The word “Luddite” originally referred to bands of English textile workers in the early 19th century who smashed machinery they believed threatened their livelihoods.

Historically, their protests targeted exploitative labor practices and low wages while defending standards for high‑quality goods at fair pay, rather than opposing technology per se.

Modern usage extends the term to people in the 21st century who oppose new technology or new ways of working, though this label often oversimplifies diverse motivations and critiques.

Scholars note the Luddite label has been mischaracterized as backward, obscuring how techno‑skepticism can be a principled challenge to the power structures and ideologies driving technological development.

The original movement can also be understood as a labor revolt against poverty and wealth transfer from workers to owners, not a blanket rejection of machines.

A central driver of 21st‑century Luddism is anxiety about automation’s impact on jobs and power, with some experts predicting mass unemployment and highlighting that only 5% of new jobs from 1993–2013 emerged in high‑tech sectors like IT or telecom.

Concerns include a diminishing economic need for human labor as emerging technologies displace tasks, which has prompted proposals such as universal basic income for those no longer needed in traditional roles.

Modern Luddite tendencies also involve critiques of representative democracy and opposition to global financial capitalism, with some protesters seeking alternative social systems centered on direct democracy, equality, and individual freedom.

The movement today spans varied ideologies—including anarchism, socialism, and liberalism—and emphasizes social justice and collective bargaining as counterweights to technological power.

Commentators also describe regions like the EU as attached to legacy technologies and lagging in the 21st‑century digital economy, reflecting institutional forms of techno‑resistance.

Public anxieties are widespread, with 77% of Americans concerned about job loss due to AI and studies estimating that 47% of U.S. jobs are at risk from automation. [25].

Some analyses estimate up to 300 million jobs worldwide could be lost to AI‑powered automation, amplifying resistance to rapid adoption.

Fears extend beyond jobs to wage stagnation, rising inequality, and the possibility that rapid AI adoption will worsen social tensions for already disadvantaged groups. [25].

Skeptics also point to a lack of transparency and accountability in AI development and deployment, which can compound economic insecurity and distrust.

Broader social factors—including fears of national identity loss intertwined with economic insecurity—can energize populist resistance that overlaps with opposition to certain technologies.

Modern “neo‑Luddite” examples illustrate a spectrum of motives and tactics.

High‑profile figures who warned about AI’s risks, such as Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking, have been labeled with the “Luddite Award,” showing how critiques of AI safety are sometimes dismissed as anti‑tech.

Some groups, like the large Antiwork community on Reddit, press for higher wages and unionization and critique work norms that they believe are reinforced by technology.

Other cases show extreme actions, such as a lab manager faking a bomb threat to protest a university VR lab’s “metaverse” vision and its potential for surveillance and control.

Certain extremists inspired by the Unabomber have targeted infrastructure under a neo‑Luddite banner, while others advocate nonviolent simplicity, such as Satish Kumar’s “small is beautiful” ethos that urges technology to serve human creativity. [19].

Environmental and health critiques also feature, with activists like Vandana Shiva opposing technologies such as genetic modification and artificial fertilizers.

Some communities, such as Indonesia’s Badawi, have rejected internet access to preserve local traditions and reduce perceived mental health harms.

At the individual and organizational level, technology resistance is shaped by psychological and sociological factors such as fear of change, fear of loss, and even associations of digital transformation with staff cuts.

Learning resistance can be driven by low interest or fixed mindsets, and external factors like socioeconomic status, demographics, and personal attitudes also influence adoption. [11].

Perceived usefulness and perceived risk predict acceptance, while risk‑averse consumers avoid new tech and often rely on social proof to reduce uncertainty. [13].

Demographics matter—age and education correlate with willingness to adopt—and prior high‑tech purchases can signal openness to future technologies.

Multiple risk types shape decisions, including physical, operational, economic, social, and psychological risks, and mitigations like safety measures and alerts can ease concerns.

Trust and data privacy worries are common, particularly among older adults, and trust building can facilitate learning and adoption. [12].

Workplace concerns include lack of technical expertise, insufficient customization, and high costs, which can stall adoption and fuel resistance.

Employees are especially wary of digital surveillance and monitoring that erode autonomy and freedom at work.

Some people worry about technology’s mental and social health impacts, including increased isolation tied to higher tech reliance.

Resistance is also influenced by low trust in leadership, disengagement, and skepticism about leaders’ understanding of frontline realities.

Effective approaches to address resistance emphasize early and sustained involvement of end users in technology decisions to uncover requirements and build ownership.

Clear, transparent communication plans that address concerns, set expectations, and explain benefits are consistently linked to higher acceptance.

Robust training and support reduce confusion, improve skills, and help employees collaborate effectively with AI and other tools. [35].

A phased adoption approach, redesigning career paths and skills, and continuous human‑machine interaction can lower anxiety and optimize outcomes.

Framing adoption as human‑machine collaboration, supported by ethics guidelines and data protection, reduces replacement fears and builds trust.

Change management with visible, authentic leadership and a culture of continuous learning is vital to realizing ROI from digital investments. [36].

Trust is a critical foundation, yet only 21% of U.S. employees strongly agree they trust their organization’s leadership.

Leaders can build trust by modelling openness, respect, and integrity, creating psychological safety, and fostering honest two‑way communication. [72].

Transparency and empathy are essential for AI adoption, and governance and cybersecurity practices strengthen confidence in AI‑driven decisions.

A culture of transparency—supported by regular contact, visible leadership, and accessible information—helps mitigate resistance and sustain adoption.

Job security fears are real and widespread, with estimates of 85 million jobs eliminated by 2025 but 97 million new roles created if training and reskilling keep pace.

Supervisors should open dialogue to debunk automation myths, understand employee feelings, and involve workers in shaping how automation is used.

Employees often perceive automation tools as threats or burdens unless managers clearly explain benefits, incorporate employee ideas, and provide training to refocus people on higher‑value tasks.

Creating safe spaces for candid discussion, championing team wins, and prioritizing people’s well‑being help teams navigate change without alienation.

Targeted training and development opportunities build confidence and help employees see tangible benefits like improved productivity and efficiency.

When well managed, digital tools can be productivity enhancers—76% of employees say digital tools make them more productive.

Cloud adopters often report increased revenue and significant value, though success requires strategic investment and follow‑through.

AI’s promise is substantial, but up to 60% of AI/ML projects fail due to inconsistent data, underlining the need for data quality and responsible AI practices.

Organizations report that AI can transform productivity and innovation, but many executives see gaps in employee readiness and talent strategy, which reinforces the importance of training and clear communication.

For building rapport with a technology‑resistant supervisor, approaches that help include empathetic, transparent conversations about risks and benefits, evidence‑based dialogue on job and power concerns, and openness to alternatives and pacing. [36].

Inviting them into problem definition and solution design, proposing phased pilots, and emphasizing governance, privacy, and ethical safeguards can align solutions with their values. [35].

Suggesting upskilling paths and human‑machine collaboration models, while creating psychological safety and recognizing their expertise, can reduce anxiety and foster partnership. [36].

Grounding discussions in shared goals—quality, fairness, and sustainable work—connects back to the original Luddite emphasis on standards and dignity, reframing adoption as serving people rather than replacing them. [2].

The word “Luddite” originally referred to bands of English textile workers in the early 19th century who smashed machinery they believed threatened their livelihoods.

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Report Reveals the Impact of Digital Adoption on Enterprises

WalkMe's 'The State of Digital Adoption 2024' report highlights the crucial role of digital adoption in enterprises, revealing that improper use of technology is costing companies an average of $1.14 million per week. The study also underscores the importance of optimizing technology investment, especially in the backdrop of global IT spending expected to reach $5 trillion.

Hadeel Hashem
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An exhaustive study titled 'The State of Digital Adoption 2024', executed by WalkMe Ltd., unveils significant findings on how the adoption of digital technology is influencing enterprises. The research involved over 4,000 executives and employees and pointed out that improper utilization of technology is costing companies an average of $1.14 million per week in lost productivity. Moreover, employees are losing a staggering 44 working days annually to technological issues.

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Increasing Emphasis on Digital Adoption

Despite these challenges, enterprises are increasingly acknowledging digital adoption as a strategic necessity. The study shows that investment in this area has jumped by 63% compared to the previous year. Yet, only a meager 6% of the surveyed organizations have fully executed digital adoption best practices. However, these organizations are reaping substantial benefits including an average monthly saving of $4.9 million in costs.

Future of Businesses in Digital Landscape

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The report forecasts that by 2028, companies that fail to incorporate digital adoption strategies might find themselves in an unsustainable position. The misuse of digital technology investments, particularly in medium-sized enterprises, is also brought to light, with an average of $13 million in digital investment not actualizing its return on investment (ROI) due to poor adoption practices.

