AI and the Future of Work: protecting and preparing our people

It’s broadly believed that AI will become an integral part of our lives, etching itself into the fabric of our economy and society. So much so that our upcoming generation of students has been coined the “phigital” generation – and will be unwilling or unable to draw a distinction between the physical world and its digital equipment.

The ongoing adoption of AI is poised to transform the way we work and drive different expectations for how organizations should function. And while we’re not completely certain what the new world of work will look like, it’s our opportunity and responsibility to prepare our people, and our citizens, with an inclusive approach to the digital economy. As business, government and technology leaders, we can focus on four areas to support the future workforce in the age of AI:

·       Augmented humanity

·       Skills economy

·       Purpose and culture

·       Change agility

Augmented humanity

For 60 years we’ve been trying to get computers to learn like humans. And we are nearing human parity in terms of sensory perception, sight, hearing and comprehension. This means that they can aid the human experience—assisting, augmenting and acting on their own.

These assistive capabilities hold tremendous potential. At Microsoft, our vision for AI puts humans at the center, leveraging technology to augment the work experience and unlock human potential and growth.

This emerging intersection of humans and machines could help us harness data in unimagined ways, to drive new breakthrough discoveries, customer experiences and business growth. An Accenture Strategy report suggests an investment in AI-powered, human-machine collaboration could represent a 38 percent revenue boost totaling $7.5 billion on average for an S&P 500 company over a four-year span. [1]

AI’s image and speech recognition, and ability to interact with natural language, also has the ability to be a force multiplier to drive innovations that benefit everyone; unlock solutions for societal challenges; and support the more than one-billion people with a variety of disabilities – enabling them to engage with their work in new and empowering ways.

Skills economy

With the possibilities of AI being too significant to ignore, we will need to adapt. While available economic data is far from perfect, there are clear indications that the ways in which enterprises organize work, how people find work, and the skills they need to prepare for work are shifting dramatically.

We know that as automation accelerates, it primarily will impact middle-skill workers and create more unevenness across the labor market. AI will also create new types of job opportunities – some of which we aren’t yet able to imagine. By 2022, the World Economic Forum predicts 42 percent of tasks hours will be performed by machines; and 27 percent of total roles will be new, a jump from 16 percent in 2018. [2]

In both cases, it’s critical to start skilling people, to ensure that everyone can participate in the digital economy. The fact that digital skills have now become a prerequisite for basic economic inclusion means that, as a society, we will need to make adjustments to leverage new technologies without further exacerbating income disparities. We must work with today’s workforce and students (the workforce of tomorrow) to expand the high-skill IT talent pipeline and basic digital literacy, especially among underrepresented groups.

Purpose and culture

With increasing frequency, concerns are emerging around the ethics of AI. As computers behave more like humans, whose values will they emulate? It’s wonderful to talk about “timeless values,” but technology will play back to us the values that we program into its algorithms – for better or for worse.

Research shows that a growing number of employees are looking to align their personal values and sense of purpose with those of the company they work for. In Mercer’s Global Talent Trends study, seventy-five percent of employees who are thriving say their company has a strong sense of purpose that resonates with their own personal values. [3] And for the millennial workforce, an organization’s social and environmental commitments rank just as high. [4]

As today’s workforce looks to organizations to take a stand on our society’s important geopolitical issues, Microsoft includes in this arena a responsible and ethical approach to AI. That’s why we’ve created a framework of principles that guides our decision-making across the company: transparency, accountability, privacy & security, fairness, reliability & safety, and inclusiveness.

These aren’t just topics for big tech companies. As companies of all sizes, governments, universities and individuals begin to leverage AI, the issue of ethics is creating new questions for public policy and the evolution of the law. Skilling up for the future isn’t just about science, technology, engineering and math; as computers behave more like humans, the social sciences and humanities will become even more important, underscoring why diversity in the technology industry is critical.

Change agility

As the potential of AI continues to grow, and employee expectations continue to evolve, business success becomes directly linked to the ability of organizations to learn rapidly and change quickly. We know that 75 percent of current S&P 500 firms will be replaced by new firms over the next 10 years. [5]

If AI and automation free up employee resources, organizations have an opportunity to rethink how they deploy people, especially because the jobs that remain will likely require different levels of labor intensity and cognitive maturity. New thinking is necessary to align jobs with future value – based on examining where tasks overlap, which activities are future-critical, and which will become obsolete.

Business leaders need to feel confident that they have built a workforce that is agile enough to adapt to, and capitalize on, changing market forces. It is the learners that survive and flourish, constantly reskilling and upskilling to match what’s needed in the workforce. Agility is key – fueled by a growth mindset and a learning culture.

Our call to action

These focus areas provide critical insights into how we best ensure that everyone is prepared and able to participate in the digital economy. And while there isn’t one exact approach, as digital leaders we should collectively center our planning around four things.

1.     Ensure that any approach we take puts humans in the middle.

2.     Identify future workforce skills and focus immediately on the job categories that will be most impacted.

3.     Align on a culture of responsibility that takes a holistic approach to how we future-proof our employees and the communities around us.

4.     Think through how to reframe our organizations in ways that support business growth and sustainability in the digital economy.

In these ways, we can help all people amplify their capabilities and thrive in today’s economy, while responsibly and ethically preparing our workforce for what the future will bring.

Sources:

1 Accenture Strategy: Reworking the Revolution

2 World Economic Forum: The Future of Jobs & Skills

3 Mercer: Global Talent Trends 2018

4 Deloitte: 2018 Global Human Capital Trends

5 Richard Forester, Yale: Lifespan and Number of U.S. Public Companies is Shrinking