It's hard to wrap your head around the seismic shifts happening in society, not to mention the rate of technological changes that are just around the corner. For anyone who is paying attention, they will surely be able to see what I'm talking about - AI and automation will go parabolic. Maybe I think too much about it because I'm a father, whose nature it is to look at the future his offspring will have to navigate. My kids are grown and are essentially on their own now; all I get to think about at this point is if I prepared them sufficiently. I think I instilled the right amount of curiosity, critical thinking, resiliency, and expectation setting. All I can really say at this point is - I did what I could for them to prepare them for the world in the future.
Even though I, along with everyone reading this column, have been very fortunate to live in a great period in history. A clear path was presented to us early on in life to become useful to society and get paid accordingly. We were guided on how to get credentialed and build up experience. Historically, the demand for labor and ideas was abundant for people who train to do something that satisfies a need - the more specialized, the better. More and more people of all demographics and socioeconomic backgrounds had access to this path throughout our recent history. Yet, every metric of importance like health and happiness, seems to be declining. That's obviously not an intended consequence of finding your lane in society.
For younger generations who are seeking a life they have envisioned...what happens when AI supplants most of the doctors, lawyers, engineers, managers, accountants, bankers, coders, traders? I don't even think the creatives are safe either...artists, writers, actors, designers, musicians, influencers. It's going to get noisy in the not-to-distant future. It's going to feel pretty weird and whatever you think you can endure will be tested. Their future is not going to look like what most of us older generations experienced during our careers. But hey, we weren't in large drafting rooms, or typewriter pools, like our parents either. Things change. It always has.
With all this change around the corner - brought to us through the latest technical innovation to further erode our minds and bodies - what goods and services will still be needed by societies everywhere in the world? The answer is boxes and consumer products like tissue/towel. After all, boxes provide travel insurance for goods in transit (e.g. your goods will arrive in the condition they left) and the consumer products have become a natural part of society's personal routines.
The best approach to thinking about these changes is that advanced, super intelligent tools will only help us do our jobs better. Yet, somebody with hands, feet, and intuition has got to operate and maintain these monstrous, finicky assets. The modern paper machine is the only way we know how to deliver these paper-based products at scale. Upstream and downstream from the paper machine is a big supply chain that spans from the forest to the landfill - with many products experiencing a few cycles in between. After all, if you think about it, we manufacture garbage.
How might young people working their way through high school and college be able to navigate this future shock? It's not such a problem for the boomers and Gen X since our careers have been already cast. We can ride this change out before we are sent to pasture. It's the young folks who are going to look around and think to themselves, "what can I do in my future career that will not ultimately be replaced by technology like AI and robots?" My simple answer is to make paper. Not necessarily the communication grades - we've already seen that part of the industry decimated through digitalization of everything. It's the functional grades like containerboard, boxboard, and tissue/towel that will prevail far into the future.
There are many career paths beyond paper manufacturing that will be somewhat safe for future generations. Particularly the trades. However, we all favor the industry we are already participating in. The paper industry also has the sustainability factors that favor its existence, at least for a few more generations. I would also argue, the paper industry is resilient against off shoring - since bulky corrugate and bulky tissue are costly to move large distances around the world. Is it economical to ship popped popcorn? The weight to volume ratio is not conducive to shipping. Pulp has enough density to reach far-away markets at a reasonable transportation cost, but that is not the case for the end product the pulp forms, e.g. corrugate or structured tissue. If you think about it, corrugate already moves around the world in a sense, but it is already performing its job protecting products inside the box.
I don't think anyone confidently knows what is going to happen in the future since there are so many factors out of our own control that can change society. We can only speculate based on trends, biases, fears, and past experiences. No matter what though, containers and consumer products will need to be manufactured, delivered, consumed, and disposed for many decades to come. Possibly even centuries. Perhaps this message of future viability in our industry is how we recruit our eventual replacements. It's not sexy. It's dirty, hot, wet, smelly, dangerous. It is also a fascinating process that is fully sustainable. Come join the fun, young people!
Steve Sena (stevesena@me.com) is a Cincinnati native. He obtained degrees in Paper Science & Engineering from Miami University in Oxford, OH and an MBA concentrating in Economics from Xavier University. He's worked for a broad array of leading producers, suppliers, and converters of pulp and paper grades.
