AI Reshapes Business And Labor: Adaptation, Responsibility, And New Opportunities Define The Future

As AI rapidly enters every workplace, industry leaders and educators debate not just the skills needed to thrive, but how we can all use this technology with responsibility, critical thinking, and an eye toward a more equitable future.

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Michigan Ross Professor M.S. Krishnan and Professor Shobita Parthasarathy from the Ford School of Public Policy join this episode to discuss opportunities AI brings to the business world and some of the challenges and functions in which AI needs guardrails. Topics covered include the transformation of labor, developing technology to center and serve people, and the role of AI in education. The experts discuss interacting with AI critically and with personal responsibility, in a world where widespread adoption is well underway. 

The panel discusses the challenges and opportunities of AI in revolutionizing labor and work. Its widespread implementation has the potential to enhance a person's ability to do their job, but also to remove people from the workplace. Krishnan speaks on merging AI capabilities with human capabilities to improve labor and business functions across the board.

"Will AI replace some roles?" Krishnan asks. "Yes, absolutely it will. But at the same time, it will replace the labor only if the labor does not learn and improve. [Everyone] has to learn now how to work with AI. AI will make a carpenter a better carpenter. It'll make a plumber a better plumber."

Krishnan explores a future where people who are comfortable working with AI replace those who are not. There's a tension between this future, where workers must understand AI to maintain positions in the workforce, and Shobita's conviction that people must recognize their own agency and responsibility in their interactions with AI and their choice to engage with it.

AI has the ability to change the landscape of education - from making teaching more personalized to each student, to making knowledge more widely accessible. As educators, both guests have choices to be made about what lessons surrounding AI are most important to impart to the classroom and the next generation of business leaders.

Talking about the use of generative AI in her classroom, Shobita says, "Every time you use generative AI, it's putting real stress on the environment. I think a lot of students today care about those sorts of things. I want them to think about the limitations of the data and what the generative AI is really doing."

Krishnan also believes that students should understand what AI can and cannot do and critique it. He shares that students' use of AI should not be policed in the classroom, stating that their ability to use all the tools at their disposal will better prepare them for jobs in the business world.

To wrap the conversation, Jeff asks the guests in a perfect world, what one lasting change to business and society they hope to see from this technological boom. On the business side, Krishnan speaks to his excitement about businesses creating completely personalized value. Shobita has two wishes for society's relationship with AI: democratized expertise and an active sense of responsibility and critical thinking instilled in AI's users, empowering people at large to be active participants in shaping the future of AI.