Optimizing Technology Investment

The report highlights the importance of optimizing technology investment, especially as global IT spending is predicted to hit $5 trillion, with a 13% growth in software expenditure. WalkMe's Vice President, Ofir Bloch, underscores the vital role of digital adoption in achieving HyperProductivity, a state where employees can effortlessly use applications and companies can automate processes to create a seamless, streamlined workflow.

The report concludes that mastering digital adoption is the key to navigating productivity challenges in a fluctuating economic landscape and ensuring full realization of ROI on technology projects.

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Historically, their protests targeted exploitative labor practices and low wages while defending standards for high‑quality goods at fair pay, rather than opposing technology per se.

Title:

Content: The new is the old well forgotten.
Where in the Network there was a fashionable insult to the opponents of AI
In the Internet discourse, deep in the study of sarcastic comments of anonymous persons, you can find the term "Luddite".
This label is often referred to as people who dare to express the slightest inclination to inhibit the constant development of artificial intelligence (AI).
Related video
Interestingly, such prominent figures as Elon Musk, Stephen Hawking and Bill Gates have been awarded the Luddite Award, which is recognition of their cautionary position regarding the potential dangers associated with artificial intelligence.
During the ceremony, Robert D. Atkinson, the organizer of the award, noted: “Unfortunately, luminaries such as Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking have contributed to the feverish refraction of hands about the impending apocalypse of artificial intelligence, ” writes IFLScience.
In Focus.Technology appeared its own Telegram-channel.
Subscribe not to miss the latest and exciting news from the world of science!
Atkinson also explained: "Do we consider any of them personally Luddites?
No, of course not.
They are pioneers of science and technology.
But they and others have done a disservice to the public — and undoubtedly have helped and comforted the increasingly common neo-Luddist impulse in modern society — by demonizing AI in the popular imagination.
But how did the term come about?
Its roots can be traced back to the early 1800s in England.
Before the industrial revolution, skilled craftsmen who knew a lot about textile production made clothes using their own machines and specialized tools.
However, a situation arose when new technologies and methods of mass production appeared, as a result of which artisans were unable to compete.
The result was a movement whose purpose was the destruction of the textile industry and the destruction of new machines.
Although there is some truth to this story, it does not reflect the whole essence of the Luddite movement.
Their actions were not driven solely by a reaction to new technologies; rather, they were a response to the profound transformations taking place in their professional activities.
While it is true that they often attacked a knitting machine known as a stocking frame, as well as other mechanized fixtures, their main concern was the labor practices associated with these machines.
Kevin Binfield, editor of the Luddite and Compassionate Works, explained their motives: "They simply wanted machines to produce high-quality goods, and that these machines employed workers who had been trained and received fair wages.
It was their only concern. ”
The nickname "Luddites" comes from the nickname "Ned Ludd", an apocryphal figure who allegedly sabotaged a textile factory in 1779, although historical evidence suggests that this man was most likely a fictional one.
In a 2007 paper, researcher David Linton explained: “Some say that a young man, possibly with cognitive impairment, named Ned Ludd once misunderstood an order and accidentally broke his frame machine.
Others argue that this was done deliberately, in a fit of anger.
Whatever the motive, it seems to have become a joke phrase that whenever the machine breaks, for whatever reason, you can say something like, "Ludd must have been here."
From this construction, it is a short step to the ironic application of the name Ludd to vandalism for political purposes. "
Between 1811 and 1816, the Luddite movement held sporadic and somewhat unorganized protests, characterized by the destruction of cars and the burning of factories.
In response, the mill owners resorted to extreme measures, using deadly force against the Luddites.
In April 1812, there was a grim turning point in Huddersfield, where at least four people died at the hands of the mill owners.
In retaliation, the Luddites killed the owner of the mill, William Horsfall, who boldly declared his intention to "smear himself with Luddite blood to the saddles."
Horsfall was shot while sitting on his horse.
Faced with these uprisings, the government immediately sent thousands of soldiers to quell the protests.
Moreover, they adopted a law according to which the breakdown of cars was subject to the death penalty or sending to colonies.
Subsequently, the movement dissipated, but the stable expression "Luddite" could not accurately convey the ideals and goals of the Luddites.
Previously, Focus wrote about the first IPSO in the history of mankind.
It turns out that it was invented in Babylon and it concerns the Flood.

Modern usage extends the term to people in the 21st century who oppose new technology or new ways of working, though this label often oversimplifies diverse motivations and critiques.

Scholars note the Luddite label has been mischaracterized as backward, obscuring how techno‑skepticism can be a principled challenge to the power structures and ideologies driving technological development.

Title:

Content: Hey tech billionaires, if you want to talk about radical change, let’s abolish venture capitalism

 / Source: GuardianAus

The future that technology elites like to imagine looks remarkably similar to the one we’re in

‘Any meaningful, progressive – and dare I say, hopeful – view of the future of technology must be willing to engage with its politics, history and consequences.’‘Any meaningful, progressive – and dare I say, hopeful – view of the future of technology must be willing to engage with its politics, history and consequences.’Do you support sustainability, social responsibility, tech ethics, or trust and safety? Congratulations, you’re an enemy of progress.

Andreessen lambasts academia for being “disconnected from the real world, delusional, unelected, and unaccountable – playing God with everyone else’s lives, with total insulation from the consequences”. I have never read a more apt description of Big Tech.

So why should we give this manifesto any time of day? As the co-founder of one of the world’s biggest venture capital firms, Andreessen holds significant power. And he’s far from alone in his thinking – the manifesto offers a glimpse into the belief systems of many tech billionaires. Echoes can be heard of Mark Zuckerberg’s infamous former motto:Tech elites like to cast themselves as radical revolutionaries. But we find ourselves in a relentless cycle of sameness. headtopics.com

Concealed within the rhetoric of tech progress is preservation of the status quo. The future that tech elites imagine looks remarkably similar to the one we’re in: unchecked power, consolidated wealth, low regulation and minimal consequences when technology proves to be harmful. If we want to talk about

It serves tech billionaires well to make it seem as though social progress is intrinsically linked to tech development. They cast themselves as our; here to save humanity provided they retain the power, capital and market dominance to do so. Anyone who dares get in the way is dismissed as backwards or ignorant. This mischaracterisation goes at least as far back as the early 1800s and the Luddite uprising. headtopics.com

Then as now, when elites misrepresent techno-scepticism as dangerous or backwards, they are trying to direct attention away from rational concerns about manifestations of power and profit.The brand of optimism wielded by prominent tech industry figures weaponises hope for a better future. It asks us to shy away from the political realities of technology as it stands in favour of a libertarian fantasy (or nightmare).

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The original movement can also be understood as a labor revolt against poverty and wealth transfer from workers to owners, not a blanket rejection of machines.

Title:

Content: Brian Merchant, author: “Luddites are more dangerous to the rich than Robin Hood”

The Luddites have been a great historical resource. Any showy enemy of anything that looked like technological progress has been called a Luddite. Today with generative artificial intelligence and its critics, the word has been revived. The author and journalist Brian Merchant (Iowa City, USA, 1983) saw it coming and has written a book that reviews the Luddite revolt in England at the beginning of the 19th century and its similarities with current technologies: Blood in the Machine (Blood in the Machine, currently without a planned edition in Spanish) thus explores the origins of the current revolt against big technology.

Although the book has appeared in the midst of the AI hype, Merchant began his research a decade ago: “Uber was growing and it was beginning to be seen that it was having a hard impact on taxi drivers, I heard the term Luddite from the pro-Uber sector and wrote an article titled You don't understand anything about Luddites”. Now in his book he remembers that the Luddite revolt was a labor struggle, not anti-technology, at a time when unions were prohibited. In a conversation with EL PAÍS from his residence in Los Angeles, Merchant clarifies the historical impact of the Luddites and the possible similar struggles that are being played today in Silicon Valley.

1. The Luddites were not against progress

The labor revolt over the loss of rights was more important than the destruction of textile machines: “The biggest mistake about the Luddites is to say that they were against technology and progress,” says Merchant. “They were against certain technologies because they recognized the way in which they were going to be used in their context against them as workers. It was a labor movement, against poverty, not anti-technology. The British Government began to mold them in this way almost immediately, it was keen to mock the Luddites and present the argument that they were against progress. It is very similar to how today people in positions of power in technology companies accuse those who complain about poor working conditions. It's the same story for 200 years.”

The book quotes a phrase from historian Eric Hobsbawm that explains this stage: “It was collective bargaining through riots.” According to Merchant, this tactic in a workers' struggle was very powerful for two reasons: “First, it was symbolic because everyone understood that what they were destroying was not just a machine. It was also the specific machine used to transfer wealth from the workers to the employer. Second, it was useful because they destroyed the equipment that businessmen needed.”

