Ohhhhh the AI thing. It’s bananas. It’s crazy. It’s going to destroy humanity. And it’s so much fun. 

Today’s podcast – how AI will affect the future of work. But not in a bloviating, imaginary way, which is how much of the AI discussion is happening (paired with doom and gloom of the end of the world). But more of a measured, tangible and smart way to approach it, from corporate leadership to the individual being affected. 

It’s not hyperbolic to say that AI is similar to the rise of human life on earth. That sounds wild, but it’s also accurate. This is a pivotal point not just in the workplace, but in how society operates. It’s not going away. On board yet? Good. Let’s get to the bigger things. 

Those bigger things include YOU. AI has been around for a while, behind a nice user experience model (thanks, Google!) that has allowed for some adoption. With the explosion of ChatGPT, many people are rushing to dictate and use some AI models to influence what they are looking for. 

Initially, this will create a lot of noise in the marketplace (“Robot – write me a blog!”), but as we get past the newness of this, it will then influence workplaces in larger, more dynamic ways. 

What’s important to note here, and this is the crux of the podcast, is that while AI will change everything about work, it’s up to us, as individuals, to control our positioning in this new world. 

Yes, corporate leadership is looking at how to leverage AI (and they should). But you, as an individual, should be spending your time learning about it and using it, because without doing so, you will be left behind. 

We all have a lot to learn … AI is no exception. Your future is dictated by choices today. More to come on AI, but here is a good start.

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Click Here for an Unedited Transcript of the Podcast

I’m Jim Frawley, and this is Bellwether. Welcome to Bellwether. Thank you for being here. Episode 116, 17, something like that. We’re talking about ai. If I had my robot working, I’d know what episode it was. Um, <laugh>. Let’s talk about AI in the future of work. It’s not something that we can ignore. It’s something that I’ve wanted to talk about for a long time on the podcast. I’ve talked about it a little bit, but I haven’t really done a dedicated episode on it.

0:53

Uh, I speak a lot to clients about it. I speak a lot to non-clients and audiences about it, and it’s, um, it’s a very exciting time. This is great. Um, what I wanna cover today, I’m gonna give you just a brief overview to level set because there’s a lot of noise flying around in terms of what AI is and how it’s transforming and all of that good stuff. Let’s talk about how AI is affecting work today.

1:15

Let’s talk about how it’s work affecting you and work tomorrow. And then we’re gonna wrap it up in a nice little bow and, and we’re gonna set you off on your way and it’s gonna be great cuz you’re gonna be ready to deal with it. Um, here’s, here’s just a level set on ai and what I think about ai. This is, I’ve heard it said this way before and I completely agree with it.

1:36

It’s similar to the rise of human life on earth. And that’s not hyperbolic. Like this shit is legit and crazy and important and huge and it will not go away. And so we can’t really put our head in the sand. Can’t put your head in the sand. Silly ostrich. You have to embrace it. You have to adjust to it, and you have to get prepared for it. And right now it’s kind of irrelevant, right?

2:07

It’s all just doing small tasks that it can do for you. Is, is the way most people have imagined it. Social media content and writing kids books and creating pictures and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And basically it’s just being used to create noise. That’s all it is. It’s just a lot of noise. We’re seeing all the social media content, apparently. It’s also writing Valentine’s Day cards. That’s great. We’re using it in these little things.

2:27

Creating your meal plan and your workout plan and all this stuff. And there’s all kinds of things that you can do, uh, where it’s basically gonna compile information and it, and it’s great. Okay? That’s wonderful. Uh, but this will evolve and grow. And it’s starting to do that into ways that have much more meaning. And that’s what I wanna talk about today. I want to talk about that much more. Meaning let’s chat about you and let’s go.

2:53

All right? Because this affects everybody and full stop. This affects everybody. Um, and so, so that’s it. So let’s talk about the current state, right? It’s creating noise. A lot of industries have already embraced ai. They’re doing work with it. It’s not, it’s been around for a lot of auto automation. Google’s been doing it. Think about your maps and all these types of things. The apps, it’s been around, it’s made life easier.

