Future careers (AI's impact)

Transcript

Sue Attewell: I think just to bear in mind that the recruiting manager is looking for an individual. They're not looking for an AI bot. They're not looking for a generic tool. They're looking for an individual.

Emily Slade: Hello and welcome back to Future You, the early careers and student advice podcast brought to you by Prospects.

Sue Attewell: I'm Sue Atwell and I'm head of AI at Jisc.

Emily Slade:  So you're head of AI. How long have you been head of AI? Four years. Four years. Did that role exist prior to four years ago?

Sue Attewell: No.

Emily Slade: Did you invent it?

Sue Attewell: No.

Emily Slade: So what happened there? And are we going to start seeing more and more of those types of roles appear?

Sue Attewell: What happened there was I used to work in innovation and five years ago we thought, hey, there's something coming here around AI. And it was one of those occasions when we got it right. Innovation, every nine ideas you get, seven of them are wrong. Two may be possibles and one might be a flyer. And on this occasion we were right. So five years ago, we started an AI team for two people, whilst also having lots of other responsibilities at the same time. And a year down the line, we started to formalise it and grow the team slowly. And that's, how a lot of jobs start to emerge. they emerge from need. And I think I'm not going to forecast long term because I think that way only likely is failure. people tried to forecast if people back in the horse and cart, they'd tried to forecast cars, they'd have come up with faster horses. Is the great thing there. But I think certainly in the short term, we've definitely seen a growth in roles like head of AI, director of AI, those kind of things. But we're also seeing a growth, or we'll see a growth in the very near future in roles around trust and safety, around AI and ethics, around human and AI collaboration. You know, we'll see a lot of roles in those kind of fields, I think, in the short term. In the more longer term, we will see lots of roles that don't currently exist, but I'm not going to have a guess at what they might be.

Emily Slade:  And can you speak to AI replacing roles that do currently exist?

Sue Attewell

At the moment, we're not seeing a lot of that. We had a lot of forecasts around that a while ago, a couple of years ago. We're starting to see that change at the moment and it's more about how we work changing. But we've been on a track of automation replacing jobs for 30, 40, 50 years. I don't see that stopping. It's going to continue the process. I think what's different about AI is it's replacing jobs at all levels. So previously we've seen automation, it's been cutting jobs out at the manual lower skilled level. With AI, it cuts across its high skills, special skills, middle management, you know, it's all kind of levels that it's there and most roles. But We're not seeing the impact of that yet.

Emily Slade: Right.

Sue Attewell: Not in any large numbers. You know, the graduate jobs market is still pretty static in terms of numbers, roles. But how those jobs are playing out in daily life, I think is changing. You know, we're seeing a lot of research coming up with statistics like 80% of people will see 50% of their tasks change.

Emily Slade: Whoa, that's crazy. And change, I think this is the fear, isn't it? Like change is in then there's nothing for you to do or change is in then you are, I don't know, fixing the AI when it breaks.

Sue Attewell: I think currently it's more about utilising AI in your daily work. So, you know, my daily life has changed dramatically over the last four years. I use AI an awful lot to help me do some things that, quite frankly, I don't like doing very much. so I use it to help me write some emails, particularly to people I don't know. Pretty good at writing them to people I know, but when people I don't know, I find it's really helpful getting tone and things like that. Just throw two or three bullet points in, get it to write me a nice professional sounding e-mail. Help me do things like proofreading, which I've always been bad at. But that's a really good app. It'll do it in seconds. tell me where the errors are and I can go find them. So using it to help them do, offload some of the tasks you don't want. we've seen teachers use it for things like help them to draft lesson plans or to tailor materials to different cohorts within a class. So to personalise some tasks to make them more interesting. we're seeing people just change some of the things they're doing, but I think it's really important to think about what you should change. So I've seen lots of using things like marketing, coming up with effective marketing campaigns and things like that. It's really good at that. Why shouldn't you use AI for that? Some other things that have a bigger impact on people, maybe you shouldn't use AI for. So lots of discussions happening about which tasks within roles can be automated, then which tasks should be automated? Because some boring tasks need to still stay with the humans because they need the human touch. But, it's getting there. AI is now doing a fairly decent job of telling that you need to arrange a meeting with these six people. Can it find a slot that you're all free at? that's a task I'm sure everybody hates. I detest it when I have to look for lots of people diaries and find a slot. And it'll just do it, you know, give it the names. We have open diaries, most firms do internally, you know, let it go away, let it do it. Really good. So it's really something to help, I think can change the way we do some jobs.