2. Why Robin Hood is better accepted than Ned Ludd

Ned Ludd was a legendary character. No one knows for sure if he existed. It was the legend of a teenager who would have broken the first machines at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. In 1811, rebellious workers used his legendary name to sign letters and further scare: “Ludd probably never existed. But the incarnation of it would become a mascot, an organizational tool, a wink: a powerful 19th-century meme,” Merchant writes.

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Ludd lived near Nottingham (United Kingdom), like another legendary figure who has been better treated by history. There must be a reason, says Merchant: “The Luddites organized a popular and powerful rebellion. People wrote popular songs about them. They were like Robin Hood. But it is interesting that Robin Hood has endured as a positive light, while the Luddites have not. He suggests that the myth of Ned Ludd is in some ways more dangerous to the elites and the wealthy than that of Robin Hood, which is a little more nebulous and open. The Luddites say: go ahead and break the machines of your oppression. Robin Hood says: steal from the rich and give to the poor. “I think that’s a little more tolerable.”

3. How are they similar to today's problems?

The background of the book is that the history of the Luddites is similar to what happens today in Silicon Valley, where a small group of corporations dominate new technologies. “The way technologies are developed has basically not changed. You have a handful of people with access to enough capital or political influence to be able to build a factory and use automation technologies. “Back then, the most aggressive owners didn’t ask anyone how to find a way to make this a win-win.”

Merchant has received criticism for equating the great businessmen of 19th century England with 21st century America. But there are details that he does not see that far away: “The technology development process is in some ways even more undemocratic today than then. There is this immense pool of capital available to Silicon Valley innovators through venture capital. Uber wasn't profitable for 10 years, but they had access to that capital. Did anyone really like that? Did it work for workers and delivery people? Nothing mattered, they just had more money and moved on.”

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A central driver of 21st‑century Luddism is anxiety about automation’s impact on jobs and power, with some experts predicting mass unemployment and highlighting that only 5% of new jobs from 1993–2013 emerged in high‑tech sectors like IT or telecom.

Title:

Content: You will not miss us!
8,008 followers
Why robots will take your job, and what to do - panic or rejoice
Why robots will take away your profession.
Increasingly, you can hear about the challenges posed by automation and cybernization to existing professions today.
And we are talking not only about unmanned vehicles and chatbots replacing call center operators, but also about programs that can calculate bank loans and insurance rates, depriving analysts and, moreover, neural networks that claim to compete with highly qualified and creative employees.
Exemption from routine or danger of unemployment?
A cause for concern or long-awaited freedom?
History of the problem
Mechanisms of ancient times.
Competition has always existed – professions disappeared and arose, people fought for jobs with each other and with technology, philosophers and economists built forecasts and tried to predict the prospects and are still doing it.
For example, you can assess how much automation threatens your profession and how quickly robots will replace you by using Will Robots Take My Job.
Aristotle was the first to think about the possibility of transferring “work ” to machines.
In the first book of his Politics, he suggested that they could evolve to such an extent that the need for human labor would disappear.
For him, quite in line with the views of work at the time, as something distracting from participation in public life and personal development, this was an extremely optimistic forecast.
“Work ” in ancient Greece was considered to be the lot of the lower classes, and the mechanisms would only liberate slaves, considered nothing but“ machines of flesh and blood. ”
The reorientation of the economy to the export of wool led to the introduction of a policy of “enclosures ”.
The real competition of a sufficiently large mass of people technology for the first time was only more than a millennium and a half later in England.
At first, the reorientation of the economy to wool exports led to the introduction of a policy of “fencing ”, in which landlords expelled farmers from the fields in order to free the territory for sheep grazing, which led to the first massive surge of“ unemployment ” – albeit not in the current sense.
The then arising vagrancy and poverty contemporary of these events, the Chancellor of England and philosopher Thomas More described the famous "sheep ate people."
However, after a few decades it became clear that no – not eaten.
The former peasants were absorbed by the growing cities, where they found a new job in textile manufactures, processing the same wool obtained from shearing sheep.
This was the first example of how, by taking away one thing, “technology ” is able to offer something different.
But we must admit: the process of urbanization was painful, the work that replaced the cultivation of land turned out to be hard and dirty, the gap with the traditional way of life was very traumatic, and the population of England as a result of hunger and the fight against vagrancy, which was conducted, including the use of gallows, decreased, according to some estimates by 30% (to understand the scale - the Soviet Union during the Second World War lost "only" 15% of the population).
Workers in a textile factory, late 18th century.
The next episode of the confrontation between people and technology occurred a century later in the same field of light industry - the invention in 1785 by Edmund Cartwright of a mechanical loom increased labor productivity forty times.
Jobs that had just been lost were once again lost.
But again temporarily – after spinning machines, others appeared and all of them demanded new resources, and their extraction – new types of labor.
Manufactures were replaced by factories, and muscle strength by the power of steam obtained from coal.
Machine Destroyers
The Luddite movement.
This time, the changes that occurred were met with bayonets - there was a movement of Luddites.
Sabotage of work and direct action: attacks on factories and the destruction of machines caused a harsh reaction of the state, which sent troops to suppress the “army of Ned Ludd ”.
It is characteristic that no one at the top bothered to convey to the workers the idea that there will still be work for them, even if not the one to which they had time to get used.
The fact is that the “top ” themselves at that time did not think too much about how all this was arranged, and people were perceived as expendable material, while the inertia of consciousness of ordinary workers who had just recovered from the transition from the agrarian to the urban way of life was also very high.
The First Industrial Revolution at the beginning of the 18th century.
The theoretical basis for the interaction of technological innovations and the masses of labor began to be summed up only by economists and philosophers of the middle of the XIX century.
They were the first to suggest that the disappearance of certain types of work in the process of technological development entails the emergence of new ones, and “work ” as a whole is not something final, which may be“ not enough ”.
The First Industrial Revolution was in full swing and the optimism of its apologists only grew stronger over time.
By the end of the century, it seemed that progress would eliminate not only social problems and contradictions, but could also rid humanity of wars.
However, while some spoke of the "Luddite delusion", others spoke of the "enslavement of the masses" and the need to hand over to the "factory workers", predicting that as long as the instruments of production are in the hands of the big proprietors, their employees will remain disenfranchised, and the lack of social security will cause explosions of unemployment at any moment.
Second wave
The Second Industrial Revolution.
The word “unemployment ” came into being at that time.
The fact is that a peasant working in the fields or a craftsman who provides for the needs of himself and the small surrounding community could not face something like this - he himself formed his employment.
When the scheme of selling labor on a strict schedule became mass within the framework of fulfilling a strictly regulated set of duties, the challenge arose to lose such an opportunity.
The Second Industrial Revolution was on the way.
The basics of streaming production were laid at the end of the 19th century, and by the beginning of the 20th century, the combination of Ford ’ s marketing strategy (he invented that the car was not an attribute of the elites, but a mass need) and the conveyor he introduced led to new changes that went beyond factories and factories.
On January 18, 1886, the first car invented by Karl Benz was released.
It was the emergence of technology on the streets of cities that brought a new wave of competition.
Look at the photos of the streets of the beginning of the last century: here they are dammed with carts, among which a lonely clumsy car is trying to maneuver, but ten years later, the only horse frightened by the roar of engines and sobbing of klaxons is clutching to the sidewalks.
Here it will be important to note how unpredictable this jump became: “At the beginning of the 20th century, the French Academy warned about an environmental disaster, which inevitably should lead to the accumulation of horse manure associated with the development of horse-drawn transport in Paris, ” recalls, reasoning about the prediction of the future Stanislav Lem.
However, note: in those regions where human labor is cheaper, technology can not replace it, as we are shown, for example, rickshaws, until recently used their own muscle power and only with a sharp drop in the cost of small vehicles motorized.
A more modern example is “computer rickshaws ” – hundreds of thousands of low-skilled Chinese, hacked captchas all day, because their work costs less than the introduction of scripts.
Technological unemployment
The line of the American unemployed during the Great Depression.
In the 1930s, Maynard Keynes, who gave the world the theory of the “social state ”, from the attempts of which many economies have not recovered so far, introduced the term“ technological unemployment ” into mass circulation.
Since then, the debate about whether the introduction of new technological solutions and opportunities can create a long-term job crisis or whether everything is limited to repurposing, when obsolete professions are replaced by new ones, and it is enough for people to change or improve their skills.
Until the end of the last decade, most experts were inclined to believe that “technological unemployment ” is always a temporary phenomenon, leading to the renewal and improvement of the professionalism of workers.
Mechanical labor was replaced by physical labor, the operator - a profession more status and highly paid than the worker, the reduction of costs leads to the release of time - these are the main theses sounded then.
Pessimistic views remained largely the domain of marginals, such as Theodore Kaczynski, famous for his terrorist struggle against progress under the name of Unabomber and primitive philosophers.
Pessimism
The first full-fledged computer in the USSR BESM-1.
Cautious voices expressing doubts about the correctness of this approach sounded even then.
And if in one of his speeches in 1962, President Kennedy said that “if people are able to invent new machines that take away their jobs, even more so are able to invent new jobs, ” then two years later, a letter from scientists and activists concerned with the problem of technological unemployment, sent to his successor, Lyndon Johnson, stated that“ a revolution in cybernetics will create a separate nation of poor, unskilled unemployed. ”.
Theorists disputed the impossibility of long-term unemployment, as did Martin Ford in the book “Light in the Tunnel: Automation, Acceleration of Technology and the Economy of the Future ” or Marshall Brains in“ Robotic Nation ”.
Gasne-Peter Martin and Harald Schumann, in their Global Trap, describe a society in which the labor of twenty percent of the population is enough for the world economy to continue to develop.
There are those who see it as a threat and a danger, like Paul Krugmann in his article “Sympathy for the Luddites ” or Frey and Osborne in“ The Future of Work. ”
In addition, in practice, it turned out that technology is not so freeing up time – for example, representatives of professions requiring high qualifications, at least in the United States today work more than 30 years ago, and technologies that provide remote access to working tools allow them not to break away from professional tasks and in their “free time ”.
It is also important that new jobs, as it was noticed at the beginning of the XXI century, are created not so much by technology as by the change in the way of life that they entail.
So in the mid-2010s, nine out of ten working people are employed in professions that did not exist a century earlier, but only 5% of the jobs that appeared from 1993 to 2013 are in high-tech areas, such as IT or telecom.
However, the question is whether this does not mean that indirectly they still arise due to technologies that provide an opportunity for development for the service sector.
Is it bad?
A shot from the film "I, Robot" (2004).
Harvard economics professor Lawrence Summers, who previously served as U.S. Treasury Secretary, said in 2014 that he no longer believes that automation will always create new jobs and that it is not some hypothetical possibility in the future; it is something that is emerging now.
In his opinion, the changes will be very global and will lead to mass unemployment not only among low-skilled employees, but also for “blue ” and“ white ” collar workers, because “there are many reasons to think that the software revolution will be even more significant than the agrarian one. ”
The robot prepares food.
However, this is what allows us to look to the future with optimism.
Summers ’ s thought of the meaning of the digital revolution echoes the position of futurologist Alvin Toffler.
As early as 1970, in his book Future Shock, he wrote that by comparing the Digital Revolution with the Industrial Revolution, we downplay its significance and it would be more correct to draw a parallel with the exit of mankind from caves and the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture and cattle breeding.
Potentially, this means that humanity is on the verge of an unprecedented, unknown written history civilizational leap of colossal proportions.
And, due to the fact that the speed of changes in the world has increased many times and now, the fact that in the case of the end of the Stone Age, took millennia, is being carried out in front of one, a maximum of a couple or three generations, this breakthrough, of course, will be painful.
However, having reviewed the usual way of life, the attitude to it and their values, will not humanity be able to break through to the conditions of life, previously even unimaginable.
"Terminator 2: Judgment Day" (1991).
We are easily accustomed to such changes in “work ” as freelancing and remote work, quite calmly came to a repeated change of professions, instead of a continuous, decades-long“ career ” and even were able to include them in your life, saying that this is the way to find yourself.
So is it not time to begin to accustom ourselves to the idea that, as economic historian Robert Skidelsky said, “Sooner or later we will run out of work ”?
After all, freelancing and remote employment are about freedom, about leaving the “office slavery ” and searching for the way of life that is convenient for us.
Yes, to get used to the idea that the traditional “work ” is over and now we will have to independently invent what to occupy ourselves will not be easy.
It will require responsibility, but it is freedom.
Isn ’ t it time for us, joyfully exclaiming “Glory to the robots! ”, to go in search of our place in the new world?
Why robots will take away your profession.
The fact that it is not only about robots, but also about the “work ” itself and the possibility of life without it, about the risks associated with negative scenarios of confrontation between people and machines and the possibilities of overcoming them, we will talk in the next parts of the cycle.
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Concerns include a diminishing economic need for human labor as emerging technologies displace tasks, which has prompted proposals such as universal basic income for those no longer needed in traditional roles.