3:16

The challenge AI has always had is we, I mean, this has been talked about for decades. The challenge has been human adoption and user experience was the big play for ai. And Google was very good about that. And they’ve done it. Apple’s very good about it. Um, but now it’s kind of evolved. Humans have caught up a little bit. And so now it’s, you know, the timing is ripe for this kind of thing.

3:42

And, and ai, uh, OpenAI and chat, G p t and all that stuff is, you know, we feel like we’re ready to jump in. And this is kind of the new one, and it’s just the starting point, but it’s been around for, for a long time. So, um, and OpenAI has been around for a long time. They’ve done a lot of work too that, that you’re probably familiar with. So, um, a lot of misconceptions about ai.

4:03

Um, but I think the reason we have so many misconceptions is because we don’t fully appreciate the scale of what’s possible with ai. Most of us are just kind of getting, catching up and getting up to it. The people who have been really knee deep and and arms deep in AI for the past, you know, bunch of years can talk about this scale. Will it destroy humanity? Some will say yes, I think probably not.

4:28

We’re adaptable people or we’re at least 50 years out from that as it goes. Um, <laugh>. But, uh, but AI will make life fundamentally different within the next 10 years, if not five years, if not three years. And so what is important to remember is that humans are adaptable and it’s very unsettling. AI is very, very unsettling in the workplace and what it’s going to happen. And will we remain relevant for our individual, right?

4:57

There’s the macro and the micro and we’re gonna talk about individuals and everything else. A lot of people are going to be left behind in this. And so I don’t want that to happen to you. I want you to be, uh, I want you to be there, but we are adaptable. Um, some people are not. And that’s a fact and that’s gonna be harsh. And there’s going to be a, um,uh, a feeling of, you know, we’re being left behind and we’re gonna fight it and we’re gonna stick to the old way.

5:20

So if you’re thinking about the old way and how you want to clinging to it and do that, you’re probably gonna be one of those people who are gonna be left behind. And that’s a fact. And that adds more fear. And so that’s why we fight. And we say we don’t, don’t take this away from me and all of this. This is societal change problems that we’re gonna have to discuss and deal with, but we’re gonna keep it just to, you know, we’re gonna keep it to the workplace and, and talk about that.

5:41

So what I would encourage you to do is embrace it, don’t fight it, um, and learn it and get really, really good with it. Because this is, this is the future of ai and it’s the future of work and it’s, it’s going to change everything. So let’s talk about benefits cuz we’re just ripping through this. This is, I’m gonna try and do this episode in less than 15 minutes, um, and tell you everything you need to know in 15 minutes.

6:07

Um, potential benefits. Let’s talk about the benefits of ai. One, increased productivity and efficiency. That’s the easy play. That’s it. Um, this is a goldmine for businesses, goldmine for businesses. Um, however, at that same time, generally what’s a goldmine for a business is very uncomfortable for individuals. And that’s something we need to remember. So it will make you productive, it will make you more efficient and will do all of these types of things.

6:34

But what does that mean for you, the individual? And we have to kind of figure that out. So businesses are going to invest heavily in AI because AI will supplement the 25% of workers they’re going to keep while they shed 75%. And the money is going to, you know, filter up the top. That’s what businesses do. We can resent it, we can hate it, we cannot like it, but that’s just a fact.

6:55

And it’s the way the world goes and that’s the way life exists and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So, um, companies are looking at how to utilize AI in different types of ways, and they are going to lay off people. People are expensive, they’re slow, they make mistakes. AI does not so well yet, you know,you know,you know where I’m going to. So, so that’s that. You’ll hear a line about how you’re gonna have increased job satisfaction with ai, um, <laugh>, and it’s a nice little PR pitch.

7:24

You know what some people will, some people will, a lot of people won’t. And here’s why. Um, AI is going to eliminate all the mundane tasks that we have to do. Great. So let’s talk about job satisfaction and mundane. There is comfort in the mundane. There is comfort on the days that we wanna mail it in at work and we just kind of push papers and we just do whatever and we’re like, okay, and I did some work and whatever, I’m kind of mailing it in today and that’s it.

