'A million jobs in London could be changed by AI'
8 hours ago Share Save Nicky Ford BBC London Share Save
PA News AI's replacement of people has already led to fewer jobs now being advertised, according to analysts
Artificial Intelligence may be the key to transforming the workplace - but how could it affect you? If your job involves repetitive or automated tasks the impact could be significant. Research has suggested nearly a million jobs in London could be changed by AI, affecting more than 200,000 telemarketers, 150,000 bookkeepers and more than 95,000 data entry specialists. The research from online CV company LiveCareer UK, indicated other jobs at risk include fast food and warehouse workers, retail cashiers, paralegals and proof readers. Consultancy firm McKinsey agreed, and said the number of adverts for jobs vulnerable to AI's impact is down 38% compared to three years ago.
Careers expert Jasmine Escalera says people should ask their boss how they can compliment the adoption of AI, not be replaced by it
Women were identified as being at a higher risk than men because they occupy more of the roles AI could impact. Jasmine Escalera, an expert at LiveCareer, said companies should take this into account and avoid "inadvertently using AI" to create increased gender disparity. She said it was important to engage with the idea and consider how AI has started to change roles already, and how might it change moving forward. "Have an open conversation with your manager on what you can do to complement the change," she advised.
At Queen Elizabeth Hospital, an NHS pharmaceutical robot assists with dispensing drugs, and works with AI to improve methods of doing so
One NHS Trust has started using AI as a tool to help staff, not to replace them. Medication at Queen Elizabeth Hospital's pharmacy is dispensed by a robot and administered by clinicians. AI then uses data to build a pattern of how much medicine is needed to ensure the smooth-running of the hospital. For example, when it's winter flu season, the respiratory ward needs to have enough nebulisers. Rachel Knight, the chief pharmacist at Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust said they were dispensing about 400,000 items a year. "Understanding the intricate detail of what we're dispensing, to who and where it needs to be is really challenging". Pharmacists could not manually identify any patterns, but AI can. "It can tell us where we need to store our medicines so they're ready for the patient at the point of use. It makes our whole work flow more efficient and it also makes it a lot safer for the patients," she said. The government made AI a key part of their 10-year strategy for the NHS. It would involve showing staff about what it can do and how it can do it. Ms Knight, as well as a pharmacist, is also on a digital apprenticeship scheme to teach staff AI skills. "I knew that it was going to be really pivotal over the next 5, 10, 15 years and I didn't feel that in my role as a leader, I was able to lead my team effectively through that." Zeinab Hussain is the digital health leader at Lewisham and Greenwich Trust. She said AI was not there to take jobs but to take over some of those "mundane repetitive tasks". She added: "If it can help us to detect risks sooner, then really that's just going to help us with better outcomes in the long term. "There's plenty of work to do in the NHS, so there's absolutely no concern around us losing staff, but actually it's about upskilling them to do different roles within the organisation."
Fewer job adverts
What about other industries? Much has been written about the City's adoption of AI and the impact on entry-level white-collar jobs. Research from McKinsey suggested more than a third of midsize (250 employees or more) businesses across the country said they were now using AI. They said the overall number of jobs advertised had fallen by 31% between May and July compared with the same period three years ago. In occupations with high exposure to AI, the adverts dropped by 38%. Researchers said if entry-level hiring continued to slow, organisations risked leaving gaps in their future workforce. They advised businesses to rethink how they use AI and identify "which tasks are best automated and which need human creativity, judgement and relationships. "Today's entry-level hires will shape tomorrow's AI strategies, culture, and competitiveness."
'Half of workers'
We can expect to see "efficiencies". Amazon, JP Morgan, Microsoft and Ford are among the companies who are predicting AI will affect jobs. Chief executive of Ford, Jim Farley, predicted AI would "replace literally half of all white-collar workers in the U.S".
One sector leading the way with the adoption of AI is tech. Over the summer Snap, the company behind the social media platform Snapchat, ran a summer workshop in partnership with the Royal College of Art to help young people experiment with augmented reality and design a landscape, using AI to build it. Speaking from the workshop, Arron, a first-year in graphic design at Central St Martins, said designers "need to learn AI as a tool to help us, not replace us. "I think in the future there should be more regulations as to how it's used."
Arron is learning how AI can be beneficial to his future career in graphic design
Snap has been using AI to develop augmented reality glasses that interact with the world. Director of computer vision engineering, Qi Pan, disagreed with the idea that AI would displace jobs in his sector but would instead help people be more efficient in what they do. "Our developers take a creative idea that's in their head and try to turn it into reality. And AI really helps us to do that in much faster ways. "I think what we'll see is that we'll see just an exponential increase in the amount of productivity rather than jobs being taken away."
[SRC] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c07vmllz38jo