Title:

Content: WEF Adviser Yuval Harari: ‘We Just Don’t Need the Vast Majority of the Population’ in Today’s World

Breitbart – by Robert Kraychik

Yuval Noah Harari, historian, futurist, and World Economic Forum (WEF) adviser, said, “We just don’t need the vast majority of the population” in the early 21st century given modern technologies’ rendering human labor economically and militarily “redundant.”

Harari’s remarks were made in an interview with Chris Anderson, the head of TED, published on Tuesday. He assessed widespread contemporary disillusionment among “common people” as being rooted in a fear of being “left behind” in a future run by “smart people.” Such fears are justified, he added, given his projection that emerging technologies will displace economic needs to many categories of existing work:

A lot of people sense that they are being left behind and left out of the story, even if their material conditions are still relatively good. In the 20th century, what was common to all the stories — the liberal, the fascist, the communist — is that the big heroes of the story were the common people, not necessarily all people, but if you lived, say, in the Soviet Union in the 1930s, life was very grim, but when you looked at the propaganda posters on the walls that depicted the glorious future, you were there. You looked at the posters which showed steel workers and farmers in heroic poses, and it was obvious that this is the future.

Now, when people look at the posters on the walls, or listen to TED talks, they hear a lot of these these big ideas and big words about machine learning and genetic engineering and blockchain and globalization, and they are not there. They are no longer part of the story of the future, and I think that — again, this is a hypothesis — if I try to understand and to connect to the deep resentment of people, in many places around the world, part of what might be going there is people realize — and they’re correct in thinking that — that, ‘The future doesn’t need me. You have all these smart people in California and in New York and in Beijing, and they are planning this amazing future with artificial intelligence and bio-engineering and in global connectivity and whatnot, and they don’t need me. Maybe if they are nice, they will throw some crumbs my way like universal basic income,’ but it’s much worse psychologically to feel that you are useless than to feel that you are exploited.

Harari contrasted the 20th century with the 21st while forecasting what he said is the current century’s and future economies progressively diminishing need for human beings. He said:

If you go back to the middle of the 20th century — and it doesn’t matter if you’re in the United States with Roosevelt, or if you’re in Germany with Hitler, or even in the USSR with Stalin — and you think about building the future, then your building materials are those millions of people who are working hard in the factories, in the farms, the soldiers. You need them. You don’t have any kind of future without them.

“Now, fast forward to the early 21st century when we just don’t need the vast majority of the population,” he concluded, “because because the future is about developing more and more sophisticated technology, like artificial intelligence [and] bioengineering, Most people don’t contribute anything to that, except perhaps for their data, and whatever people are still doing which is useful, these technologies increasingly will make redundant and will make it possible to replace the people.”

https://www.breitbart.com/economy/2022/08/10/wef-adviser-yuval-harari-we-just-dont-need-the-vast-majority-of-the-population-in-todays-world/

Modern Luddite tendencies also involve critiques of representative democracy and opposition to global financial capitalism, with some protesters seeking alternative social systems centered on direct democracy, equality, and individual freedom.

Title:

Content: Not Available

A Fight For

  • Documentary

A month after the Wall Street occupation, a number of protesters follow their example and set up their tents in front of the Ljubljana stock market. The protesters are united in the critique of representative democracy and global financial capitalism under the slogan ‘nobody represents us’. Their organisation is based on the principles of direct democracy. In absence of other social alternatives, a community starts to emerge in the camp in front of the stock market where everyone has an equal say, and everyone is united in their diversity. After the initial euphoria the great idea of direct democracy clashes against the contemporary individual; antagonisms surface, similar to those of the system which the protesters fight against. The story about the Slovenian version of the ‘occupy’ movement is portrayed with the stories of a few protagonists, who despite several defeats do not lose hope in a different world.

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The movement today spans varied ideologies—including anarchism, socialism, and liberalism—and emphasizes social justice and collective bargaining as counterweights to technological power.

Commentators also describe regions like the EU as attached to legacy technologies and lagging in the 21st‑century digital economy, reflecting institutional forms of techno‑resistance.

Title:

Content:
UK's Labour Party Confirms Brexit Reversal Is Dead And Buried

by Tyler Durden
Monday, Jul 15, 2024 - 07:30 AM

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

I was wondering when Brexit would come up. It has already and I am pleased to confirm the Brexit reversal idea is dead and finally buried.