7:55

Um, and so we like that. However, the question is, will that keep us up to pace with everybody else, right? So the, this is going to force us to kind of go, go, go, go, go. We’ll use AI to do this and we’re gonna create more. We’re gonna use AI to do this. We’re gonna create more, we’re gonna do more. We’re gonna do more. We’re gonna do more. And that’s exhausting. That’s exhausting.

8:17

Um, if I go through one more, there’s a flower shop. I mean, I keep meaning to take a picture of, you know, work hard today. So tomorrow’s great and it’s kind of this go, go-go mentality, really driven by the coaching industry about this growth mindset. And we have to do more and we could do more today to fix tomorrow. And it is exhausting. Okay? So, um, we have comfort in the mundane that’s going to be eliminated because AI could do a force and it should, okay?

8:39

But it’s not gonna mean that we could just sit around and do nothing. We’re going to replace it by creating more work based on this AI and do that. So, um, job satisfaction does not come from the mundane. We have to talk about that as well. So yes, AI will eliminate the mundane and increase job satisfaction. That actually means the same thing. Here’s what I mean by that. Job satisfaction comes from creating work.

9:05

Job satisfaction comes from ownership of something that you wish to accomplish and seeing it come to fruition, that’s job satisfaction. If we eliminate the mundane tasks and just get assigned more of stuff we don’t really want to own, we don’t really want to do, that’s not really, AI’s not really going to help job satisfaction. So what we have to do is change our thinking and change our mindset, which we’ve talked about on this podcast before about creating work and creating ideas.

9:31

And that is, you know, when we clear out the mundane, it’s actually a good thing, but we need to refill it with something that’s not bs. And that’s what we have to, that’s the human thing that we have to figure out for us. Each individual is what are we going to create and not just be a passive, all right, well this is done. What are you gonna give me to do now?

9:52

And yes, boss, please give me more work. The, the days of being just a passive observer, endurer, I can’t say they’re over, but it’s not gonna be solved by ai because if you’re just gonna let it be replaced with more of this mundane and you know, just get assigned stuff and do stuff that you don’t actually want to do, then you’re just gonna be just as miserable as you are today. So that’s life.

10:16

Welcome, welcome to it. Something I learned way too late and we’ll see more people take the risk of being entrepreneurs and all of this type of stuff. It’s very, very difficult to do, but we have to make this effort and see fruition. That’s purpose. That’s meaning, that’s exactly what, you know, everybody claims to want, but it takes work to get there and that’s not really what everybody wants to do. Um, so that’s that.

10:39

So when we think about benefits of ai, increased productivity for the business, yes, painful for the individual, but what’s good for the individual is the elimination of mundane tasks. You’re gonna lose that comfort. But if you’re open to it, we have to create more work and do those like really human things to challenge it and make AI reach its full potential so that we could do those things together. Um, there will be new opportunities for work in AI for those in your fifties, you’re probably a little too late, let’s be honest.

11:08

You’re not really going to adapt to it, but there is a major transition time. Okay? So when I say that is what, what, what do new job opportunities look like? We generally think about kids coming out of college and how can they code and program and do these different types of things? Fine, but you can’t have new jobs and programs until you understand how to use it first. And so that’s step one.

11:27

Rather than worrying about what’s 10 years down the road about will I be relevant, start today, play with ai. It’s free open. AI is free to play with, play with it. Learn the new ways of thinking and how to adopt it and come up with new ideas. That is new opportunity right there. So when you’re looking to build something and, and how does AI come in and how do people come into it?

11:46

It’s emerging of two capabilities. What can you think up and how can you think about these things in new ways? And how can AI execute on this and challenge and elevate it and do it in more, do it in more unique creative, different types of ways. That’s what’s going to be relevant in the workplace, at least in the short term. And when I say short term in the next decade. So yes, new opportunities are going to be here.

12:07

It’s up to you to learn it. Okay? You’re watching TikTok videos of all these people doing these new things and you know, that’s great and you say, oh, that’s cool, and then you don’t do anything. Uh, you’re gonna be left behind, right? You actually have to practice this and do it. It could be anything. Write me a marathon training plan, write me, you know, all those things I said at the beginning, those silly little, you know, whatever.

