Eliminating employees

Deep breaths, everyone. We’re chatting about an unpopular topic, today. Although to be fair it’s only unpopular with employees. Mention it to business owners and their eyes get wide with glee at the possibility of eliminating employees. Highlighting the emerging staff-free movement in our last article seems to have touched a nerve. Many pooh-poohed it’s even possible so here’s just a few super clever local businesses doing the staff-free ‘thang’ successfully (shared with their consent):

Outsourcing

Way back when outsourcing first became a thing, a couple of savvy accountants decided to give it a go. They shut up shop, fired their staff and now work from home earning well over a million dollars each year. They achieve this by charging customers full price but the work is done cheaply by contractors in India. (Incidentally, we don’t condone this - our trials found the quality was abysmal and high risk).

Premium + Boutique business models

We’ve all heard about the big hotel chains struggling to breakeven. In contrast, a micro hotel in the South Island is so incredibly popular that it turned Oprah away. It’s intentionally small, with few staff, retaining it’s exclusivity and those eyewatering prices. The director says:

"In a site like this, we could have …. 100 rooms but then we'd have 100 staff, and we wouldn't be talking to any of the guests because we'd be dealing with staff dramas.”

Local real-estate heroes, Paul & Jono Sissons of Remuera, have also embraced this strategy saying:

“I don’t want an army of agents, I want an SAS team”

Artificial Intel

One of New Zealand’s leading architecture firms often vents to us about there being ten years left in the traditional architecture business model. A.I. is replacing core chunks of staff work and often does it better. Take for example, the A.I. software which efficiently assesses compliance with the building codes.

Contractors + Tech

There’s nothing new about using contractors, instead of employees, but we have a cracker of a story to share. It’s about a slightly nerdy young couple who sought us out years ago with wild ideas about getting rid of classrooms to teach the world online. They hire contractors for anything techy but for the most part it’s just them working from home with their kids and (wait for it) regularly earning over $500k each month.

It works because technology achieves global customer reach without employees. Technology is starting to feel more like the terminator than Schwarzenegger ever did; the employee terminator:

• restaurants use order-at-table-apps to kill off staff

• supermarkets, gas stations and airports eliminate staff with self-check

• pop up barriers immobilize cars that overstay their parking time until the fee is paid online, annihilating wardens.

• there’s even robotic in-home nursing units

• nail polish can be printed on, without nail technicians

• teachers marking is done by A.I. 

• teams of agriculture weeders are replaced by A.I. powered laser-weeding units

• drycleaners have automated pick-up and drop-offs

• data-entry clerks & secretaries have gone the way of the Moa (extinct).  

But what can’t be eliminated are the things kiwi’s excel at; innovation, ingenuity, entrepreneurship, open mindedness and heartwarming hospitality. Pair those qualities with current advancements and New Zealand is set to excel globally. Elon Musk summed it up perfectly saying “In previous decades, building wealth often required factories, large teams, or massive capital. Today software, automation, and the internet allow small teams or even individuals to scale quickly”.

Go kiwi’s!

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