How Work Has Changed Since the 1980s: From Typewriters to Zoom

If someone needed you, they had two options:

1. Wait until the next day
2. Call the house phone and risk speaking to your spouse, your mum, or your very suspicious teenager who wanted to know why someone from work was calling at dinner time.

Most people chose option one.

Today of course we have emails, WhatsApp messages, Teams chats, project tools, and the ever present “quick question” that arrives just as you’re about to sit down for dinner.

Work no longer closes the door behind you at 5pm. It sits quietly in your pocket.

Meetings Were… Different

Meetings used to involve actual rooms and actual chairs.

It’s another reminder of just how work has changed since the 1980s.

If someone couldn’t attend, they simply didn’t attend. Nobody tried to dial in from the car, from the supermarket, or from their dog walk.

Last weeks Zoom call with Melissa and Patty made me laugh because we were talking about how normal it now feels to:

• jump on a video call
• share screens
• send links in chat
• take notes in a shared document
• record the whole thing for later

Back then a meeting meant someone brought a notebook, or someone might take the minutes of the meeting and then type them up for everyone later and maybe you’d get a cup of tea, and hopefully someone remembered the biscuits.

Research Meant Real Effort

Need information in the 80’s?

You went to a filing cabinet.

Or a library.

Or you asked Janet in accounts because she seemed to know everything.

Today we type a question into Google and have the answer in seconds. According to research from the Pew Research Center, the rise of the internet and smartphones has completely transformed how people access information and communicate.

The speed of information is incredible.

But it also means the expectation to move faster than ever before.

How Work Has Changed Since the 1980s: The Pace of Work

What we all realised on that call is that people probably do three times as much in a working day now.

Back then you might:

• write a letter
• make a few phone calls
• attend a meeting
• maybe type something up

Today one person is expected to:

• answer emails
• manage social media
• attend video calls
• update websites
• reply to messages
• track analytics
• create content
• and somehow still do their actual job

Technology has made things easier in many ways, but it has also quietly increased the amount of work we do.

We’re Always “Available”

In the 80’s if someone wanted you urgently they needed a landline and a good reason.

Today we are reachable anywhere.

On the train.
In the supermarket.
In the garden.
On holiday.

Which means the idea of being “offline” barely exists anymore.

The Good Old Days… And The Good New Days

Now don’t get me wrong. Technology is amazing.

Looking back really shows how work has changed since the 1980s, especially when it comes to communication and technology.

I was literally on a Zoom call chatting with Melissa (she had just come off the ski slops) and Patty (was in Colorado) as if we were sitting in the same room. I run a business online. My work, my clients, my content, and my ideas can reach people anywhere.

That’s something the 1980’s version of us could never have imagined.

But it’s also fascinating to realise just how much work life has evolved in such a short space of time.

From typewriters to AI.
From filing cabinets to cloud storage.
From landlines to smartphones.

And from leaving work at the office… to carrying it around in our pockets.

Sometimes when we talk about “how busy things are now,” it’s not just our imagination.

Work really has changed.

And if nothing else, the Zoom call proved one thing.

Even with all the technology in the world, sometimes the best conversations still start with:

“Do you remember when…”

Before we knew it, we were reminiscing about what work actually looked like in the late 70’s, through the 80’s and into the early 90’s.

You know the ones.

Before we knew it, the conversation turned into a series of “do you remember when…” moments.

But it also made me realise something else.

Just as work has changed, so has the way people find businesses.

Years ago people relied on word of mouth, local directories, or the Yellow Pages. Today they search online, ask AI, read reviews, and expect to find answers instantly.

Which means businesses need to evolve too.

If the way people communicate has changed this much, it only makes sense that the way people discover and choose businesses has changed just as much.

Search behaviour has shifted dramatically, especially with AI and chat search. I wrote more about that here: Is Your Website Optimised for AI? Why It Matters Now

Your website, your content, and your online presence should grow with those changes… If you would like to chat more about your business, why not book a call.

Yvette