Emily Slade: And is there's always a conversation around it saving time as well. And then what do you do with that extra time? Because I think the utopia is that we go down to three day work weeks, four day work weeks with that additional time that we save, but that's not necessarily the case.

Sue Attewell: Not at the moment. It's not. I think what it's doing is giving you more time to focus on the more complex tasks. So instead of, and also, you know, to just think a little bit more. So instead of bouncing from task to task, feeling, I'm not quite ready for this, I'm going to try and get my head in this space while I run upstairs to the next meeting room. maybe we've got 15 minutes to actually read things, prepare and go for it. But more specifically, I think most of the use case, it's about focusing on those complex tasks, the things that, you know, where people add value. So problem solving, interactions with other people. So in education, more time to spend face to face with students and learners, or more time to spend talking, supporting your direct reports, more time to spend thinking about what's actually important that we focus on, what can we do that will really have an impact this year? so freeing up time to focus on things that matter. all the things that you have to do but have very tiny impact.

Emily Slade: Yeah, that's fair. Can you speak to the environmental impact on it?

Sue Attewell: So there's some misconceptions here. I think, so I'm going to speak generally to it. I'm not an expert in this field at all and there are people that are expert in this area, but I think it's really important not to hold AI to a higher account than we do other technologies. So at the moment people talk about, if I use AI, it's using all this water. But what are you going to do if you don't use AI? Are you going to use another technology? Are you going to use Google? Are you going to use a Microsoft product? Or are you, in the comparison you're making in your head when you say it uses all this water, going to do the only alternative to that, which is run down to your local library, find the right book with the answer in, get it out and then run back to the office? Not many people are going to do that. Not many employers would put up with that, to be honest, because people would be missing an awful lot of times. it's about not holding it to a higher standard than we do the technology we all use all the time. we pick up our phone to Google something or to do something, to use social media. That's using water, it's using power. So compare like with like. But AI data centres do use water. But we're starting to see, and that's where I think it's more at that top end that we should be thinking about. We're starting to see things like, you know, Microsoft have built their first wooden data centre. We're starting to see closed loops where data centres are recycling the same water around. So they're not using, you know, as much huge amounts. So we start to see changes happening at that big level. And what we should be thinking is at our level, it's a bit like recycling your yogurt pots and things like that where you're contributing is, am I using this responsibly? So am I doing, am I using AI to do something that's going to help me, that's going to have an impact? You know, am I creating something useful or am I just bored and I'm creating yet more pictures of cats doing funny things to add to the internet? Well, that's absolutely a waste of environmental resources because I'm just amusing myself. It's about thinking about what's appropriate and everybody's going to be different and everybody's going to think about this. But I mean, it's also part of what's required of me. Do I have to do this data analysis? Do I need to have done it in 30 minutes? Can I do that in 30 minutes on my own or do I need to get some help from somewhere? That's interesting. You know, because it's also about fulfilling your requirements. Because there's an element of thinking about what's right and what's ethically right for you. But it's also an element of, this is what I'm paid to do. This is what my role requires. And I think there's going to come a point where some people might have to think, well, is this the right role for me? Because it's a conflict. But that happens, I mean, that happens at the moment with things like companies investing in arms manufacturing and things like that, where you have to think, well, absolutely, I don't really want to work for these anymore. So that kind of thing's always existed and it's just another layer that we have to start thinking about. is there a match here? Is there a mismatch? What we can't think is that we can go somewhere and impose our own personal view on a company that has diametrically opposing. It's about finding our fit, which again, you know, we can use, you know, if we're comfortable, we can use AI to help us find companies that we that have the same kind of ethical views, the same kind of moral stance as we do.

Emily Slade: For anyone feeling anxious about the future, I know you've sort of said you're not going to predict where we're going to be in 10, 20 years time. But for anyone feeling anxious about the state of the future, especially if they've committed all of this time and expense into getting an education and then they fear that everything they've just been educated in is going to disappear in the next five years. What would you say to them? What advice would you give them?

