What Is The Impact Of Automation On Job Opportunities
As technology advances, AI and automation are penetrating every industry worldwide – emerging as controversial tools. While many believe, and rightfully so, that automation is greatly assisting humans in making their jobs easier and more lucrative, others fear that it will soon take away their jobs.
In relevance to this never-ending debate of the impact of automation on job opportunities, it has been reported that since 2000, automation has gradually phased out 1.7 million manufacturing jobs. However, on the flip side, ongoing studies and research have shown that by 2025, automation will create around 97 million job opportunities.
Automation is revolutionizing every industry, from manufacturing to healthcare, transportation, and others. Automation integrated with AI – Artificial Intelligence and ML – Machine Learning makes modern workplaces more productive, efficient, and scalable.
The impact of automation and artificial intelligence in UAE on workspaces is uncertain; the only certain thing is that automation will have a major role in the future.
Benefits of Automation – Things you need to know
We are living in a modern era where automation is everywhere. It uses efficient computer programs or machines to eliminate manual efforts, reduce costs and save time.
Businesses can tap into the untapped potential and workflows by understanding how automation works, allowing them to introduce and implement dynamic changes to old-school operations.
Becoming a part of the digital journey empowers employees to grow and enhance their intellectual, communicative, and intellectual talents. Moreover, it pulls them out of the never-ending cycle of tedious and time-consuming manual tasks.
Automation can benefit you in several ways, including:
- It boosts productivity
AI and automation can improve work productivity by many folds. Once you automate all the boring, time-consuming, and other mundane tasks, it frees time and resources to focus on more important things. Moreover, it also reduces human errors. For instance, if you automate the HR department, your employees will no longer have to manually record absentees, paid holidays, or assess employee performance.
- It makes recruitment and hiring easy
One of the biggest challenges in any industry is finding the right fit for the job. The process of hiring new employees is exhausting. It drains a lot of time, money, and other resources. Automating the recruitment process, tracking potential applicants, scheduling interviews, and onboarding or off-boarding employees can be managed easily.
- It simplifies the decision-making processes
Automation improvises traditional business processes. By augmenting human talents, it transforms the way businesses work and grow. It simplifies the processes, identifies the problems, and optimizes data to enhance accurate decisions.
Automation And Job Loss – What is the truth?
With time, automation and AI are taking over the world, and it is crucial to keep up with the changes.
One of the most obvious changes is job displacement due to automation. This has been evident in many agriculture, manufacturing, and transportation sectors. As automation drastically reduces time and labor costs, these companies let go of their employees.
To simultaneously consider automation and job security, individuals must educate about technology and hone their skills. If not, the unemployment ratio due to automation will increase.
To counter job loss and boost your career growth, you need to employ automation and AI in your favor. However, recent statistics show that automation is now largely preferred over humans in areas where it can improve productivity.
In a recent study by the Mckinsey Global Institute, it is expected that 30% of jobs will be replaced by automation in 2030.
AI and automation have greatly displaced employees from the following sectors:
- Factory workers are being replaced by software and robots
- Retail store cashiers are being replaced by automated checkout systems
- Taxi drivers are being replaced by modern, self-driving cars
As alarming as it is seeing this number rising, AI also possesses the potential to create more job opportunities, such as:
- Software developers and automation engineers to create bots
- Data Analysts and Scientists
- Digital marketers
- Research and development
Another study by the Mckinsey Global Institute (MGI) shows that over the last two decades, automation has created about a third of job opportunities in the US that never existed before.
Automation and the Future of Work
Automation has existed since the Industrial Revolution; however, the recent events of the Covid-19 pandemic and emerging entrepreneurs have increased its pace.
We often hear that as automation advances, it will create unemployment in the future. However, to determine the real impact of automation on job opportunities, we do not need to fear it but manage the transition.
For instance, AI and automation have the potential to bring in more and better economic opportunities, instigate decentralized manufacturing modern, and create rewarding careers with more inclusive and diverse workforces. AI can read and analyze data, decipher and learn from the patterns, predict the outcomes and provide accurate insights without human intervention.
This is why many companies are automating some of their business processes, especially those that are mundane or take a lot of time and manual effort.
To leverage these benefits, all sectors in every industry – public or private – need to transition the labor market and empower workers into a knowledge-based and digital work environment. In this way, a business can enhance automation and job security for the employees.
As per the “The Future of Jobs Report 2020” by the World Economic Forum, AI and robots are expected to replace almost 85 million jobs globally by 2025. Even though it sounds scary – and it is, the same report states that it will also make room for more than 90 million job opportunities in the same time frame.
With automation, the road goes both ways.
Automation already enables robots, machines, and even software to replace humans. It is better to deal with it instead of dodging it.
Take Advantage Of Automation
As automation continues to become an intrinsic component of every business in different industries, the future entails infinite advances. The real impact can only be determined by how well the workforce in each sector is educated about this inevitable transition. Moreover, adaptive enterprises globally need to face new challenges by adopting automation.
- Automation and skill development
Over time, the demand for technological skills, higher cognitive skills, and complex data processing, including AI programming, coding, and others, will rapidly increase. Undoubtedly, it will further aggravate the existential dilemma for workforce skills and threaten emerging businesses.
To deal with the modern-day crisis and enjoy the benefits of automation, companies need to undergo extensive research and assessment. As a result, they will learn the factors that indicate when, why and where automation should be integrated.
As fascinating as it is to automate businesses, every company must undergo a rigorous process to analyze the future possibilities, supervision, threats, data inputs, controls, and stability before they initiate it.
It is important to remember that once you automate one business process, it will tell you something new about the other. Therefore, if you fail to document your automation process, it will do more harm than good, and soon, you will lose control over your business.
- Automation and labor force
It is crucial to invest in retraining, educating, and upskilling employees to advance in this technology-driven era. Automation makes it easy and brings in more resources to train employees how to work less on non-value-adding tasks and more on out-of-the-box chores – it is a show-and-tell solution.
Encourage your employees to learn about new automation software and platforms like iApply, participate in such forums, and tap into the wisdom of accepting and adapting automation. Not only will this boost work productivity, but it will also bring in better job opportunities.
- Automation and job market trends
To deploy automation and execute it successfully, the company needs to have a solid technological foundation and infrastructure that aligns with the current market trends. The sad part is that big business has minimal room for data sharing and mostly functions with fragmented processes in silos.
For businesses to be successful and not lose job opportunities, they need to create a collaborative work environment where employees are updated per the ongoing market dynamics. This will boost the employee’s career growth and keep the business ahead of its competitors.
The Bottom Line – Stay Automated
To take advantage of automation, it is important to understand its role in your job, business, and industry. You either side with it or let it wipe you off your workplace. It is your call.
Get your workplace automated, and learn your way around it, so you are always one step ahead and know where to draw the line. Use it for mundane tasks and focus energy on the bigger goals; this way, automation will have a progressive impact on employment.
Industrial automation is inevitable; whether you are unemployed, a fresh graduate, or want to make a career shift or switch jobs, it is important to embrace automation, adapt to the changes, and learn skills that will always be in demand.To find the right job opportunities, you can use smart, AI-based tools to your advantage.
