Charlie Colenutt: What 70 Jobs Taught Me About Work in Britain

Jimmy's Jobs of the Future

Boxlight Creative Studio

Technology, Business, Careers

5 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 23 April 2025

⏱️ 73 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Want your own Brand or Business Podcast? Try out our NEW Podcast Calculator: https://www.boxlight.io/ Charlie Colenutt: What 68 Jobs Taught Me About Work in Britain What do modern jobs really look like — not from a spreadsheet, but from the inside? Charlie Colenutt spent two years travelling the UK, interviewing nearly 70 people about their real-life working lives. From teachers to care workers to consultants, he uncovers the patterns behind burnout, bureaucracy, purpose, and pride. In this episode, he joins Jimmy to share the most surprising things he learned — and why the future of work might be shaped more by fear, crisis, and policy than by AI or ambition. 👇 Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 01:29 Charlie’s Book: A Snapshot of Work in Britain Today 02:39 From Barrister to Author: Charlie’s Unexpected Pivot 06:03 Interviewing 68 Workers: What Surprised Him Most 10:54 What Jobs Actually Look Like Behind the Scenes 21:20 How Bureaucracy Is Killing Good Work 29:52 AI & The Future of Work: Hope or Hype? 35:47 What People Really Do All Day 36:37 Where the Jobs of the Future Will Come From 37:51 What Makes People Happy at Work (and What Doesn’t) 42:46 Why Crisis Shapes So Many Career Decisions 48:22 What’s Stopping People From Changing Jobs? 51:20 Do Degrees Still Matter? The Education Debate 53:25 Charlie’s Own Career Crossroads 01:02:46 What the Job Market Will Look Like in 10 Years 01:09:23 Final Reflections: Work, Purpose and What Comes Next #CharlieColenutt #JimmysJobs #FutureOfWork #ThisIsWorking #Bureaucracy #CareerChange #ModernJobs #WorkCulture #AIAndJobs ********** Follow us on socials! Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jimmysjobs Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@jimmysjobsofthefuture Twitter / X: https://www.twitter.com/JimmyM Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimmy-mcloughlin-obe/ Want to come on the show? [email protected] Sponsor the show or Partner with us: [email protected] Credits: Host / Exec Producer: Jimmy McLoughlin OBE Producer: Sunny Winter https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunnywinter/ Editor: Sunny Winter Junior Producer: Thuy Dong Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	While Jimmy's jobs of the future is busy asking what's next for our economy and the world of work,
0:06.0	today's guest has gone out and asked people arguably the far scarier question, what's happening right now?
0:13.0	Charlie Colnut is the author of Is This Working?
0:17.0	A hilarious, humane and occasionally hair-raising look at the state of modern work.
0:21.6	What started it all was Charlie's own journey.
0:24.6	He was a young grad in law in the pandemic, a job which isolated through lockdowns, stripped of its status,
0:31.6	largely resulted reading PDFs in his bedroom.
0:35.6	It triggered a deeper question, if this is work, what's it actually for?
0:41.2	So he went out and asked people up and down the United Kingdom about their jobs.
0:46.2	And my reflection is what he found is both brilliant and bleak. I honestly think this book is a future
0:53.1	classic about the present and it may be the last
0:56.2	true snapshot of working life before AI really rewrites it all over again. Charlie, welcome to
1:06.1	Jimmy's Jobs of the Future. You've written this excellent book called Is This Working, which is like a modern
1:13.7	snapshot of the jobs we do told by the people who do them. And honestly, it feels like
1:20.3	Jimmy's jobs, the opposite. In the sense of we sit here and interview politicians, masters of the universe,
1:28.3	former prime ministers, etc., about where they think the future of our economy is going.
1:32.6	You've actually gone out on the streets of Britain for the last two years and interviewed 68 people
1:37.3	about their professions and the people doing the jobs day to day. And I just found it the most
1:43.1	interesting read in lots of different directions and lots
1:47.0	of thoughts that I hadn't thought before and prompts that's made me think about things in a different
1:51.9	way. But tell us the origin story around it and how you came to write it. Well, first of all,
1:58.0	thank you very much for having me. Yeah, it is very much the opposite of your podcast.
	...

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