Letting Go of the Past to Build the Future
Soft skills are the new hard skills in the age of AI. Human abilities will be more valuable than ever as AI takes on more tasks in the workplace. 🤖
There’s so much talk about AI - and for good reason. AI will continue to grow and take up more space in many companies’ "work" architecture.
It won't (yet) be the wholesale replacement of humans. It will (now) be the augmentation of humans, working alongside us to make us more productive.
This will mean reallocating and refining many human roles in the near future. There will be fewer humans on some teams. There will be more humans in other areas.
It will also rebalance how we think about hard and soft skills.
AI is more likely to augment hard skills, while soft (i.e., human) skills are less likely to be displaced by AI.
What does that mean for HR?
We have to be savvy enough about AI to understand its capabilities and limitations and be a leading voice within our organizations on how and where we use it.
We must improve our understanding and assessment of the soft skills needed to manage hybrid businesses of the future that run on a mix of human and AI power.
At a leadership level, we have to become workforce architects who can understand how and where to deploy a range of resources to address business needs, including full-time employees, consultants, gig/freelance workers, guilds and teams, outsourcing, and AI.
We have to get better at creating learning environments where skilling and reskilling are woven into the fabric of how our employees work.
We also need to rethink the nature of work itself. The idea of lifetime employment is a relic of the industrial age. The future is much more fluid, with increased talent mobility (by employee or employer choice).
Reid Hoffman's Tour of Duty model from his book The Alliance is what we should aspire to today.
Think of work relationships in 18-24 month increments. Make honest assessments on how the company and employee will benefit from those 18-24 months. Assess whether the role and scope still meet the needs of both parties at the end of that period. If not, have a program in place to support a positive transition inside or outside of the company.
No one can predict exactly what the future holds. We have to let go of the past to build it.
I'd love your perspective. How are you thinking about integrating AI into your businesses or your personal workflow? Add your take in the survey below and expand in the comments.