If 2023 was the year that AI showed what it was capable of, 2024 will be when it becomes a fully-fledged part of everyday life.
That’s the expectation of the BBC’s Leah Carroll, who has outlined five AI trends that workers can expect to see influencing the corporate world over the coming 12 months.
First up, Carroll extolled the benefits of AI for workers with disabilities. Though the likes of speech-to-text software have been around for quite some years now, AI technology could help them become much more accurate and effective, and in so doing break down some long-standing barriers to inclusion.
Next on Carroll’s list was hiring and firing, with AI expected to make recruitment much more equitable. Despite companies trying to eradicate bias from their recruitment processes, countless studies have shown there’s still work to be done – for which AI could help. Carroll noted that academics and industry experts are already working on ways to reduce bias, and their results could make it into practical applications this year.
Once the right person is hired, AI could then be used to deliver a bespoke training package that is tailored to their individual needs or knowledge gaps. Not only will this keep costs down for businesses as their employees are trained in exactly what’s needed, it could also ensure the playing field is levelled so that everyone has an equal chance of career progression and development.
Still on the subject of training, Carroll’s fourth point involved it in a different way – specifically that of equipping employees to work alongside AI. Though some jobs may be rendered obsolete by emerging technologies, a much greater percentage will involve working with them, freeing people up to focus more on those creative endeavours that cannot be automated (at least, not yet…). As such, training in 2024 will likely involve ways in which people can work with AI to get the most out of the systems now available to them.
The final point sounded more of a warning: that AI will advance much faster than the laws and boundaries put in place to regulate it. What’s more, rolling out any workable regulations will require no small amount of collaboration. Carroll says: “As AI becomes commonplace in many industries, experts say that a successful framework for regulation will require global collaboration from corporations, governments and academic researchers.”
If this is achieved, however, both businesses and their employees could look forward to an exciting, AI-assisted future.
