Having been in some form of sales for over 40 years it’s hard for me to see a robot sitting down with someone and making the sale.

That’s pretty much online buying — isn’t it?

So what jobs are going to be the very last ones replaced by robots? I think I just made the case for one of them — sales.

Automation In Retail

Like many of you I shop at Walmart from time to time and I see more and more self-service checkouts available for customers.

There seem to be fewer and fewer lines operated by living breathing human beings.

I do understand that payroll is one of Walmart’s biggest expenses and that self-checkout for them makes perfect sense.

But I will never use them. It’s just a personal decision. When they first came out I found that I don’t have the level of intelligence to operate these torture machines in a quick efficient manner.

The scowls and evil looks of waiting shoppers was enough to convince me that while good with most electronic devices self-serve check out is not my forte.

I am more than happy to do my fellow shoppers a favor and rely on a good old flesh and blood checker to process my purchases quickly and efficiently.

Thanks to people like me someone has a job. I leave the store feeling I’ve done my part to keep American the land of the free and home of the brave.

Just not brave enough for self-checkout.

Some Final Thoughts

I can fly around the world and never make contact with an airport employee until security. But I still need someone to check me into a hotel, get my room key and process my credit card for something called incidentals.

I’m grateful the Farmer’s Markets have the actually farmer there to give me the run down on what make a rutabaga a good rutabaga.

So I hope that human beings will be available when and if I need them.

One thing for businesses to keep in mind, there won’t be any automated shopper’s for a long, long time. Maybe there’s an app for that. Comments below.

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