A.I. is changing work. Here’s what businesses can do to keep up
Artificial intelligence is set to bring about new types of jobs and companies must ensure employees learn the relevant skills needed to perform advanced tasks, according to a senior Salesforce executive.
In fact, advancements in technological areas such as robotics and automation, as well as AI, are changing the future of the workforce, said Renzo Taal, head of Asia and senior vice president for Asia Pacific at Salesforce.
“We look at these technologies as being enhancements, not per se, replacements,” he said on Thursday.
Speaking to CNBC’s Matthew Taylor at the Innovfest Unbound conference in Singapore, Taal explained that “human creativity and abstract thinking” would be major components of the new types of work that will emerge as a result of closer human-machine collaborations.
In a study conducted by Salesforce, 73% of hiring managers said creative thinking skills will be more important in an AI-driven workplace.
AI-related companies have their work cut out for them: They have to train and develop their employees by identifying important skills gap and ensure that people understand what their roles are going to be, according to Taal. Both businesses and workers will need to get on “the learning bandwagon” or they risk “getting left behind,” he added.
While there are concerns around AI displacing existing workers, a report by the World Economic Forum last year indicated that 133 million new jobs will be created in place of 75 million that will be displaced from now till 2022.
