Consider this scenario: You walk into your neighbourhood bank to en-cash a check.
You stroll down to the friendly teller who’s been there for the last 10 years.
But you can’t find him there. You can’t even see a queue.
As you ask around, you get to know that the teller has been fired.
You’re flabbergasted.
The employment landscape is changing with the advent of AI, and may well evolve beyond recognition over the next couple of decades. According to statistics, over 1.2 million people working in banking and lending are likely to be replaced by Artificial Intelligence by 2030.
The employment landscape is changing with the advent of AI, and may well evolve beyond recognition over the next couple of decades.
Jobs are going to be lost, but many surveys are very optimistic. A study by Accenture has found that companies that deploy AI wisely will see a net increase in jobs, and nearly 14% of them can see a revenue increase of up to 34%.
Let’s take a look at some of the ways future jobs are going to be impacted:
Impact of AI on Future Jobs With Examples:
In their mammoth paper, Frey and Osborne have argued that 47% of job functions will disappear, and not the jobs themselves. It essentially points to a specific skill-set that a future employee would need: to be able to learn, unlearn, and relearn.
A report by Accenture says that over 60% of surveyed employees view AI in a positive light. 2 out of 3 people acknowledge the need to be able to develop new skills continually, moving forward in their career, to be able to work intelligently with AI.
Although AI is all about up-skilling ourselves and learning how to use it effectively, there are some jobs that will bear the brunt of its advent.
Take the example of the telemarketer. To be one, you do not need higher education, emotional intelligence, or a high IQ. It is mostly repetitive and drab, and career growth is minimal.
In fact, telemarketing career growth is slated to decrease by 3% by 2024. Companies can save a lot of money in the long run by using AI to carry out telemarketing.
Policybazaar, the largest online insurance policy platform in India, has seen a remarkable improvement in their online customer service. It has resulted in around 50% of their sales directly being done through chats. And this is because they have shifted to AI; when you ask a query on their website, you are actually conversing with an intelligent chat-bot.
The number of red flags with humans at the helm was 35%, which is down to a meager 7% as of now, leading to improved customer satisfaction and better customer engagement.
What all this essentially means is that jobs that require a low level of skill are most probably going to be gobbled up by AI.
The usual thinking is, when technology advances, it’s the blue-collar jobs that are hit the hardest at first.
And that number may go up to as much as 30% of all low-skilled jobs.
Jobs like receptionists, proofreading, and data entry are going to be wiped out.
But having said that, AI will open up new and unforeseen opportunities.
Let’s take the example of the ATM machine. When the ATM machines came into existence, there was a general feeling of foreboding over the job security of bank tellers.
Many have suggested that the job role was about to die. However, what followed was utterly unexpected. With ATM machines being built, the cost of setting up bank branches decreased. So banks set up more offices, which ultimately resulted in hiring more tellers.
Here’s an infographic depicting the possible automation fallout:
According to the World Economic Forum Report 2018, 75 million jobs will be displaced all around the world. But, 133 million new ones will also be created.
The nature of jobs will change, and we need to adapt to the change as soon as possible. But there will be many jobs that will be safe from the onslaught of AI.
In fact, these jobs will need more and more humans to use the power of AI to their advantage correctly.
Artificial Intelligence: Friend or Nemesis?
AI will affect every industry in some way or the other, but not to the same extent.
The following are the job titles that are likely to be at the highest risk:
These jobs quite repetitive in nature, are at the brink of extinction.
But jobs which require instinct, creativity and high emotional intelligence are very unlikely to be eliminated.
Take the example of the medical practitioner. They have to check hundreds of patients, where, along with deep knowledge and fundamental understanding, they require essential skills like empathy and compassion – something that simply cannot be fed into an Artificial Intelligence (AI) program.
Many other jobs, including HR, sales, and marketing managers, are very unlikely to be significantly affected by the advent of AI.
In the case of HR managers, they need to engage their employees intelligently and are involved in various business dynamics like appraisals, promotions and severance negotiation, all of which are very difficult to program into an AI machine.
But concepts like Data Science, Data Analysis, and gathering metrics using Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become much better, with detailed analysis about an employee based on a variety of factors like the number of leaves taken, the number of hours worked, the number of leads converted and so on.
It helps HR managers make better decisions that help the company in the long run. Similarly, in the case of marketing and sales, there are AI tools to calculate and tabulate a variety of metrics as needed correctly, but the result requires human interpretation. That is why these jobs aren’t in immediate danger.
Jobs like event planners and PR officers that necessitate human intermediation are also likely to benefit the analytical power of AI, but in a way that will allow them to do their job better.
Another great example is the writing profession. It requires creativity, innovation, and subtlety, something that is unlikely for machines to pick up in the near future.
Winding Up
Rather than wasting time on figuring out the future, it’s time to embrace it. Instead, humans should focus on re-skilling themselves with the kind they will need in the future.
High school and college syllabuses all over the world needs a drastic overhaul to inculcate digital education to children from an early age so that they get familiar with a future world shared by humans and machines.In the words of Fei-Fei-Li, ‘More than 500 million years ago, the vision became the primary driving force of evolution’s ‘Big bang,’ the Cambrian Explosion, which resulted in explosive speciation of the animal kingdom. 500 million years later, Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology is at the verge of changing the landscape of how humans live, work, communicate, and shape our environment.’