Not In His Lifetime

[Via Eurointelligence] Already assured of victory at today’s general election in the UK, Sir Keir Starmer has started to make manifesto pledges for beyond 2029. Yesterday he said that the UK would not rejoin the EU within his lifetime, nor would it try to become an associate member of the single market or the customs union.

We are not surprised, except that the issue came up so early. The reason to shut this down right now and as conclusively as he did is that keeping the door open for the future has policy consequences today.

To rejoin even in the medium-distant future would have required him to start closing the massive regulatory gap that has opened since Brexit almost immediately. Most of that gap was due to divergence by the EU itself. The UK did not mirror the 50 or so laws of the Green agenda. It adopted the data protection regulation – GDPR – in the last decade, and maintains its own version to this day. But the UK does not have the EU’s digital markets act, or EU regulation on AI and cryptocurrencies. Nor does have regulation on what is euphemistically called corporate social responsibility – making companies liable for human rights violations in their supply chains. For the UK to rejoin the EU even during a second term would require such a high degree of regulatory convergence that it would dominate all other policy areas.

We see another reason in the EU’s Luddite tendency, its attachment to 20th century technologies and corporatism. We always felt that the undoubtedly large economic gains from goods trade integration need to be set against the opportunity cost of the EU’s failure to partake in the 21st century digital economy.

The single market, as it is constituted today, is very much a product of 20th century product-focused regulatory thinking.

The Right Decision

Who in their right mind wants to adopt the EU’s green agenda? The EU’s nannycrat legislation on corporate social responsibility? On digital rights? On cryptocurrencies? On anything the EU does?

Those nostalgic for the EU membership need to address those questions.

Congratulations to Boris Johnson for getting Brexit done. Few believed he would.

His problem was not knowing what to do with Brexit once it happened.

Simultaneous Burial

It’s always a mistake to let EU nannycrats set your policy. That’s why Brexit was smart policy even if takes a while to prove that.

Not only did Starmer finally bury EU membership (the Wicked Witch of the East), he buried an even worse customs union idea (the Wicked Witch of the West) in a simultaneous burial.

Congratulations!

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Public anxieties are widespread, with 77% of Americans concerned about job loss due to AI and studies estimating that 47% of U.S. jobs are at risk from automation. [25].

Title:

Content: TechnologyNews
300 million jobs threatened by artificial intelligence
Analysis and Reflections
The world is witnessing an unprecedented shift in the work and employment environment.
News from Libya 24
With rapid advances in technology, the world is witnessing an unprecedented shift in the work and employment environment.
Artificial intelligence (AI) has become a key driver of this change, with the ability to perform complex tasks that previously required human intervention.
This stunning progress raises many questions about the future of jobs, with some studies suggesting that artificial intelligence could threaten about 300 million jobs in the coming decades.
In this article, we will review the scientific and literary analysis of this phenomenon, focusing on the economic, social and psychological dimensions of this radical transformation.
Artificial intelligence.
Economic transformation and jobs at risk
Economically, the enormous impact of artificial intelligence on the labor market is undeniable.
This impact relies heavily on the technical ability of AI to perform tasks more efficiently and at a lower cost than humans.
In sectors such as manufacturing, logistics, and retail, robots and artificial intelligence systems are beginning to replace workers in routine and repetitive tasks.
For example, AI systems can manage inventory, process orders, and even deliver logistics in a more efficient way.
This progress reduces production costs and increases profits for companies, but at the same time causes the loss of a large number of traditional jobs.
A study by Oxford University suggests that about 47% of jobs in the United States are threatened by automation over the next two decades.
This high percentage raises concerns about the fate of millions of workers who may find themselves unemployed in the near future.
Artificial intelligence.
Social and psychological dimensions of transformation
Besides the economic dimensions, there are social and psychological dimensions that must be taken into account.
Job loss is a threat to social stability, as many individuals and families depend on their jobs for their daily livelihood.
Keeping a large proportion of the workforce jobless can lead to increased rates of poverty and unemployment, putting additional strain on social welfare systems.
Psychologically, job loss can cause mental health problems such as anxiety and depression.
Work is a big part of individuals ’ identity and sense of self-worth.
When people lose their jobs, they may feel empty and lose purpose, leading to a deterioration in their mental state and health.
In addition, older people may have difficulty adapting to technological changes and learning new skills, increasing their sense of helplessness and marginalization.
Challenges and opportunities in education and rehabilitation
To meet this huge challenge, governments and educational institutions must take decisive steps in education and rehabilitation.
Investing in continuing education and training is essential to enable workers to acquire the skills needed to adapt to the demands of a changing labor market.
Customized educational and training programs can develop technical and digital skills, allowing workers to move into new jobs that require advanced skills.
In addition, aseptic intelligence itself can play an important role in improving education and training.
Artificial intelligence technologies can be used to deliver customized learning experiences that meet the needs of individual learners, increasing the effectiveness of the educational process and enhancing the chances of success in acquiring new skills.
The future horizon.
Balance between technology and humanity
Despite the great challenges that AI poses, we must remember that it also represents tremendous opportunities for humanity.
Artificial intelligence can improve many aspects of our lives, from healthcare to transportation to scientific research.
To make the most of these opportunities, we must strike a balance between technological progress and human needs.
It is important to develop policies and laws that ensure that the benefits of AI are distributed fairly and equitably.
Governments must work to create an environment that encourages innovation, while at the same time providing the necessary support to workers affected by automation.
This can be achieved through financial support programs and vocational training, as well as strengthening social safety nets.
Ultimately, AI is both a challenge and a valuable opportunity.
While threatening to lose 300 million jobs, it could also open up new avenues for innovation and economic growth.
To achieve this, we must be prepared to face the economic, social and psychological challenges that this transformation poses.
By investing in education and training, and developing equitable government policies, we can ensure that the future is bright for all, where everyone benefits from the advancement of AI and no one is left behind.
At this crucial moment in human history, we must adopt a holistic approach that combines technological progress and human care, creating a world in which AI is a positive force that enhances the well-being of all.
By doing so, we can turn threats into opportunities, and cross into a better and brighter future.
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Some analyses estimate up to 300 million jobs worldwide could be lost to AI‑powered automation, amplifying resistance to rapid adoption.

Title:

Content: Microsoft: 'People care more about AI's benefits than their job security'

The majority of workers are more interested in the applications of AI to free up their time at work than they are afraid of it affecting their job security, according to a new study.

Some 70% of workers indicated that they would use AI to free up as much of their workloads as possible, against 49% who held concerns over the potential of AI taking their role.

Microsoft’s 2023 Work Trend Index indicated that 76% of employees think that AI would make a good tool for completing administrative work, while a similar amount (73%) would also use it for creative tasks.

Data indicated a correlation between the grasp that workers have on AI and the degree to which they believe it could improve their job.

For example, 87% of workers in creative roles who are extremely familiar with AI said they’d be comfortable using AI for creative aspects of their job.

Generative AI has become an increasingly important technology in the past year.

ChatGPT has already found its way into businesses and a number of companies have commenced work on large language models (LLMs) such as OpenAI’s GPT-4 and Google’s PaLM.

The report (opens in new tab), commissioned by Microsoft and undertaken by Edelman x Data x Intelligence, gathered responses from 31,000 people across 31 markets between 1 February and 14 March.

Microsoft’s 2023 Work Trend Index: Digital debt bites

The report also found that workers are increasingly under strain due to lost focus time, the need to keep in constant communication, and gross inefficiency in meetings.

Meetings in particular were highlighted as a hindrance to productivity when handled poorly or scheduled too often.

While Microsoft 365 data showed that workers spend three times as many Teams calls and meetings per week, 58% of respondents stated that it’s hard to collaborate on ideas in a virtual call and 57% found it hard to catch up on missed discussions in a digital environment.

Data also indicated that the top 25% of email users spend as many as 8.8 hours per week looking over or crafting messages, and that the same proportion of workers spend almost a full working day (7.5 hours) in meetings per week.

64% of respondents indicated that finding the time and energy to do their job is difficult, and the data suggested that these unmotivated employees are 3.5 times more likely to find strategic thinking or innovative ideas difficult to manage.

Reducing the proportion of workers’ time spent on communication and administrative tasks is a core aspect of Microsoft 365 Copilot, the firm’s AI addition to its productivity suite, which is capable of summarizing meetings, prioritizing emails, and preparing document drafts.

Microsoft’s 2023 Work Trend Index: Will workers be replaced by AI?

Microsoft’s report indicated AI will play an ever-larger role across markets, with 82% of leaders having indicated that workers will require new skills to compete.

Job listings have begun to reflect this already, with LinkedIn posts that referenced ‘GPT’ or ‘generative AI’ 33 times more numerous than a year ago.

“We’re in the next phase of change with the introduction of generative AI, and it’s already starting to reshape the labor market,” said Karin Kimbrough, chief economist at LinkedIn.

