My son turns 15. Here's what I'm afraid to tell him about his future career
In two months I'll be speaking to a group of university students sharing the findings from our latest research paper (on the expectation gap between employers and Gen Z employees) and offering advice on navigating early career challenges in the workplace and in managing their lives a turbulent world.
The old advice about apprenticeships, degrees, and 'safe' careers no longer holds. Here's what I'm wrestling with — as a parent and as someone who spends a lot of time studying and ruminating on the future of work, any conversation about work now has to be predicated on the seismic shifts that AI and robotics are having on work.
With frontier firms (one that embed hierarchies of AI agents across multiple functions) set to reach mainstream in two years (current adoption is estimated at c15%), what does this mean for jobs, especially entry level ones?
I think we are now no longer only talking just about entry level jobs. Is it pragmatic to think we can create new jobs fast enough? We've seen that firms that use AI as an opportunity for revenue growth rather than cost cutting can retain their people and grow their revenue. But who do they do this at the expense of and is there enough growth to go round?
Is this the elephant in the room no one is talking about?
What do I say to my 15 year old son who is 3 years away from leaving school? Should he start out in a skilled trade? Plumbers and electricians are forecast to be some of the last professions to be disrupted and their remuneration will likely reflect that. How far off is the day a humanoid robot arrives at your house in an autonomous vehicle and repairs a burst pipe?
Or do I build a human-centric business that he can come and work in through this period of turbulence?
Is this break neck advance just the inevitable consequence of being human with zero sum progress so entrenched in our DNA that another vision of the future cannot be imagined? Will a boycott by organisations and the public put the brakes on things?
And what does a good level of AI adoption good like and then when we're content with it, how on earth do we stop this thing? Or do we buckle in for the ride and simply pay close attention? Ironically, modern tech is having a negative effect on our attention span. It is an inhibitor to the mindset needed to thrive in this decade and beyond.
Notwithstanding some of the dystopian predictions, the next decade will see more change in our lives than the last century and while the Silicon Valley billionaires tend to make good predictions about how technology will evolve, their predictions about the impacts on societies are far more myopic.
Their vision is of a utopia on the other side, where everyone has a basic universal income and the cost of living is low as mass AI & robotics have 10x'd the economy enabling a windfall dividend to provide for everyone's basic needs.
And then what jobs are left? Just CEOs. Will we still need charity? Will community spaces proliferate? Will there be an explosion in sport and culture? Where will people find meaning? Do we need work to find meaning or can leisure, family and community replace it? What will this effect have on self-discipline and what habits will we maintain? What happens to education?
One thing is certain, it will not be an orderly transition - there will be resistance, society may well split into those on board and those resisting or wishing to disconnect, including many younger generations.
I'm not cancelling any plans for the future and I believe that the human spirit is a powerful force that will prevail.
The skills I think leaders need to navigate the road ahead: Self-discipline, imagination, courage, adaptability and long-term thinking.
A leader is no longer just a manager or CEO. Leadership is about the impact you have, the example you set and the culture you create. And this happens wherever people have the opportunity to influence others and shape the future.
Lots of unanswered questions. Welcome all your well-informed comments.
This article was written by Mark A King. You can follow him here - https://www.linkedin.com/in/markkingbravo/
