The advent of AI, and generative AI (GenAI) in particular, has the potential to drive quite dramatic productivity gains and create new industries that do not exist today, but there is also the risk that it will create a new digital divide between the technological haves and have-nots. Many jobs will disappear while new ones will be created. The question for society is how to maximise the benefits of the new technology while ensuring that no one is left behind when it comes to availing of them.
“I think the discussion on the impact on jobs is more nuanced than a binary creator-or-destroyer conversation,” says David Lee, chief technology officer with PwC Ireland. “The impact will vary across both job types and industry. In looking to understand the impact I think it is helpful to distinguish between an overall job and the tasks that currently make up that job. Undoubtedly AI will help to automate many of the tasks that make up many existing jobs, but this does not imply that the job is destroyed, but rather that it will need to evolve.”
Cait Mulcahy, head of capability and automation with Three Ireland takes an optimistic view. “Technological leaps have historically displaced certain roles while creating new opportunities. For instance, the rise of mobile telecoms and the internet over the past 20-25 years has generated vast new industries and employment opportunities. Thus, it’s reasonable to expect that AI will be a net job creator in the long run. AI will lead to the emergence of new roles – some already foreseeable, like AI specialists, and others yet to be imagined – thus fostering job growth and economic development.”
She points to new roles already being created by the technology. “At Three, we now employ robotic process automation specialists, messaging bot developers, and data scientists – positions that didn’t exist a decade ago. Moving forward, AI will undoubtedly generate numerous roles in Stem fields. Additionally, the ethical implications of AI will necessitate roles focused on ethics, training, and education.”
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PwC’s 2024 AI Jobs Barometer indicates that openings for jobs that require specialist AI skills have grown 3.5 times faster than openings for all jobs since 2016, according to Lee. “New roles such as AI ethicists will be crucial in ensuring that AI systems operate within ethical boundaries and do not perpetuate biases,” he points out. “It is also expected that roles such as AI-generated work auditors will emerge, tasked with scrutinising content for quality, accuracy and ethical compliance. We expect to see roles such as data curators for managing and organising the vast amounts of data required to train sophisticated AI models. It is important to note that judgement and human skills will be pivotal in an AI world and that includes communication skills.”
It is not simply a case of accommodating new roles in the workforce. “To prepare for these changes organisations should focus on skills and redesign work,” says Deloitte Ireland consulting partner on human capital, Gary Notley. “The first step to this is to understand what ‘work’ is and the types of jobs in the organisation and examine whether the impact of AI is simple, like automation that machines do best, or complex, requiring machines and humans to work together. After that, deconstruct jobs into tasks and skills. Understand the impact of skills on each job, upskill and reskill the workforce to create new value, and foster a culture of continuous learning. Then, redesign work and workflows to effectively integrate generative AI.”
Lee believes there is a societal responsibility to ensure that AI does not create or widen any existing divisions within the labour market. “For people within the existing workforce there is, based on our research, a strong recognition among employers about the need to invest in the upskilling of their existing workforces to take advantage of the AI opportunity. However, the ability to fund this upskilling will vary across organisations. In particular, it is important that the various state agencies tasked with supporting the SME sector are alert and reactive to this need.”
He also points to the need to ensure that people outside of the workforce and those yet to enter it are equipped with the skills required to participate in an AI-enabled labour market. This is not limited to AI-related technical skills but also “the creative thinking, data literacy and continuous learning mindset that we will need to instil via our first- and second-level education sector”.
“Change is inevitable, but we can support those at risk of displacement by helping them leverage new opportunities,” says Mulcahy. “At Three, we run initiatives like our Digital Academy and Citizen Developer programmes, which encourage the adoption of new technologies, including AI and automation. These programmes provide our employees with the time and resources to learn new skills and apply them in their roles. By fostering a culture of continuous learning and skill development, we ensure that everyone has the opportunity to thrive in an evolving technological landscape. This approach can serve as a model for other organisations looking to support their workforce through similar transitions.”
But organisations may not be paying enough attention to the skills issue, according to the 2024 Deloitte Human Capital Trends report, which showed that 75 per cent of organisations globally intend to accelerate their use of AI over the next five years while only 13 per cent of workers have been offered AI-related skills training in the past year.
“Organisations should invest in AI literacy programmes, ensuring that all employees have a foundational understanding of AI’s capabilities and implications,” says Notley. “Organisations should also foster a culture that celebrates exploration and learning, accelerating the adoption and mastery of generative AI. These are safe spaces that allow people to experiment and explore new ways of working, which in turn helps build trust and confidence while they build new skills and innovate.”
Lee concludes by highlighting another significant societal issue. “With the increased focus that AI adoption will place on Stem-related skills it is important that this does not widen the existing gender imbalance within the Stem arena. It is important we adopt a proactive approach to prevent this occurring.”