12:27

See what output you get. If it’s not good enough, then you have to change it the way you ask it and give it different types of parameters. We’re thinking in terms of parameters, we’re thinking in terms of theory, and then how do you give really specific direction and expectations so the robot can understand it. This has implications on interpersonal skills as well. So these are the types of things that we have to learn today.

12:49

And it’s a fun exercise. It’s actually a lot, a lot of fun to do that. So when we think about opportunity, that’s one of the things that we have to do there too. Um, let’s talk about skills, right? Cause I’m getting to the 15 minutes. I might go to to 20. I’ve got an outline and I’m, I’m blasting through and you know, sometimes I could go deeper. If you want me to go deeper, I’m happy to do that and reach out and I will go really, really deep.

13:10

Most people don’t pay attention for 45 minutes, so that’s why I don’t do it. Um, let’s talk about the skills that are gonna be in high demand, okay? As we just talked about that transition to learning AI and all of that, um, there are a couple things we have to learn about skill sets. AI is ultimately the result of human work. Okay? That’s it. It compiles it thinks it, spits it back out, and that’s it, it’s a lot of those, those types of things for now, okay?

13:36

Um, skills that will be in high demand in how you could do it. The first, you know, as I think about it, and I wrote this down and I hate this term, but growth mindset, um, learning new skills. We hear this a lot. We need a growth mindset and we need to be thinkers and blah, blah, blah. How that manifests is difficult. Creating a growth mindset. Most people don’t know how to digest this.

13:56

Creating a growth mindset’s kind of like work on your listening skills. It sounds nice, doesn’t mean shit, okay? It doesn’t mean anything unless you give it meaning. So we need, basically what growth mindset means, is we need to ask a lot of questions and assume we don’t know the answer. That’s growth mindset in a nutshell. Okay?Um, it means not having any answers, it means losing your assumptions. That’s where we have to, we have to strip ourselves down here.

14:22

That’s growth mindset is not building on what we have from the past, but stripping it away and learning what to ignore so that we could be open to new ideas in the future. Um, I have more and more conversations, personal conversations, not necessarily work conversations with more and more people who are getting much more aggressive in, in having the right answer and being right. And I recognize that this is just a fear of what’s happening, right?

14:47

They just spit out what they heard either on a news channel or, or something else. They have no context. They have this belief that they’re trying to pass off as truth because they’re trying to hold onto an old idea because they’re unsure of what’s coming next. Growth mindset. We have to shift and shed those assumptions and lose it and be open to the fact that maybe somebody’s got something better than what we think.

15:08

That is incredibly important today. So that’s that. Um, it’s basically insecurity, okay? I mean, that’s when we hold onto these old ideas, it’s, it’s an important thing holding onto these old ideas. It’s insecurity in its purest form, okay? So shed those, those assumptions and do that human-based skills, what makes you uniquely human are going to be incredibly important. Yes, we could talk about empathy and we could talk about, um, all those things, but real creativity is a human skill.

15:39

Interpersonal skills, problem solving, right? It’s ultimately, um, we still need humans. AI is still ultimately the result of human thought. Okay? So how can we be creative with using AI and elevating these types of things? AI is supportive. How we interact with other humans is incredibly important. So sales, jobs, psychological work, um,you know, all of these types of skills are gonna be very, very important in the workplace. We should be working on those.

16:05

Get out and meet more people, be more social, right? We don’t have to, this isn’t like you have to go back to school and, and take these classes. It’s literally interpersonal. Learn how to have a conversation. Again, get out and network. How do you strike up? Strike up small talk. I hate small talk, but we still have to do it. It makes us part of a bigger world. These types of skill sets that we have to kind of say what makes us human, other people and our relationships make us human.

16:28

And that’s what do we create and how do we think about new ideas and all of these types of things that’s humanity and that’s really, really good. Um, and facilitators, facilitators are going to be important, right? When we think about project management, getting things done, how do we finish things? AI will be doing work, but project management’s much more than just Excel sheets and, uh, Trello boards and all that stuff. It’s about working with people to get things finished.

