Editorial
AI could never do what I do.
AI will never be human so will never replace me.
AI is just predictive text on steroids, I’m much more than that.
All of these statements are likely true, but what is also true is we are continually being blown away by the rapid advances in AI. Perhaps our resolve might falter just a little?
Rather than lose faith, stop thinking about what AI is replacing, and instead identify and amplify the things you can do that AI can’t.
An AI Avatar to Do Your Work?
Before we dig into what makes you unique, I think it's worthwhile to look at some of the innovations that can make it feel like we're entering the uncanny valley.
Case in point, HeyGen can have an avatar you present content online that you yourself have never said and in languages you've only dreamed of speaking. That podcast you spent months researching and painstakingly recording can now be done in no time with Google’s NotebookLM. The tool will pick the main themes from your research and deliver them in a professional and engaging podcast conversation. Regulators rightly put the use of AI avatars that look like and mimic popular personalities under the microscope ahead of the U.S. Elections. LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman undertook an interesting experiment where he interviewed his AI digital twin. Hoffman used the experiment to explore questions like: “What are some ways that I can use this tool to be more considerate and connected? More communicative, collaborative, and expressive?” It is still a work in progress, but he did publish the interview.
Leadership advisor and keynote speaker Charlene Li recently posted a livestream video of her experience developing her digital twin. Like Hoffman, she was looking to use this digital twin to capitalize on her knowledge to take on more repetitive tasks, like training or marketing videos, not to have it toil away while she relaxes on the beach.
What I found interesting about Charlene’s video was the gap between her livestream and the video she is shown of her avatar. She didn’t go cheap on the video either — she hired a specialist video maker and worked with HeyGen. I would have been much more impressed if her whole livestream had been done by the AI avatar, complete with her full personality, technical glitches, little quips and side comments with audience members. Those moments really amplified the current differences between the real Charlene Li and her avatar.
Related Article: Digital Twins in Meetings? Not Any Time Soon
Identifying Your Value and Handing the Tedious Stuff Off to AI
The point of this article however, isn't to talk about how great AI is getting. It's about encouraging self-reflection on what you do that makes you special. Ask yourself: if I was competing with AI for my job, what would I do to differentiate myself? For example, Li's avatar might be able to answer frequently asked questions as well, or even better than she could in a live context. But Li is much more than an information provider. People listen to her livestreams because she has an engaging personality that builds human connections, something an avatar cannot do on its own.
Perhaps you are a frontline worker in a retail context. Your job is under threat from automations like self-checkouts. While on the one hand shoppers prefer the efficiency of such automation, they also crave the human connection in retail experiences. The hospitality industry has benefited from increased automation, but the need to balance automation with a human touch is ever-present. Shoppers don't choose a retail outlet based on efficiency alone.
If this is your job, you want to leverage that human connection: smiles, jokes, engage people in a way that a soulless self-checkout or QR code information site cannot. You might be surprised how customers might prioritize your business because of that.
If your job requires developing content for reading or viewing, you only have to look at the growth in AI generated books (and I suspect videos will follow soon enough) to recognize the growing competition. As an author, how do you differentiate yourself even when you know that AI can mimic your writing style? AI may be able to extend your previous work, but it can’t know what you haven’t done yet. Recent personal experiences, human stories that go beyond simply informing, can be a real differentiator.
We recently studied the most engaging content on Microsoft’s social networking platform Viva Engage and SharePoint Online intranets, and the results overwhelmingly showed content with a human touch outperformed information only posts.
The more human-centered healthcare, legal and education sector jobs provide many opportunities for AI to take over tedious tasks, leaving the humans to handle the more complex moral or ethical issues, where they can leverage their own personal experiences. AI just can’t do that.
Perhaps you are a service or product provider: how could you design your service or product with AI to make your client’s job redundant? While that might not sound too smart, just going through the process of thinking about how AI could help strip away the tedious elements of their jobs will make your product or service more compelling.
Related Article: How to Decode the Very Mixed Reactions to AI in the Workplace
It is not a competition
While this article has been framed as a competition between you and AI for your job, that isn't how I believe AI adoption will pan out. Of course some jobs will be displaced as with the successful introduction of any new technology. But a far greater number will be transformed to create even more value. The automation of hotel check-ins will free staff up to create a stronger bond with customers, who will remember the human experience far longer than the efficiency of the check-in process.
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While the avatars will get better, I seriously doubt people would rather see Reid Hoffman or Charlene Li’s avatars speak than seeing the real thing. However, we are seeing people like Hoffman and Li looking for ways AI can help make them become even more special.
As AI continues to evolve, our opportunity lies in harnessing its potential to strip away mundane tasks, allowing us to amplify what makes us truly irreplaceable. So instead of fearing AI’s impact on jobs, we should embrace it as a tool that frees us to focus on the qualities that set us apart — our creativity, empathy and capacity for building genuine human connections.
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