Category: Automation Impact on Jobs

How Automation Makes Life – Not Just Work – More Human

Robotic process automation (RPA) is one of the most transformative technologies of the century, allowing enterprises to eliminate tedious tasks, freeing workers to focus on the higher-value, strategic work that only humans can do, and dramatically increasing efficiency and reducing costs in the process.

Businesses have long recognized the potential of RPA to transform the future of work, with the global market emerging as an estimated $100 billion opportunity according to KeyBanc Capital Markets. Gartner further estimates that by 2020, 40 percent of large enterprises will have deployed RPA software.

However, why should the benefit of RPA be confined to the […]

What Amazon’s decision to retrain a third of its employees means for the future of work

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Scott F. Latham, University of Massachusetts Lowell(THE CONVERSATION) Amazon’s announcement that it will invest US$700 million to retrain 100,000 employees – a third of its U.S. workforce – in new technologies is the latest reminder that the much-heralded future of work is well underway.Policymakers, analysts and scholars trying to discern the retailer’s motives and objectives chalked it up to a public relations move or the natural result of a tight labor market. Others deemed it standard retraining and investment.Lost in the […]

How artificial intelligence will do our dirty work, take our jobs and change our lives

How artificial intelligence will do our dirty work, take our jobs and change our lives

Fifty years after the moon landing, a new Irish Times series looks on what the future holds for us and the next generations. Here, part 1 explores how artificial intelligence will change our lives in the next half-century

At its crudest, most reductive, we could sum up the future of artificial intelligence as being about robot butlers v killer robots.

We have to get there eventually, so we might as well start with the killer robots. If we were to jump forward 50 years to see what artificial intelligence might bring us, would we – Terminator-style – step into a […]

Episode Summary

On this episode of The Digital Life, we discuss workplace automation and the technologies that will make it happen — from robotics to artificial intelligence (AI) to machine learning. The McKinsey Global Institute released a new study on the topic this month, “A Future that Works: Automation, Employment and Productivity”, which contains some interesting insights.For instance, almost every occupation has the potential to be at least partially automated, and it’s likely that more occupations will be transformed than automated away. However, people will need to work in conjunction with machines as a part of their day-to-day activities, and in […]

Could Automated Jobs Increase Homelessness?

Could Automated Jobs Increase Homelessness?

Nobody can predict the future. Many have tried and failed. But for the world at large in 2019, we needn’t hassle ourselves with educated guesses or calculated estimations regarding what might exist beyond our scopes. We needn’t attempt to predict the future at all, because we are already living in it…

Just yesterday, while wondering down the abandoned aisles of my local grocery store, I came face to face with an ominous looking employee who stared me down with synthetic eyes and a painted smile that immediately conjured images of Chuckie. The silent creature followed me, expressionless, with wheels […]

Governments take first, tentative steps at regulating AI

Governments take first, tentative steps at regulating AI

One of the earliest accounts of technology control appears in ancient Greek mythology in the story of Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods and gave it to humans. This stolen gift enabled the development of human civilization.

We humans are now attempting to control a new technology, artificial intelligence, and it is fair to wonder if we will be more successful than the Greek gods were.

State legislatures in New York and New Jersey have proposed legislation that represents the first, tentative steps at regulation. While the two proposed laws are different, they both have elements of information gathering about […]

Why acquiring soft skills is not as hard as you think

Why acquiring soft skills is not as hard as you think

HR & Management Why acquiring soft skills is not as hard as you think

5 min read Coorpacademy’s Jean-Marc Tassetto outlines how to respond to new data on what skills are important in the workplace.

In its latest Annual Global Trends report , LinkedIn says it’s detected a real paradigm shift in what global recruiters are looking for in job candidates. The report, based on input from over 5,000 talent professionals across the globe, says soft skills like ‘creativity’ are increasingly sought after in today’s workplace. Hard skills or soft skills for today’s era? Hard skills are still highly […]

What Amazon’s decision to retrain a third of its employees means for the future of work

What Amazon’s decision to retrain a third of its employees means for the future of work

Amazon’s announcement that it will invest US$700 million to retrain 100,000 employees – a third of its U.S. workforce – in new technologies is the latest reminder that the much-heralded future of work is well underway.

Policymakers, analysts and scholars trying to discern the retailer’s motives and objectives chalked it up to a public relations move or the natural result of a tight labor market . Others deemed it standard retraining and investment .

Lost in the reaction, however, is what it means for the rest of us workers. As an expert in technology disruption , I believe the main message […]

The Educated Underclass: Students and Social Mobility

The Educated Underclass: Students and Social Mobility

Neither a policy paper nor a career guide, Gary Roth’s The Educated Underclass: Students and the Promise of Social Mobility ( Pluto Press ) is, in the author’s words, “an examination of that edge of reality where education and economy produce results just the opposite of what in theory it is claimed that they do.” Roth is a lecturer in sociology and anthropology, and former vice chancellor and dean, at Rutgers University at Newark.

I won’t revisit much of the ground covered in the interview with him that ran at Inside Higher Ed earlier this year. My intent, rather, is […]

Universities are key to 4IR employment

Universities are key to 4IR employment

(John McCann/M&G) Universities in Africa, as with their counterparts globally, are required to contribute to the advancement and development of their societies. This needs to be underpinned by teaching and learning strategies that create well educated, socially conscious citizens who are equipped with skills for their era, in this case the fourth industrial revolution (4IR).

The 4IR is creating overarching conditions that have important implications for our universities: what we teach, what we research and our contribution to the economy, employment and society. This requires a deliberate leveraging and repositioning of our universities to optimise our role in reconstructing South […]