Throughout our research, we have found that there is nothing more embedded into our lives than career.\u00a0 As we contribute to the Counselling Connect Blog, our intention is to explicate, using a mix of research and reflective opinions, some of the dynamics that impact career. We start with a consideration of Artificial Intelligence (AI).\u00a0 AI is a branch of computer science that focuses on programing computers with the ability to resemble intelligent behaviors including learning, reasoning, planning, observing and\/or processing language.\u00a0 We think this blog, plus several future blogs, will inform career counsellors in two ways: understanding the impact of AI on careers; and counselling clients entering the workforce, or who are displaced due to AI innovations. As a disclaimer, our expertise lies in the realm of Career Psychology and not in AI; however, we are doing a lot of reading on the subject.\u00a0 In this blog, we want to examine some of the proposed advantages and disadvantages concerning the impact of AI on future job availability.<\/p>\n
Recent advancements in AI suggest that we are in a \u201cfourth industrial revolution,\u201d but with significantly more implications than previous revolutions. We think there is no doubt that AI will take over some jobs due to such technological innovations as robotics, machine learning, and 3-D printing; and through the impact of AI on manufacturing, retail jobs, and in other domains such as legal and medical.\u00a0 It seems that the question is not when, but how rapidly and profoundly automation will change the workplace.\u00a0 Many think that AI will displace most jobs requiring manual and routine labour – machines can do it faster and with more accuracy. Further, with the advent of self-driving vehicles, many truck drivers, couriers and taxis will be displaced. Recent developments in diagnostic work using computers will impact the medical profession. Currently computers can diagnose abnormalities in x-rays with as much accuracy as radiologists.<\/p>\n
On the positive side, AI can be an aid to workers.\u00a0 Instead of fearing that robots and AI might reach a \u201csingularity\u201d and replace workers, \u201cmultiplicity\u201d proposes that humans will work with machines to solve problems and develop leading-edge technology.\u00a0 Automation will create new jobs not presently conceived of, just as personal computers did in the past. For example, in Human + Machine: Reimagining Work in the Age of AI, <\/em>Paul Daugherty and Jim Wilson envision two categories of workers \u2013 explainers and trainers, both illustrating the idea of intelligence augmentation, that AI systems can be designed to augment human work behavior.\u00a0 Explainers will help humans work with machines and trainers will develop AI systems to do workplace tasks.\u00a0 For example, explainers will work in clarifying decisions made by computer algorithms and explaining them to supervisors and executives. And presently, trainers are developing chatbots that, in response to human consumers, will continue to improve on language recognition to better serve them.<\/p>\n In conclusion, we think that the outlook will be more favourable than bleak. Certainly, there will be job changes and job loss.\u00a0 However, jobs taken over by machines will not diminish the work to be done. Quite the contrary, just as electronics and information technology created more jobs than were lost, AI will do the same.\u00a0 We see several implications for career counsellors and their practice.\u00a0 At the present we do not see counsellors being replaced by chatbots\/robots due to the need for client empathy, something that AI has not been able to simulate yet. However, it is our opinion that the information that informs the practice will need to be upgraded on a regular basis.\u00a0 Most likely, this information will be dispensed by a chatbot or other a computer programmed to process human speech. Counsellors will need some degree of understanding to help clients process the changing aspects of the skills\/tasks need in some work domains such as business, management, medicine, and law.\u00a0 Counsellors will need to upgrade regularly their knowledge of new jobs created from advances in AI, including their location, and the entrance requirements of educational programs and their costs leading to employment in these jobs.<\/p>\n Jeff Landine and John Stewart Throughout our research, we have found that there is nothing more embedded into our lives than career.\u00a0 As we contribute to the Counselling Connect Blog, our intention is to explicate, using a mix of research and reflective opinions, some of the dynamics that impact career. We start with a consideration of Artificial Intelligence (AI).\u00a0 AI […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001081,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[1568,25,1074,1567],"class_list":["post-19826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-online-counselling","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-counselling","tag-technology","tag-technology-in-counselling"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
\nFaculty of Education, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, N.B.<\/p>\nFootnote:
\nThe First Industrial Revolution used water and steam power to mechanize production. The Second used electric power to create mass production. The Third used electronics and information technology to automate production. The Fourth is fusing together technologies that are blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological spheres.<\/h5>\nSuggested Readings:
\nDaughterty, P. R. and H. J. Wilson (2018). Human + machine: reimaging work in the age of AI. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press.<\/h5>\nRetrieved on February 13, at: https:\/\/www.wired.com\/wiredinsider\/2018\/04\/ai-future-work<\/a>.<\/h5>\n
Retrieved on February 13 at: https:\/\/www.zdnet.com\/article\/what-is-ai-everything-you-need-to-know-about-artificial-intelligence\/<\/h5>\n
Retrieved on February 13 at: https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/washingtonbytes\/2018\/08\/18\/there-is-work-to-be-done-ai-and-the-future-of-work\/#441a32032665<\/a><\/h5>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"