Things have changed tremendously in the past 20-30 years, especially in terms of the office. The retail industry has changed tremendously with the advent of computerised stock control. Years ago in large retailers and still in most small retailers stock control was carried out on a manual basis. This involved people counting how much of an item they had in stock on a weekly/fortnightly/monthly basis and ordering more if they need it. This can be extremely time-consuming. Almost every large company has now moved from a manual stock control system to a computerised system. This has a number of advantages, as well as some disadvantages. Also new technology has meant that employees have had to have training to educate them on the new computers and programmes that make the company operate. Employees are able to train whilst being at home, this would not affect the hours they are working which will not affect the company's profit. They are able to complete the training at home at their own pace. ICT has affected the way the world works in many ways. It has allowed us to easily transport our work from home to our workplace and back without having to transfer it to a USB stick, which can be easily damaged. It also allows us to communicate around the world which increases links and business branches in other countries. It gives us the opportunity to back up a companys files quickly and easily which means that they can keep their files safer. People can also look at the live stock market using IT which means the can find jobs in businesses which are doing better in the stock market. IT also lets people do their jobs faster and sometimes better. This means that the output of a company can be higher. While some peoples work lives are being improved, some workers are losing their jobs. An example of this is that people who hand make devices or provide types of service are going out of business because there are machines which do their jobs fast