Whether for or against generative Artificial Intelligence (AI), the reality is it’s coming … and fast. So, businesses and societies better be ready.
Management consulting firm McKinsey & Company said as much in their report titled “The economic potential of generative AI: the next productivity frontier”. Published on June 14, the report captures the company’s latest research findings in assessing the impact this new era of AI will have on the workplace. The report finds that while AI has the potential to generate a tremendous amount of wealth (we are talking in the trillions here) of additional value each year, the technology could also deliver “new and significant challenges”.
The report advises stakeholders to act – and quickly, given the pace at which generative AI could be adopted. According to the study’s midpoint adoption scenario, for example, about a quarter to a third of work activities could change in the coming decade.
The rise of AI
As the study points out, AI-based programs have been around for a while, but it is only with the release of generative AI ChatGPT in November 2022 (and many similar but markedly improved apps soon after) that the world sat up and took notice. Their ability to reorganise and classify data, write text, compose music, and even create digital art has forced many to consider exactly how secure their jobs are.
And they are right to be concerned.
A report titled “The Future of Work in South Africa”, also by McKinsey & Company, published in 2019, says displacements in the job market because of technological advancements are “unstoppable”.
On the one hand, it found that machine learning, AI and advanced robotics could lead to the loss of 3.3 million jobs in South Africa by 2030. On the other, it projected that about 4.5 million jobs would be created.
According to this study, industries most affected by job losses are the retail sector (334 000 jobs); the administrative, support and government sector (309 000 jobs); manufacturing (231 000), transportation and warehousing (186 000); agriculture, forestry and fishing (87 000); and the real estate sector (20 000).
Sectors likely to see a significant increase in the number of job opportunities include healthcare (570 000 new jobs), construction (261 000), other emerging services (152 000), and technical services (112 000), educational services (110 000), arts and entertainment (48 000), accommodation and food services (28 000), and wholesale trade (23 000).
Let’s get ready to rumble
Mauritz Bekker, author of the book Wake-up: Unleash that Entrepreneur Within, says the speed at which generative AI is being deployed and the subsequent shift from the old paradigm to the new requires that employers and employees alike adopt an entrepreneurial mindset.
He explains that the Industrial Revolution of the mid-19th century saw a relatively small number of large entities create a huge number of jobs. The education system, he says, continues “to program” us for an “industrial age” economy – that is, to be jobseekers.
“The time is now to get rid of that industrial phase kind of paradigm where we look for jobs and not for opportunities.”
Entrepreneurship, Bekker says, is not about selling a product but a solution to a problem. He says what AI will do is make it easier for more people to solve problems and put their solutions out there.
“We are all different in terms of our abilities, almost like our fingerprints. Everyone has unique talents. The new economy will be about trading in talents.”
He says, at the moment, there is a lot of centralisation by big companies that have the ability to sell their solutions.
“But I think the whole playing field will change to individual power where every person will be able to sell their talents in a form of a solution to a problem. And the more we trade in our talents, the higher the standard of living will be in communities.”
Reprogram the mind
Bekker, who has been training would-be entrepreneurs for more than 20 years, says all people are able to adopt an entrepreneurial mindset. Most recently, he developed the study material for Moonstone Business School of Excellence’s short course, Entrepreneurship.
“Whether you want to start a business or work for a company, the focus must not be on what is but what can be. What is needed now is new and better solutions to old problems. We have got the ability but are constrained by our thinking patterns. The human mind is a brilliant computer, it just needs news software and that is what we are trying to teach.”
The eight-week course consists of six modules, with the first focused on enhancing entrepreneurial abilities. Bekker says the aim of this module is to shift people from a job-seeking to an opportunity-seeking mindset. He adds a key aspect of this shift involves discovering what you are passionate about doing.
“People who are passionate about what they do will strive to do it better than anyone else,” Bekker says.
This shift also entails enabling people to let go of the old paradigm.
“Your thinking is based on your frame of reference. If you can change your paradigm, you are able to see opportunities that other people wouldn’t be able to see. And if you can link opportunities to what you really like doing, you are halfway there.”
The fourth module, “Understand and recognise the modern business environment”, looks at technology and the essential role it plays in the sustainability of modern societies. Or, as Bekker explains it, it teaches you the rules of the game and the dimensions of the playing field within which the world operates.
“Very few people are taught how the economy works in layman’s terms. When you study economics, it is usually an intensified, blurred subject. This module provides you with the understanding of how the economy works and how you can use it to your and society’s advantage.”
