Annie Tsai

We are on the precipice of a new era of work. 

I know, I know. You’ve heard it before. But here we are, quite literally living in the post-knowledge economy. It is no longer what you know in a moment in time. It’s no longer about who has the highest SAT score (I’m very thankful for this one!) or who can amass the most information in their brains (although having conversations with people who are like this is quite an incredible experience to have). Today, it is now about how fast you can learn, apply what you’ve learned, adapt, form cohesive ideas, tell compelling stories, work with others, and grow. 

Do you remember that scene in Hidden Figures (if you haven’t seen this movie, please put it to the top of your to-do list)  where the computers were concerned that the giant IBM brain machine being delivered to NASA was  going to make their jobs obsolete?

In the film, the incredible Octavia Spencer playing Dorothy Vaughan says, “The IBM 7090 DPS. It has the capability of solving over 24,000 multiplications per second.” 

Her message to her department? “When [the computer] runs(When it runs), you’re going to know how to program it. Unless you want to be out of a job?” 

Overwhelmingly, her team responds with: NO. And so instead of computing, these amazing women adapt to become programmers of the computers that took their job. 

This question of relevancy has been occupying a space in humanity’s collective minds since the dawn of innovation. As Heraclitus said long ago, “Change is the only constant in life.” Of all the quotes that you can find on the vast internet, this one (and maybe the previously but not anymore  Mark Twain attributed quote about the coldest winter experienced being a summer in San Francisco) rings the most true. Why do we think that this is any different for how we work?

Vaughan’s insight was spot on. The tactic – the manual computational work that this department had become known for – that was now replaceable. However, new specialties and jobs emerged along with the dawn of new technology. Vaughan saw the chance to create a wedge for her and her team and was ready to capture that opportunity when the time came. This cycle never stops. 

I was at an AI Summit not too long ago with other investors and Silicon Valley executives, organized by an incredible organization called FirstBoard.io in collaboration with PwC. A lot of our conversations were around workforce concern around job loss or job displacement due to advancements in AI. The cultural zeitgeist moment of ChatGPT making generative AI accessible intersecting with GenAI actually being conversationally intelligent has created a literal tsunami of opportunity for productivity and efficiency improving applications sitting on top of GPT3/4, Bard, and their own large learning models (LLMs). And this is just the beginning. But it’s not necessarily a bad thing.

I’ve been working in tech since 1997, with my first  job building an intranet and other websites part-time to help pay for tuition while at UC Berkeley. Since that time, we’ve gone through  Web1, Web2, and sort of boomeranged to and back from Web3 to what some jokingly refer to as Web 2.5. Through it all, my job skills have had to dramatically evolve over time. I’ve made websites, did graphic design, was a journalist, a marketer, built customer success organizations, did sales, wrote a book, and today run operations and finance for a software company and advise startups. I don’t see it as reinvention, but adaptation. Even though I’m in spreadsheets and meetings a lot more today than I was in my 20’s, the coding skills I picked up back then I still 100% use today. Just in a different way. 

As AI seeps into more and more of how we work (if you don’t think you’re using AI today, you’re probably wrong. It’s been around for a long time, just marketed differently.), think about it as an opportunity rather than something to be fearful of. The fear of job loss can quickly become debilitating. However, the excitement that comes from seeing an opportunity to learn new skills, get creative, and shave off 25% of your “today work” so you can spend that time doing high value things that only humans can do (for now)  –  that’s a ride I want to get on.