I see the real threat as the near term disruption to the work currently being done by people. I’m a Human Resources consultant who works with small organizations (usually under 50 employees). My job can broadly be divided into two parts, the first is proactively working with clients to stay in compliance with state/federal employment reg…
I see the real threat as the near term disruption to the work currently being done by people. I’m a Human Resources consultant who works with small organizations (usually under 50 employees). My job can broadly be divided into two parts, the first is proactively working with clients to stay in compliance with state/federal employment regulations by writing employee handbooks, job descriptions, etc. The second part is more reactive, like answering specific questions about leaves of absence, assisting employers with employee discipline/terminations, etc. I think AI is or will be capable of rendering the first part of the job obsolete within five years. I recently asked ChatGPT what topics should be included in an employee handbook. Pretty easy question and the AI nailed it. Next I asked it to draft an employee handbook for a fictional 15 person company. The result was fine- as in if I were reviewing a prospect’s existing document and they said “it’s an internal document we created by Googling ‘employee handbook.’” It had flaws and was missing a lot of key compliance policies, but as a basic handbook, it was indistinguishable from other, human created, attempts. I suspect that if my input instructions were more specific and directed the output would get better. Even if the AI is essentially predictive text, it seems to me it’s only a matter of time before the product it generates is as good or better than the customized policies I write.
This could be a good thing- honestly if there’s a tediousness to my job it can be writing these documents- and if AI can do a better job it saves me a few hours that could be redirected to more in-person consulting and coaching, the “fun” part of the job. Maybe?
The reason this is worrying in the near term is how widespread, accessible, and good the AI is becoming. It’s not just a person in a role like mine that, best case scenario, can adjust what they do to to adopt and accommodate the AI, but that’s not going to be the case for every profession. I think the nature of a lot of white collar work is about to fundamentally change and I’m not sure we’re ready.
Maybe on a large scale that’s a net positive- but on an individual level it could have major consequences for people that puts one more stressor on a system which is already at capacity.
I see the real threat as the near term disruption to the work currently being done by people. I’m a Human Resources consultant who works with small organizations (usually under 50 employees). My job can broadly be divided into two parts, the first is proactively working with clients to stay in compliance with state/federal employment regulations by writing employee handbooks, job descriptions, etc. The second part is more reactive, like answering specific questions about leaves of absence, assisting employers with employee discipline/terminations, etc. I think AI is or will be capable of rendering the first part of the job obsolete within five years. I recently asked ChatGPT what topics should be included in an employee handbook. Pretty easy question and the AI nailed it. Next I asked it to draft an employee handbook for a fictional 15 person company. The result was fine- as in if I were reviewing a prospect’s existing document and they said “it’s an internal document we created by Googling ‘employee handbook.’” It had flaws and was missing a lot of key compliance policies, but as a basic handbook, it was indistinguishable from other, human created, attempts. I suspect that if my input instructions were more specific and directed the output would get better. Even if the AI is essentially predictive text, it seems to me it’s only a matter of time before the product it generates is as good or better than the customized policies I write.
This could be a good thing- honestly if there’s a tediousness to my job it can be writing these documents- and if AI can do a better job it saves me a few hours that could be redirected to more in-person consulting and coaching, the “fun” part of the job. Maybe?
The reason this is worrying in the near term is how widespread, accessible, and good the AI is becoming. It’s not just a person in a role like mine that, best case scenario, can adjust what they do to to adopt and accommodate the AI, but that’s not going to be the case for every profession. I think the nature of a lot of white collar work is about to fundamentally change and I’m not sure we’re ready.
Maybe on a large scale that’s a net positive- but on an individual level it could have major consequences for people that puts one more stressor on a system which is already at capacity.