Warehouse workers gain a louder voice

Talk to the venture capital firms that back logistics startups, and you’ll notice that some of them have changed their tune lately when it comes to the future of warehouse labor. A few years ago, that conversation was largely about the potential for emerging technologies like self-driving vehicles and robotic picking arms to replace humans on the road and in the DC. Some investors even talked about the rise of the lights-out or “dark” warehouse that would operate entirely without people.

But today, many investors will admit off the record that we probably won’t see widespread adoption of lights-out warehouses in our lifetimes. And the development of self-driving cars for the mass market recently downshifted into the slow lane, highlighted by news that Ford and Volkswagen had closed down Argo AI, their self-driving car arm.

Instead of planning to replace the workers on their payrolls, companies in the logistics sector are now talking about how to retain and re-educate those associates. Conversations about dark and “autonomous” warehouses have shifted to topics like “upskilling” and retraining the people already working in their facilities.

One reason for these employers’ newfound appreciation for human workers is simple necessity—with unemployment stuck at a historically low 3.7% in November, they’re struggling to fill even skeleton crews. 

But there is a bigger trend at work here, one that has led to an increasing focus on employees’ workplace conditions, not just their hours and wages. In a recent trade show keynote, a professor from the University of Tennessee described rising demands by the youngest workers entering the labor market today—Generation Z—for jobs that deliver rewards beyond the simple paycheck. Sure, salary is important, but these workers also value diversity, social justice—particularly in the wake of national protests following George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police—and sustainability. 

Those younger workers are also concerned about quality-of-life issues, including the freedom to work from remote locations at flexible hours. For evidence of how important work/life balance has become, you need look no further than the recent rail industry labor strife. When railroad unions threatened to strike soon after Thanksgiving in 2022, they were demanding better workplace conditions—such as paid sick leave and more reliable schedules—rejecting a White House-brokered deal that provided them with solid pay raises.

A similar trend is sweeping through the ranks of truck drivers, according to Nishith Rastogi, CEO and founder of Locus, a California startup that operates a last-mile logistics platform. When asked what 2023 holds for the transportation and logistics markets, he predicted that the trucking industry would continue to struggle with the same issues it faced in 2022, citing examples like union strife and labor shortages. “Drivers are tired of the pressure to make daily on-time deliveries and will increasingly push back on undesirable working environments, making driver empowerment and health/wellness a necessary factor for success,” Rastogi said.

In response to the rising attention to working conditions and quality of life, some of the warehouse automation startups have pivoted to a greater focus on the role of the human worker in logistics operations. Specifically, they are looking at ways to make their autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) better “colleagues” to the people they work with and, ultimately, more valuable to the overall operation.

At a recent trade show in Boston organized by the Association for Advancing Automation (A3), a speaker from tech developer Locus Robotics emphasized the importance of sharing the data analytics generated by the company’s AMRs not only with shift managers but also with the hourly associates on the floor. According to the speaker, the benefits include opportunities to reward top workers, coach their slower colleagues, train new workers, and help existing workers learn new jobs. Pulling back the curtain on workplace statistics generates benefits at every level of the corporate ladder, it seems.