Tech and Tasks: How Automation is Changing Our Skills

Tech and Tasks: How Automation is Changing Our Skills 🚀🧠

In today’s fast-paced world, many of us rely on technology to handle everyday tasks that used to require manual effort. From driving to cooking, we’ve handed over many of our once-automatic skills to apps and services designed for convenience. But as we embrace this digital age, it begs the question: what are we giving up in the process?

 

Remember When Driving Was All Manual? 🚗💨

Think back to a time when Uber and Waymo didn’t exist. Driving meant paying full attention—manual transmissions, cranking the windows down, and navigating every mile yourself. Now, we can summon a driver (or even a driverless car) to take us wherever we need, allowing us to focus on texting, emailing, or even catching up on that podcast.

But here’s the catch—do we even talk to our drivers anymore, or are we absorbed in our phones? Would we know how to get from point A to B without Google Maps? 🗺️ 

 

Cooking, Who? 🍽️👩‍🍳

The shift isn’t just in driving; look at how we approach food. Between DoorDash and meal prep services like Blue Apron, fewer people plan, prep, and cook meals from scratch. Could you still whip up a meal without reaching for your phone to check the recipe? The convenience is amazing, but it also means we’ve lost some of the muscle memory of food prep. 

Cooking used to involve not just the meal, but the process—shopping, chopping, timing each dish just right. Now, we focus on the outcome: a delicious meal delivered right to our door. 📦🍝

 

What We Gave Up: Long Division and Beyond 📏✖️

Take a moment to reflect on math. When was the last time you did long division by hand? I love math, but even I would have to pause before scribbling out a problem without a calculator or my phone.

This “paradox of automation” is the idea that the more automated our world becomes, the less we need to use our manual skills—and the more we forget how to perform these tasks. Many are happy to trade those forgotten steps for efficiency, but is there a cost?

 

What About in Veterinary Medicine? 🐾💼

In the veterinary field, technology is advancing just as rapidly. From electronic medical records to automated appointment reminders, the convenience is undeniable. AI is even entering the scene with scribes to help write medical notes, and chatbots to answer basic client questions.

It’s incredibly efficient—but what’s the trade-off? Are we losing the ability to write detailed discharge instructions without digital help? Or missing the personal touch that comes from direct client interaction?

 

Where Do We Go From Here? 💭

I’m not saying we need to give up Uber or meal prep services—far from it! But it’s worth considering what we may be losing as we gain convenience. Whether it’s navigating without GPS or prepping dinner without an app, we’ve shifted away from manual processes that used to come naturally.

As we move forward in a tech-driven world, especially in fields like veterinary medicine, let’s be mindful of how automation shapes our skills and interactions. The challenge is balancing the benefits of automation with the human touch and expertise that makes our work unique.