level books with next level people , we do book club every single week , 12 , 30 pm Eastern Standard Time Every Saturday . The link to register will be in the show notes .

Speaker 1 25:03

Tomorrow for episode number 1,644 . So I told Alan , I said Saturday's episode is about wealth . I want to get back to health , wealth , life and love . I want to get back to the roots . Tomorrow's episode is going to be about love . Are you setting unrealistic standards for your partner ? I'm sure you've seen this . I've seen this so many times where somebody is upset with their relationship based on unrealistic standards that they're setting on their partner without their partner even realizing it . So we'll talk about that tomorrow . As always , we love you , we appreciate you , grateful for each and every one of you , and at NLU we're going to fans . We have family . We will talk to you all tomorrow .

Speaker 2 25:42

Keep improving . Next level nation .