Preparing the Workforce for the Cognitive Technology Disruption

As the world is rapidly embracing cognitive technologies, firms need to ensure that the workforce is prepared to handle this fast-paced change.

As per the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs report, by 2020, more than one-third of sought-after skills across most occupations will change. The most critical digital technologies explored are joined by a common thread. They are focused on augmenting the human experience with digital capabilities. By utilizing AI, organizations can augment their workforce with machines to enhance productivity and help employees position themselves for future changes.

The AI strategy of a firm should be one of augmentation. As marketers look at the business processes and redesign them, leveraging automation technologies like robotic process automation (RPA) is essential. Alongside the new, higher-skilled, employee roles, it is also crucial to raise the quality of the job, automating the manual aspects of the job.

This results in both a more engaging job and a better customer experience. Processes flow faster, improving the customer experience so that employees don’t have to push as much data to complete the designated job. Robots and people need to collaborate on a new, more streamlined process as new higher-value jobs will be created once robots replace the basic repetitive ones.

This revolution isn’t just about automating repetitive work using robots. Technology advancements will ultimately impact every job. As machines and humans join forces to drive value together, business leaders have a responsibility to prepare their workforce for the skills required in the future. Employees should take advantage of the resources to actively pursue new skills needed to future-proof their careers. Companies need to focus on hiring technologists having specific domain expertise to become multi-skilled and knowledgeable across domains.

Firms need to prioritize conducting continuous learning for employees at every stage. Technology innovation is a constant process and demands continuous re-learning to keep skills that help to adopt the most agile and robust, updated solutions.

As industries move into this age of AI and machine learning, skills such as persuasion, problem-solving, collaboration, and emotional intelligence will have higher demand.

Fostering a culture of learning is crucial to spark innovation.  Public-private partnerships also play an essential role in building a strong tech pipeline and preparing the young workforce for the skills required in the future.

There are very few roles that will remain unchanged for years to come. And, in technology, there are multiplying demands on learning as the half-life of job skills is predicted to get shorter with each passing day. In addition to harnessing the technology development of the AI revolution, firms need to ensure that they are leveraging employees and developing them into the leaders for the next-gen jobs that follow the AI revolution.