“While it’s still early days, this shift will expand opportunities, create new roles, and augment productivity.”

Upskilling employees may prove central to effective AI adoption, while employers also indicated that emotional intelligence and the capability of employees to make analytical judgments are among the top skills necessary for AI-centred work.

Of the business leaders surveyed, 16% indicated that reducing headcounts would be the most valuable benefit of AI within their workplace compared with 31% who identified productivity improvements as the chief benefit of the technology.

The most-picked responses also included the automation of mundane tasks, improving workforce well-being, and reducing time spent on low-value work.

Overall, the study communicated optimism for AI, with 33% of respondents who were asked to picture how the world of work might change by 2030 having indicated that good work could be done twice as fast.

Around a quarter also stated that by 2030, they would be provisioning time and energy more valuably, and would not have to interact with unnecessary data.

While a minority of employers have indicated staff cuts as an explicit benefit of AI, market conditions and research does indicate that jobs across markets could be significantly disrupted by higher AI uptake.

The UK Trade Union Congress (TUC) warned (opens in new tab) in April that without government intervention, workers will be “exploited’ by AI, and may exacerbate workplace discrimination.

Research (opens in new tab) from Goldman Sachs has also estimated 300 million jobs worldwide may be lost to AI-powered automation, and that in the US alone around two-thirds of jobs are exposed to AI automation to some degree.

“Although the impact of AI on the labor market is likely to be significant, most jobs and industries are only partially exposed to automation and are thus more likely to be complemented rather than substituted by AI,” the authors noted.

In April Dropbox cut 16% of staff, citing the changing workforce demands that have arisen out of the emphasis on AI products and generative AI in particular.

IBM has also announced a hiring freeze for roles that AI can replace, with CEO Arvind Krishna having told Bloomberg that the company anticipates almost 8,000 back-end roles could be replaced by AI in the next five years.

Rory Bathgate is a staff writer at IT Pro covering the latest news on UK networking and data protection, privacy and compliance. He can sometimes be found on the IT Pro Podcast, swapping a keyboard for a microphone to discuss the latest in tech trends.

In his free time, Rory enjoys photography, video editing and graphic design alongside good science fiction. After graduating from the University of Kent with BA in English and American Literature, Rory took an MA in Eighteenth-Century Studies at King’s College London. He joined IT Pro in 2022 as a graduate, after four years in student journalism. You can contact Rory at rory.bathgate@futurenet.com or on LinkedIn.

Fears extend beyond jobs to wage stagnation, rising inequality, and the possibility that rapid AI adoption will worsen social tensions for already disadvantaged groups. [25].

Title:

Content: The Davos elite embraced AI in 2023. Now they fear it

A spotlight is on concrete hazards borne out last year by a flood of AI-generated fakes and the automation of jobs in copywriting and customer service. Picture: Gerd Altmann/Pixbabay.

Published 1h ago

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ChatGPT was the breakout star of last year's World Economic Forum, as the nascent chatbot's ability to code, draft emails and write speeches captured the imaginations of the leaders gathered in this posh ski town.

But this year, tremendous excitement over the nearly limitless economic potential of the technology is coupled with a more clear-eyed assessment of its risks.

Heads of state, billionaires and CEOs appear aligned in their anxieties, as they warn that the burgeoning technology might supercharge misinformation, displace jobs and deepen the economic gap between wealthy and poor nations.

In contrast to far-off fears of the technology ending humanity, a spotlight is on concrete hazards borne out last year by a flood of AI-generated fakes and the automation of jobs in copywriting and customer service.

The debate has taken on new urgency amid global efforts to regulate the swiftly evolving technology.

"Last year, the conversation was 'gee whiz,'" Chris Padilla, IBM's vice president of government and regulatory affairs, said in an interview. "Now, it's what are the risks? What do we have to do to make AI trustworthy?"

The topic has taken over the confab: Panels with AI CEOs including Sam Altman are the hottest ticket in town, and tech giants including Salesforce and IBM have papered the snow-covered streets with ads for trustworthy AI.

But the mounting worries about the perils of AI are casting a pall over the tech industry's marketing blitz.

The event opened Tuesday with Swiss President Viola Amherd calling for "global governance of AI," raising concerns the technology might supercharge disinformation as a throng of countries head to the polls. At a sleek cafe Microsoft set up across the street, CEO Satya Nadella sought to assuage concerns the AI revolution would leave the world's poorest behind, following the release of an International Monetary Fund report this week that found the technology is likely to worsen inequality and stoke social tensions. And Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said he was concerned about the rise of deepfake videos and audio, as AI-generated videos of him peddling cryptocurrency circulate the internet.

But the calls for a response have laid bare the limits of this annual summit, as efforts to coordinate a global strategy to the technology are hampered by economic tensions between the world's leading AI powers, the United States and China.

Meanwhile, countries hold competing geopolitical interests when it comes to regulating AI: Western governments are weighing rules that stand to benefit the companies within their borders while leaders in India, South America and other parts of the Global South see the technology as the key to unlocking economic prosperity.

The AI debate is a microcosm of a broader paradox looming over Davos, as attendees strap on their snow boots to sample pricey wine, go on sledding excursions and belt out classic rock hits in a piano lounge sponsored by the cybersecurity firm Cloudflare. The relevance of the conference founded more than 50 years ago to promote globalization during the Cold War is increasingly in question, amid raging wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, rising populism and climate threats.

In a speech Wednesday, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres raised the dual perils of climate chaos and generative AI, noting that they were "exhaustively discussed" by the Davos set.

"And yet, we have not yet an effective global strategy to deal with either," he said. "Geopolitical divides are preventing us from coming together around global solutions."

The forum's AI governance alliance - a coalition of tech executives, digital ministers and academics - released papers on AI policy Tuesday. But it was clear that global leaders are moving at different paces to address disparate priorities.

White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Arati Prabhakar touted the Biden administration's new AI executive order, saying in an interview that "everyone is looking to the U.S. for leadership" on how to address AI. Meanwhile, European leaders pointed to their recent deal on the E.U. AI Act as a sign of the bloc's global influence over the future of AI legislation.

Leaders from the Global South also sought to put their mark on the regulatory debate. Paula Ingabire, Rwanda's minister of information communication technology and innovation, announced plans for an international summit this year, where leaders from Africa can discuss the impact of AI on their economies.

It's clear tech companies are not waiting for governments to catch up, and legacy banks, media companies and accounting firms at Davos are weighing how to incorporate AI into their businesses.

Davos regulars say growing investment in AI is evident on the promenade, where companies take over storefronts to host meetings and events. In recent years, buzzwords like Web3, blockchain and crypto dominated those shops. But this year, the programming shifted to AI. Hewlett-Packard Enterprise and the Emirati firm G42 even sponsored an "AI House," which converted a chalet-style building into a gathering spot to listen to speakers including Meta chief AI scientist Yann LeCun, IBM CEO Arvind Krishna and MIT professor Max Tegmark.

The promenade effectively serves as "a focus group for the next emerging tech wave," said veteran WEF attendee Dante Disparte, chief strategy officer and head of global policy at Circle.

Executives signaled that AI will become an even more influential force in 2024, as companies build more advanced AI models and developers use those systems to power new products. At a panel hosted by Axios, Altman said the overall intelligence of OpenAI's models was "increasing across the board." Long-term, he predicted the technology would "vastly accelerate the rate of scientific discovery."

But even as the company powers ahead, he said he worries politicians or bad actors might abuse the technology to influence elections. He said OpenAI doesn't yet know what election threats will arise this year but that it will attempt to make changes quickly and work with outside partners. On Monday, as the conference was kicking off, the company rolled out a set of election protections, including a commitment to help people identify when images were created by its generator, DALL-E.

"I'm nervous about this, and I think it's good that we're nervous about this," he said.

OpenAI, which has fewer than 1,000 employees, has a significantly smaller team working on elections than large social media companies such as Meta and TikTok. Altman defended their commitment to election security, saying team size was not the best way to measure a company's work in this area. But The Washington Post found last year that the company does not enforce its existing policies on political targeting.

AI companies are trying to position themselves as responsible partners to government, making the case that they've learned lessons from the missteps of social media companies, which came under fire for allowing the spread of foreign influence operations, fomenting extremism, and fostering racism and toxicity.

"When you look at social media over the last decade, it's been kind of a f---ing s---show," Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said. "We don't want that for the AI industry. We want a good healthy relationship with these regulators."

When Facebook, Google and other internet companies were in their infancy, they were widely viewed as political darlings among the Davos set. Yet their reputations dramatically faltered in the fallout of the 2016 presidential election, and governments around the world are still grappling now with how to regulate them. Nick Clegg, president of global affairs of Facebook, said it is "much healthier" that governments are assessing the social implications of AI as it evolves, rather than waiting like they did with social media.

