The most heated debate of the past decade is that Artificial Intelligence (AI) will replace human skills and render workers jobless. While AI will certainly change the labour environment, it will not be an overnight rebellion, neither an umbrella transition across sectors. As witnessed since the advent of technology, AI will generate new functions, roles and portfolios in the workplace, while abolishing the redundant, patriarchal, hierarchical organizational structure of the past millennium.
By 2023, AI will stop being a cool catchphrase and become the norm for most organizations. By 2025 AI will not an option, but an embedded feature across all products, solutions and services, akin to today’s touch-screen feature. And in less than a decade, AI will become a routine part of human existence, similar to desktop computers in the early 90’s and the Internet of the late 90s.
There are numerous opportunities for countries and corporations to leverage AI in the future. Cross border access to information, education and training will increase, even as workplaces become safer with robots being used for perilous jobs. AI could also support diversity, inclusion, work parity and openness, by mitigating the possibility of prejudice in hiring or investment decisions and using analytical data instead.
From a broader scenario, AI will help the public with upgraded health care facilities, safer transport systems, customized and cost effective products and services. AI could assist in crime prevention and the criminal justice system, as massive data sets could be processed faster, prisoner flight risks assessed more accurately, crime or even terrorist attacks predicted and prevented. It is already being employed by online platforms to detect and react to unlawful and inappropriate online behaviour. In the field of defence, AI would be used to augment security and attack strategies in hacking and phishing or to target key systems in cyber warfare. Collaboration between countries would also become stronger by sharing data-based scrutiny, preventing disinformation and cyber-attacks while ensuring access to quality information.
In the competitive corporate space, AI will be the key differentiator for companies that wish to stand out. Facial Recognition and Voice Interface will become the norm as technology becomes more human in its interface with the consumer. AI will analyze the digital landscape and report on exact insights, real-time updates and trend assessments to enable brands to micro-target and customize customer interface. In the next five years, more than 75% of companies plan to adopt Big Data, Cloud Computing and AI, while 86% of companies have chalked out strategies to embrace E-commerce by adopting digital platforms and apps to augment their business-consumer interface.
AI will definitely have a tremendous impact on both the work we do and the way we communicate with internal and external stakeholders. It will free us from the mundane and enable us to focus on high value work. Machine Learning, AI, Chatbots and NLP will help companies change mundane, repetitive tasks from its workforce to e-bots, therein freeing employees to focus on more complex, creative, high value work. Backend office tasks will be handled by AI even as Marketing and Sales personnel use the AI data to spend more time with their customers and customize their consumer pitch and conversations.
Where does that leave the debate that AI will rob human jobs? Fear is a powerful indicator of how the public will embrace or shun a new product or technology, and the key lies in how corporations and governments handle the public’s mistrust and fear of AI. Most low paying daily wage earners are fearful of their jobs being sucked away by the emergence of Robotics. While governments around the world have been reinforcing the fact that AI will create millions of jobs, they must be challenged to give specific examples of what exactly those jobs are, how people must train for them today, and who will bear the cost for this training. If these questions can’t be answered, then assuring the public that millions of new jobs will be created not only rings false but further compounds their dread of AI. Both organizations and educational institutes must challenge people to re-define their world beyond traditional work and force them to re-jig their skills, competencies and definitions of labour. In other words, all of us will need to collectively reflect on what kind of a post-AI society we want? And this isn’t a dialogue we should keep aside for 2030, but one that is vital for today.
Analytical thinking and Creative thinking are still the two most important skills for workers in 2023. In a technology driven disruptive world, key attributes like Resilience, Flexibility, Agility, Motivation, Self-Awareness, Curiosity, Dependability and Attention to Detail will ensure job safety, even as workers strive to garner technological literacy and learn to work alongside Robots. By 2030, AI will become an integral part of daily business, but people will still be a brand’s most valuable asset as they collaborate, think out of the box and re-define the big ideas. AI will not replace humans but supplement human knowledge, creativity, prowess, speed and experience.
Does the seamless integration of AI indicate that by 2025 an AI Bot may end up with a critical seat on the Board? Interestingly, companies have started designating AI tools to their Board of Directors. These machines will use their Machine Learning prowess to predict which companies or personnel will make for successful investments, based on the thorough dispassionate analysis of the data presented to them. Humans are emotional and subjective and therefore prone to make mistakes, but unlike machines they can make brilliant intuitive decisions, while machines use only logic!
In my opinion, new Earth will see the perfect combination of Human intuition intertwined with the logical analysis of AI to create the Perfect Collaborative Team, wherein the risk of error can be minimized and the scale of creativity heightened.
Machines will empower businesses to understand how ideas can be re-fashioned and executed to greater perfection and impact. AI isn’t going to replace human contribution but make it more streamlined and efficient. The final result will see a far more evolved and memorable experience for everyone involved.
