With the rollout of 5G, there’s a pressing need for companies to attract and utilize the skilled labor required to implement the new technology. According to Ed Fox, vice president of Network Services and head of the customer innovation lab at network and telecom services provider MetTel, firms need to make sure that their fiber solutions and power distribution networks are in place to accommodate 100 to 400 Gbps devices made feasible by the new telecoms standard. If they don’t, then they’re at risk of falling behind.
The current workforce at most companies isn’t up to the task. What’s more, firms don’t always know the type of people that they need to build out their systems. Job descriptions are dated, and there is a lack of understanding of how the new technology fundamentally differs from that of the old.
Compounding the problem is the fact that there is, as yet, not enough skilled labor to go around. Building out an extensive 5G network is a mammoth undertaking, but finding the workers to make it possible is a challenge. Even finding people to update and maintain existing infrastructure is a substantial issue for many companies, let alone finding the required labor to roll out an entirely new and upgraded infrastructure. Funneling resources to the development of 5G capabilities is a luxury that very few in the industry can afford.
As you will learn below, however, Field Engineer’s online freelance worker platform, is part of the solution.
The Impact of 5G on Business Operations and the Wider World
Mobile data is a critical part of 21st-century life. Local governments, enterprises, and consumers all want lightning-fast mobile communications, wherever they happen to be. 5G promises to enable people to check their Facebook status, send work to their boss, and send instructions to remote workers faster and more efficiently than ever before.
What’s exciting about 5G, however, is that it’s not merely an evolution of 4G, but a genuine step-change that will open up a whole raft of new use-cases, propelling the economy into the future.
The fourth industrial revolution, for instance, depends on the development of integrated systems. 5G communication protocols that slash latencies will allow elements in the value chain to communicate with each other in real-time across vast distances. The role of the technology will be as pivotal as that of 3D printing and the internet of things. It will transform how companies operate and, hopefully, increase the total output of the economy. 5G, for instance, could be the technology that drives the adoption of automation improvements that generate capital and labor productivity over the next decade. It’s an enormous opportunity for all involved.
5G will also improve mobile media entertainment by bringing it up to 5G speeds. Consumers will experience lower latency, higher bandwidth, higher video resolutions, and faster loading speeds when in range of a 5G antenna. Data rates may also permit data-intensive applications such as VR and AR without having to hook systems up to existing terrestrial fiber and broadband connections. Consumers could, for instance, have images piped through to their smart glasses as they travel around the urban environment.
The promise of 5G, however, is not limited to consumers and smart cities. There’s also a prediction that the technology will also make its way into agriculture, helping farming to become more efficient with the help of networks of integrated sensors. Ag firms will be able to get real-time data about their crops and perhaps even use 5G to direct automated drones to deliver targeted pesticides.
How Field Engineer Is Enabling 5G Deployment
While the promise of 5G is fabulous, firms need skilled workers who can do the heavy lifting to make it happen. Field Engineer, through its online jobs marketplace, is helping to ease companies’ labor constraints by providing on-demand 5G freelance engineers. Companies can use the platform to supplement their existing workers with engineers, giving them the capacity to roll out 5G and maintain their existing, legacy networks.