However, tech companies in the past have praised regulation only to oppose guidelines that could hamper their business interests.

At the World Economic Forum, the charm offensive appears to be working. Eva Maydell, a member of the European Parliament, said in her meetings at Davos that AI companies are more open to assessing the social effects of their products than their predecessors in social media did five years ago.

But she would like to see the companies do more - especially ahead of elections in the European Union and around the world.

"Being here, I understand why there's so much hype around the business arena," she said in an interview. "Where I would also like to see some hype is when we talk about values and defending democracy - especially this year."

The Washington Post

Skeptics also point to a lack of transparency and accountability in AI development and deployment, which can compound economic insecurity and distrust.

Title:

Content: General Supervision
Elham Aboul Fath
Editor-in-Chief
Thank you for your patience.
General Supervision
Elham Aboul Fath
Editor-in-Chief
Thank you for your patience.
Larry Page's influence on the world and warnings of destruction
In a world dominated by technology and innovation, major companies in the technology sector are playing a crucial role in shaping the future of humanity.
One such giant is Larry Page, co-founder and former CEO of Google.
Google is one of the largest and most successful tech companies in the world, and Larry Page was behind turning it into a tech giant.
Larry Page is a symbol of innovation and the ability to change the world with technology.
Under his leadership, Google has evolved from a simple search engine into a company that offers comprehensive services and products including email, maps, operating system, cloud storage, and artificial intelligence.
Google has also expanded into other areas such as robotics, health and renewable energy, making Larry Page one of the world ’ s most important tech figures.
However, there are growing warnings of the potential negative effects of Larry Page and big tech companies ’ influence on the world.
Some point out that these companies have come to control users ’ personal data and use it to achieve their business goals, posing a threat to privacy and personal security.
Others point out that these companies control the market, obstruct fair competition and restrict innovation in the technology sector.
In addition, the potential social and economic impacts of the advancement of technology are of great concern.
For example, the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence and self-employment could lead to job losses and a growing economic gap.
Increased reliance on technology can also affect the mental and social health of individuals, and may lead to increased isolation and loss of real communication between individuals.
In order to deal with these growing challenges, governments, international organizations, and technology companies must work together to develop laws and policies that regulate the use of technology and protect the rights of users and society.
Privacy, security and competition issues must be addressed in a comprehensive and fair manner, with a focus on public benefit and balancing technological development with public interests.
Moreover, big tech companies must take responsibility for their actions and promote transparency and accountability.
It must adopt initiatives that promote sustainability and balance profitability and social responsibility.
In the end, we must realize that technology has tremendous power to change the world either positively or negatively.
We must approach them with caution and awareness, working together to realize their benefits and overcome their challenges, while preserving ethical values and the rights of individuals and society.
Warnings of the destruction that Larry Page and big tech companies can cause to the world have become an important issue that the international community must confront and address, and maintaining the balance between technological progress and public interests is an important challenge that everyone must deal with in a new way.

Broader social factors—including fears of national identity loss intertwined with economic insecurity—can energize populist resistance that overlaps with opposition to certain technologies.

Title:

Content: Why political centrists must rediscover their passion

Summary

  • They need to be clear about what opposing populism does and doesn’t mean, argues Yair Zivan

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS’S “The Second Coming" was written as a warning about the state of the world. Although “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold" has perhaps become the most famous line of his poem, it is two other lines that should concern us all. As an estimated 2bn people across the world head to the polls in 2024, Yeats’s warning that “the best lack all conviction" while “the worst are full of passionate intensity" resonates loudly.

Democracies are being torn apart by extremism and polarisation. The gains made by the far right in the European parliamentary elections in recent days are only the latest sign of the rising dangers of populism. Its impact will continue to be felt across European politics for years to come.

The political discourse pushed by illiberal leaders labels opponents as enemies and traitors. Proponents of illiberal democracy in countries like Hungary and Turkey systematically undermine the institutions which hold liberal democracy together. The election in Brazil in 2022 left voters a choice between the hard-left politics of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and the hard-right politics of Jair Bolsanaro. South Africa’s recent election saw the rise of the radical left-wing politics of the EFF and the populist left-wing politics of MK. In response, the moderate centre too often seems to lack the courage of its convictions—and certainly lacks the passion and intensity that drive its more extreme rivals.

As centrists look to regain the political upper-hand, a crucial task for the preservation of forward-looking liberal democracies, they need to be clear about exactly what centrism means (and what it doesn’t) and why those who identify as centrists, myself included, believe it is the best path forward.

That understanding starts with a clear distinction between the political centre and the political middle. The centre is a set of beliefs, values and ideas. The middle is a fluid point on the political spectrum that gets dragged from side to side, depending on whether the right or the left is exerting more pull; in Europe the illiberal right is currently a stronger force, while in Latin America it is the socialist left.

The values around which centrism is built are the importance of moderation, pragmatism and compromise; an embrace of complexity; a commitment to liberal democracy; the belief in equality of opportunity; and the belief that through balancing tensions people’s lives can be made better. Centrism seeks out the most productive and effective approach to tackling the tensions between globalisation and local communities, civil rights and security, religion and democracy, free markets and social safety nets. It creates a tent broad enough to accommodate moderate liberals and moderate conservatives who no longer feel at home in their old political camps.

But the allure of populism is strong. Politicians from either end of the political spectrum promise simple solutions to complex problems. When they fail to deliver, as they inevitably do, there is always someone else to blame. They divide society into us v them, the real people v the elites, locals v outsiders, oppressed v oppressor, and pitch those groups against each other in a battle for total victory. Those on the other side don’t think differently; they are different. There is no space for nuance or complexity. Any hint of compromise is seen as betrayal.

Denouncing extremist politicians as racists or neo-fascists does nothing to address the source of their appeal. Theirs is a politics which feeds on genuine grievances and justified fears. People are worried about losing their jobs as a result of technological advances, not least AI. They fear losing their national identity owing to uncontrolled immigration. And they are fed up with a politics which doesn’t seem to deliver for them.

By embracing complexity and nuance, centrism can be the antidote to the over-simplification of populism and extremism. The seriousness with which it approaches thorny problems provides solutions that really do improve people’s lives. But centrism has struggled to find a way to counter the fear and anger which dominate political discourse today. It has to offer an emotional as well as an intellectual response.

The answer is for centrism to become the politics of hope. Centrists are hopeful about the future and about human nature. They are not naive, nor are they searching for utopia, but they believe that with the right approach progress can be made. Societies can solve problems and create opportunities without losing their sense of identity, community and purpose. Humanity has repeatedly shown a capacity to overcome obstacles that seemed insurmountable, when societies are governed well and offered hope.

Indeed, there are many examples of where centrism has worked, and where a united opposition has come together to defeat or seriously challenge illiberal populism. A striking recent example was the election in Poland last October, in which a coalition of opposition centre-left, centrist and centre-right parties ousted the right-wing populists of Law and Justice, who had sought to undermine the rule of law. Another is the success of Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Greece’s proudly moderate prime minister, in wresting the country back from the radical-left populists who had ridden to power on the back of a severe economic crisis.

At a time when politics can feel bleak and when politicians trade in fear and anger, that sense of hope is among the greatest contributions centrism can make to public life. It is needed more than ever.

Yair Zivan is the editor of “The Centre Must Hold: Why Centrism is the Answer to Extremism and Polarisation" (Elliott & Thompson, June 27th 2024).

© 2024, The Economist Newspaper Limited. All rights reserved. From The Economist, published under licence. The original content can be found on www.economist.com

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MINT SPECIALS

Modern “neo‑Luddite” examples illustrate a spectrum of motives and tactics.

Title:

Content: Aspiring Right-Wing Terrorists Are Targeting The Power Grid Amid Rise In Accelerationist Extremism

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The first chapter of the black-and-white PDF magazine begins with an ominous warning. Over four dense pages, the anonymous writers paint a picture of “an anti-tech revolution, beginning with the annihilation of the U.S. energy grid.”

“The horrific effects of a nationwide blackout cannot be understated. Hospitals would fail. … Financial collapse,” the magazine reads, continuing to detail traffic chaos, dwindling supplies of clean water and spreading disease before concluding that a successful attack targeting key points on the electrical grid would lead to “the collapse of the system … chaos, agony, and death”

The magazine was obtained by TPM in a chat group on the encrypted app Telegram dedicated to “Unabomber” Ted Kaczynski. Along with the breathless depiction of a widespread blackout, it included a precise list of the locations of “THE MOST CRITICALLY IMPORTANT ELECTRIC SUBSTATIONS IN THE UNITED STATES.”