16:56

And that’s project management and that’s gonna be, you know, very important. Um, and the ability to think, we have to think that skillset has gone away. It’s a very kind of flighty kind of statement, but the, the ability to think has gone away because we haven’t had to think over the past few years. A lot of people will jump in and tell you what to think, but we haven’t had to think over the past few years.

17:18

Technology has kind of muffled that quite a bit. And so how do we think and, and encourage this philosophical, you know, how do you become philosophical? How do you think this is, you know, every day just pick a different random question and just think it through to till it’s just beaten into the ground. We should be able to think not about what’s right, but what’s possible. Um, and those are the skill sets.

17:43

So as we go in, what are we at here? 17 minutes. Sorry, I’ll wrap it up in like two and a half minutes here. I’ll do it under 20. Overcoming the challenges. There will be challenges to ai. Change is uncomfortable. Um, and the ultimate goal, I guess for, for government, for business is to make this transition as smooth as possible for the people. That’s your role right now. So that I’m speaking now to the businesses, to the government.

18:06

That’s, that’s that employee prep begins. Now, even if you’re planning to cut your workforce by 50, 60, 70%, which is going to happen by the way, people, that’s going to happen in the next bunch of years. Um, people staying still need the skillset, okay? And as you train these employees and teach these employees these new ways of thinking, more roles and divisions will come up. So you may not have to actually lay off all of those people that you can manifest and build your businesses in different types of ways.

18:33

So some of these skills, the educating of your employees and the training of your employees, these are skillsets we don’t typically think of in the workplace of skillsets. We have to teach belief systems. How do you articulate what you believe? This isn’t the typical kind of corporate top down. This is the messaging I want you to have. How do you get people comfortable with expressing their ideas? That is a skillset that we have to teach.

18:56

Um, how do you articulate question thinking? How do you think and reframe ideas? This is the new type of, of educating that we have to do. And that’s something to invest in today so that AI can, people know how to use the ai. This is part of your business transition. This is part of your people strategy. PS this is exactly what we do. So you can call us and we’ll just, we can make it easy for you.

19:18

We know exactly what to do. We’ve got the program, we’ve got the set, we could do this. Um, and so that’s it. So AI in a nutshell, as we’re wrapping up here, coming up on my 20 minutes, this is a lot to take in, A lot to take in. AI is going to basically what I’ve just told you in the past 20 minutes, AI is gonna fundamentally change everything on this planet.

19:40

Um, if you don’t embrace it, you’re gonna be left behind. This all sounds very, very dark, but there is possibility. We are adaptable, we are unique, we are special snowflakes, we have capability, but it’s going to take work, okay? On the business side, business owners, business leadership, this is an investment you have to make for your employees. It’s going to help your business. It’s going to change your business. It’s necessary for your business.

20:02

It’s an investment. It’s a new line on the balance sheet. You’re gonna have to do it from people. You’re gonna have to do the work. You’re gonna have to create, you have to understand ai. That’s your responsibility. It’s to get yourself ready so that you’re relevant to the workplace so that people are going to want to hire you and people, people are going to want to retain you. This is a point where we’re going to see a bifurcation in society, in the workplace, everything where there’s the people who understand it, the educated and the people who don’t.

20:28

Okay? So this is very, it’s a very, very important time. The bifurcation is going to happen soon. You could do it. I believe in you. I’m here to help. Reach out anytime. Good luck with ai. Good luck with the world <laugh>, and here’s your, your big nugget for everything. Um, I’ll touch on this more, right? I’ll, I’ll do more podcasts on AI in the future of work. It’s going to be so big.

20:49

We, we can’t ignore it. We have to embrace it. So good luck with it. I’m here to help. Reach out anytime and I’ll talk to everybody very soon. Thanks for listening. Thank you so much for listening. Now, do something for yourself. Bellweather is much more than just a podcast. Join us@bellweatherhub.com where you can read riveting articles, view upcoming events, and connect with other interesting people. I look forward to seeing you out there soon.