Mix substances or compounds needed for work activities
Little of this can be handed to software today.
This happens in the physical world, so software agents do not touch it. Automation here means robotics and machinery, which is a different market from the one mapped on this site, on a much slower clock.
| How automatable | Barely automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Physical, manual and inspection work |
| Jobs that do it | 21 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | None |
| O*NET activity | Performing General Physical Activities (4.A.3.a.1) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 21 occupations that perform it.
- Mix specified amounts of sand, clay, dirt, or mortar powder with water to form refractory mixtures.
- Mix mortar or grout and pour or spread mortar or grout on marble slabs, stone, or foundation.
- Perform minor plumbing, welding, or concrete mixing work.
- Mix, apply, and spread plaster, concrete, mortar, cement, mastic, glue or other adhesives to form a bed for the tiles, using brush, trowel and screed.
- Mix cement, sand, and water to produce concrete, grout, or slurry, using hoe, trowel, tamper, scraper, or concrete-mixing machine.
- Blend marble chip mixtures, place into panels, and push a roller over the surface to embed the chips.
- Mix, pour, or spread concrete, using portable cement mixers.
- Mix sealing compounds by hand or with portable electric mixers.
- Mix and match colors of paint, stain, or varnish with oil or thinning and drying additives to obtain desired colors and consistencies.
- Mix paste, using paste powder and water, and brush paste onto surfaces.
- Mix mortar and plaster to desired consistency or direct workers who perform mixing.
- Mix mortar, plaster, and grout, manually or using machines, according to standard formulas.
- Mix plaster, and carry plaster to plasterers.
- Chop tar into small pieces, and heat chopped tar in kettles.
- Mix and pour concrete around bases of posts, or tamp soil into postholes to embed posts.
- Mix or pour concrete into forms to encase waste material for disposal.
- Blend compounds to form adhesive mixtures used for marker installation.
- Control the viscosity and weight of the drilling fluid.
What we would actually use
Nothing in our landscape addresses this work. That is the honest answer rather than a padded list: this activity needs a person present, or a machine rather than a software agent.
Nothing on this site applies. Automation here is robotics and machinery, a different market on a much slower clock, and no software subscription moves it.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
21 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
- Brickmasons and Blockmasons
- Carpenters
- Cement Masons and Concrete Finishers
- Cleaners of Vehicles and Equipment
- Construction Laborers
- Derrick Operators, Oil and Gas
- Fence Erectors
- Hazardous Materials Removal Workers
- Helpers--Brickmasons, Blockmasons, Stonemasons, and Tile and Marble Setters
- Helpers--Painters, Paperhangers, Plasterers, and Stucco Masons
- Helpers--Roofers
- Highway Maintenance Workers
- Painters, Construction and Maintenance
- Paperhangers
- Plasterers and Stucco Masons
- Rotary Drill Operators, Oil and Gas
- Roustabouts, Oil and Gas
- Stonemasons
- Tapers
- Terrazzo Workers and Finishers
- Tile and Stone Setters
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Prepare mixtures or solutions”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.