Sue Attewell: I think it's about really thinking about where you want to go as an individual, what you're trying to achieve. But I think it's about making sure that you stay up to date with the skills that are needed in the area that you want to go to. Making sure that you focus in on those human skills that will always be important. So things like deep subject expertise, problem solving, creativity, critical thinking, making sure that you can evidence all those kind of skills, making sure that you can use AI tools well, not down to specific tools because tools will change, but make sure that you understand how they're used in your sector and can use them even if the tools change, you understand the kind of the way they're used and why. I think part of any kind of job application process is about persistence. it's about resilience. It just is sometimes a slog. And I can say that from personal experience. Sometimes for no reason, and it's not actually often a fault of your own. it's not that you're inherently bad, it's not that you don't have the skills that are needed, it's just that maybe on interview day somebody performs a little bit better, they woke up a bit brighter and they presented themselves better and you're having a bad day or you've got a bit of a headache. It might just be that they've got a specific skill set that's just filling that hole in the team. that you haven't got. So it's a very minor thing, but they're like, oh yeah, but we don't have that skill set already in the team. And sometimes you're not even aware of that. Somebody brings something conditional to the table at interview and you're like, oh, that's interesting. So you know, it's not always about you failed. I think we often, you know, that's our tendency when we go for interviews or job, you know, I've done all this and I failed. You haven't failed. Somebody else has been better. or has got the perfect skill set and you've got a 95% match, but that's not failed. You know, the right job is out there. That's why I say it's about persistence and resilience. And I think, you know, having resilience is a skill we're all going to need because change has been happening for many, many years and many people have been negotiating this whole thing of whole careers dying, whole industry is disappearing. And new ones coming. I think that cycle is probably going to speed up.

Emily Slade: Closing thoughts in the age of AI, in the age of misinformation, in the age of a seemingly overwhelming job market, do you have any words of hope for them?

Sue Attewell: I think just to bear in mind that the recruiting manager is looking for an individual. They're not looking for an AI. They're not looking for, a generic tool. they're looking for an individual that can come join their team, fit in and add some impact. And by fit in, I mean have the right skills and experience, unless you're recruiting at a kind of lower level where you expect to have to teach people. we've just taken on an apprentice. Absolutely don't expect them to have the skills and experience and interest. I expect them to have the right interests. I still want, you know, I still want some kind of fit. But I think, you know, people are recruiting for other people, you know, that's what they're looking for. They're looking for people that come across well. I think so, you know, always it's really important to use AI well, use it to augment don't outsource your thinking. You'll soon regret that if you do, because you know it's not as good as people. But it's also misrepresenting you, know, it's homogenising you, just telling you're the same as everybody else. You really don't want to be the same as everybody else. And also I think it's about really thinking about focusing on applying for the right jobs, the jobs that you can do, the jobs that you have the skills and experience and interest in. And sometimes you've got the skills, but you're not actually interested. Well, don't go for it because you're not going to succeed. I've been there. We all make bad choices sometimes. You know, it's really, I think, instead of focusing on, you know, doing 2000 applications, you know, focus on finding the right roles. and put your efforts maybe into that end of the process instead and then focus on tailoring and showcasing yourself well to fit those roles. Because we sometimes think volume matters, but mostly it doesn't.

Emily Slade: Yeah, I think that's really interesting. And on the back of that, I think, as you say, employers, I was an actor and so it feels very relevant, the similarity. They want to cast the role with the best person. They want to employ you if you're the best person. They are not there to trick you or to, do this to like mock you. They want you to join their company and be a good employee.

Sue Attewell: If I'm recruiting an employee, I've got a gap. Usually that means I'm doing the gap. I'm picking up the extra thing. Yeah. I want to recruit somebody to that role. And I want to recruit the best person because I want to recruit ideally somebody that can come in and almost start doing some of the role straight away. Maybe not all of it, but some of it. And just take something off straight away. Absolutely. You know, recruiters are doing this for a reason. They're looking for a person with a specific skill set. Don't waste their time if you don't have the skill set or you don't have the experience. Move on and find somebody that's looking for you. Because somebody will be looking for you.

Emily Slade: Yeah. Yay. Thank you so much.

Notes on transcript

This transcript was produced using a combination of automated software and human transcribers and may contain errors. The audio version is definitive and should be checked before quoting.

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