Brooks: AI changing dynamics of America’s future workforce

Darren Brooks is a senior lecturer and assistant chair in the Department of Management and the coordinator of the MBA Program at FSU's College of Business.

The landscape of America’s workforce continues to evolve as issues such as falling birth rates, shifts in prioritized skills and new job growth from AI create an intriguing outlook for the future.

According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, employers are adding jobs while investing in new technologies but continue to struggle finding skilled talent. While the workforce population continues aging as Baby Boomers choose to work longer, a skills gap is predicted for younger generations who will eventually dominate the labor population.

Florida State University’s Darren Brooks is a senior lecturer and assistant chair in the Department of Management and the coordinator of the MBA Program at the College of Business. With expertise in human resources, learning systems and change management, Brooks is a proven business leader and educator with more than 20 years of private and public sector management and human resource experience.

Brooks is aware of the potential issues that arise for the future of America’s workforce but believes there have been precedents set when society faces rapid change.

“AI will have a significant impact on how we work that may involve the elimination of some types of jobs currently performed by humans,” Brooks said. “However, at the same time new opportunities for work will emerge. This divide between dystopian catastrophe and utopian world of hyper productivity have dominated a lot of the writings and media attention. I take the view that with every technological evolution, being forward thinking and adaptive to inevitable changes are the best ways to deal with change in work or any other aspect of our lives.”

Media interested in interviewing Brooks about ways to best address the changing dynamics of America’s future workforce may reach out to him at dbrooks@business.fsu.edu.

Darren Brooks, Assistant Department Chair, Senior Lecturer and MBA Program Coordinator, College of Business

1. What types of jobs could be impacted by AI?

The emergence of AI into our work and personal space established a new frontier that has both positive and negative impacts. On the job front, while all work will be impacted, jobs that are more routine and subject to replacement by AI technology are subject to replacement. This can span areas of technology, service professionals such as call center agents, and professional positions. In discussing with industry and technology professionals and reviewing research in this area, what has emerged is the need to develop skills that augment the capabilities of AI. These types of job skills enhance the need for AI + human interaction, not reduce it. As I often express to my students, augmenting is about the integrating of both technical skills and human skills. Another way to think about it is that tasks that are commoditized, basic and transactional become tasks that can easily be replaced by AI or other technologies. Tasks that require social intensive skills or skills requiring creativity, complex decision making, empathy and interpersonal skills, management fundamentals, skills-trades, systems thinking, and domain expertise will be better positioned for human workers than AI.

2. How critical are training and development programs to ensure that younger people who enter the workforce don’t have a significant drop-off in skills? 

Training is an essential partnership between employees, organizations, educational and vocational institutions today and even more for the future. In fact, the term reskilling and upskilling continues to be utilized in both academic research and popular media, and for good reasons. Millions of jobs will be affected by AI in some way or another. Over the next few years, as companies figure out ways to scale AI across organizational domains, more jobs will be impacted. Training and development play a key in moving employees from the replaceable job categories to the augmenting jobs. 

Students and working professionals alike should be developing AI skills related to their field but also build skills that have utility across the organization. Another way to contemplate this is to think about the portability of skills. Schools such as higher education institutions, high schools, etc. should teach students the right AI skills alongside traditional human skills to prepare them for shifts in work. By continuous training throughout one’s career, workers — young and old —- reduce the potential for skill loss. This increases their value to an organization and allows them to be re-allocated to other work should their job be automated or eliminated completely. However, I must emphasize that re-skilling and up-skilling are shared responsibilities between employers and employees.

3. What, if any, shifts have you seen in workforce skills over the past 30 years?

 Throughout my career, I have seen tremendous shifts in required work skills, particularly around technology. This includes moving away from premise-based mainframes and desktop terminals to portable computing devices, cloud computing and communication technologies. The complexity and techno-driving influence on work will always evolve. However, as we become more technology driven, what makes us human, or you might suggest unique, continues to elevate in importance.

4. What areas are the most critical to invest in to ensure workforce development remains steady, especially as Baby Boomers continue retiring and younger generations take over. 

The question about investments in workforce development is largely tied to our view of the value of the human race, particularly our capacity and capabilities for work. If policymakers, business and education leaders, and members of society in general find value in the human capacity to create economic, social, cultural value through work, then investments into developing worker skills and thereby opportunities to pursue productive outputs from their work would be a top priority of policy, regulatory, and strategic efforts. More specifically, investments should be made in the next generation to accelerate skill development, expand access to skill development beyond traditional educational and vocational pathways, and prepare workers for a world of work that prioritizes, what I refer to as skill interoperability across the organization than rigid jobs that are defined by narrow job descriptions and tasks that can become obsolete.

– Stephen Stone