This apocalyptic brand of extremist rhetoric — and the focus, specifically, on targeting substations — is part of a growing phenomenon that has captured the attention of both the far right and law enforcement. The trend has resulted in a dramatic rise in attacks that have left tens of thousands of people without power. Experts have attributed the wave to the digital spread of right-wing accelerationist ideology, which aims to hasten societal collapse, and materials like this magazine that encourage and provide instructions for targeting the grid.

Participants in the Telegram chat where TPM obtained the magazine shared it on multiple occasions, along with Kaczynski’s writings, details on how he made his “boom packages,” bomb making manuals and plans to build homemade, untraceable “ghost guns.” They also hurled racial slurs and anti-gay rhetoric while talking about plans for staging attacks.

“I think you guys should start writing some manifesto papers but keep them hidden so no one will find them,” wrote one member of the chat in August 2022. “Then one day if you unexpectedly die, there will be some papers on what you believed in.”

A few days later, the member, whose avatar featured a glaring bald eagle, posted an even more specific vision naming a major provider of abortion care and reproductive health services.

“If I were to do something (If society doesn’t start changing i might) I will take my time and plan carefully,” they wrote, adding, “There is a planned parenthood not too far away.”

Due to the inflammatory and potentially dangerous nature of the content, TPM is not naming the magazine, the alias of its writers, or the chat group in which we obtained it. One of the members who posted the magazine said it had been “removed” from other sites and “marked as terrorism.” They noted that it “contains the addresses of those substations and how to deal with them” and encouraged other members of the chat to “download” it or keep it “somewhere you can access it.”

CASCADING FAILURE

It is easy to dismiss these writings as digital bluster, but law enforcement and academic experts have repeatedly attributed the frightening online rhetoric to the real-world rise in assaults on power stations. And data indicates white supremacists are the driving force behind the uptick in these dangerous attacks.

The electric grid has increasingly come into the crosshairs of extremists and other criminals since an April 2013 sniper attack on a Pacific Gas and Electric substation in Metcalf, California. That attack was “the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred,” according to Jon Wellinghoff, who headed the nation’s top utility regulator at the time.

At least one gunman came to the remote Metcalf substation after midnight, authorities have said. The individual or individuals avoided security cameras, cut telecommunication cables, and fired over 120 rounds that took out 17 large transformers at the facility, which provides electricity to Silicon Valley.

Despite the damage and the sophistication of the operation, which the Los Angeles Times described as a “military-style raid,” it did not result in any major blackout. Officials were able to reroute power around the site. The lack of disruption after Metcalf underscores how difficult it is to pull off the wild scenarios that online enthusiasts envision when they discuss these attacks.

However, while it didn’t shut off the lights, the Metcalf incident has been cited as an inspiration for similar incidents that followed — some of which caused greater disruption. Experts have described Metcalf as a “wake up call” and a “dress rehearsal,” though the motivations behind the attack remain mysterious. In 2015, a DHS official told CNN they had “some indication” an “insider” at the facility was involved. The FBI later suggested it believed the Metcalf attack was staged by a disgruntled employee and that it was not connected to terrorism. No suspects have been identified.

“We can confirm the Metcalf power substation incident remains under investigation,” an FBI spokesperson told TPM. “No additional information can be provided at this time.”

Since 2013, the idea of shooting attacks on the power grid has gained traction online.

“From our standpoint, what has shifted in the last ten years since Metcalf is the awareness of the tactic and the attention that has gotten,” a Department of Homeland Security official, who requested anonymity due to the sensitive nature of their work, told TPM.

“In the publicly available forums we can see tactics and references to the previous, successful incidents getting discussion, diagrams being passed,” the official said. “It’s all happening kind of in the overt space.”

The proliferation of extremist materials online is one of several reasons these attacks present a challenge for law enforcement. According to the Department of Homeland Security, there are over 79,000 substations that play a vital part in the nation’s electrical grid. Many are in remote locations and are privately owned, which means they have varying standards for security. DHS is trying to address the issue by gathering intelligence in the open web to produce bulletins and informational materials and by making security recommendations to the private companies that own much of the electrical grid.

According to multiple officials, DHS has done over 1,200 security assessments within the electricity subsector, including 24 visits to facilities in the last month alone.

RAGING AGAINST THE ‘ANTI-WHITE SYSTEM’

While there are myriad risks to power stations, relatively simple shooting attacks from far-right white supremacist terrorists have emerged as a major threat to the grid. Thirteen individuals associated with the white supremacist movement faced federal charges related to “planning attacks on the energy sector” between 2016 and 2022, according to a report from the George Washington University Program on Extremism that was released last September. And those numbers are growing — 11 of the 13 cases cited in the report came after 2020. This far-right fixation on power stations comes as there is a consensus among federal law enforcement agencies that white supremacists have become the top domestic terror threat.

DHS does not have a definitive figure for the number of attacks on substations since they only track incidents with a clear ideological component. However, in just the past six months, there have been multiple new, notable attacks — and one major plot — to take down power stations. Not all of these incidents are politically motivated. After one of these attacks, which took place in Washington State in December and left thousands of people without power, authorities arrested two men who they said hoped to use the blackout as cover to commit a burglary. But other plots show how the idea of taking down the electric grid appeals to the far right, particularly adherents of the violent end times philosophy known as “accelerationism.”

In February, the FBI announced that it had arrested a duo, Brandon Russell and Sarah Clendaniel, and charged them “with conspiracy to destroy an energy facility.” According to an affidavit filed by the FBI in support of the criminal complaint, Russell and Clendaniel allegedly corresponded with a confidential informant and worked on a plan to take out five power stations in the Baltimore area with rifles. The FBI affidavit suggested Russell and Clendaniel were in a romantic relationship. Photos obtained by the FBI showed Clendaniel in tactical gear decorated with a swastika.

Based on encrypted chats quoted in the affidavit, Russell and Clendaniel allegedly intended for  attacks on multiple power stations to spark a cascading failure that would lead to a widespread outage. That type of catastrophe is the dream scenario for accelerationists.

In exchanges that took place during September 2022, Russell allegedly provided the informant “a white supremacist publication that provided instructions on how to attack critical infrastructure” and encouraged them to “use Mylar balloons to short out a power transformer.” The next month Russell again urged the informant to target a substation.

“Putting holes in transformers though is the greatest thing somebody can do,” Russell allegedly wrote.

Russell has a troubled history in the neo-Nazi movement. In May 2017, he lived with three roommates in Tampa, Florida. The four men had started a local chapter of the neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen Division with Russell as their leader. One of the roommates, Devon Arthurs, eventually left the group and murdered two of the others. Russell, who was not home during the crime, was arrested when he was found to be in possession of explosive materials during the murder investigation. Arthurs later claimed that his roommates were plotting to attack critical infrastructure, including power lines.

Atomwaffen, which rebranded as National Socialist Order in mid-2020 as it faced investigations in multiple countries, is perhaps the best-known modern white supremacist accelerationist group. In general, accelerationism is an ideology that believes modern society is evil and encourages acts that would bring it downl. Many white supremacist accelerationists expect this cataclysm to come through a race war.

“Accelerationists believe that there is nothing redeemable about contemporary society,” said Michael Edison Hayden, a senior investigative reporter and spokesperson for the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups.

The power grid is a natural target for white supremacist accelerationists, who view it as the backbone of “the anti-white system,” Hayden said.

“Thinking about how the power lines function in that context, this is the central nervous system of contemporary society, and that’s why it’s so important to accelerationists in particular,” Hayden said. “As they see it … the system that is oppressing them cannot function … without power.”

White supremacists are not the only adherents of accelerationism. There are anarchists and some on the far left who could be described as accelerationists. Indeed, one of the writers of the magazine that listed locations of substations and described the methodology of the Metcalf attack described themselves as something of an eco-anarchist who rejects all political movements.

“It is our view that the techno-industrialist machine is a violent, destructive, and irreparable system of subjugation, and because of this we do not support any social or political efforts to rehabilitate it,” they wrote. “It is our belief that the techno-industrial system presents an absolute and urgent existential threat to all life on earth. Thus, we are not a partisan movement, nor do we have any interest in furthering the ideologies of any movement on the left-right political spectrum.”

TPM emailed with one of the writers of the magazine. They said the publication was produced by a “small group.” While this writer denounced racism as “fucking stupid” and said they would prefer “militant groups of educated anarchists” to use the magazine, they said they would not necessarily be opposed to working with the far right towards the larger goal of “the destruction of techno-industrial society.”

“It is another unpleasant reality that the far-right is far better armed and has easier access to a lot of the locations listed than the Left or post-Left,” the magazine writer explained. “If the question then, is whether toward the ultimate goal of rapid global deindustrialization, I would accept the assistance or ‘alliance’ with any far-right group, I would hesitate to say no. I would much rather turn the lights out and then fight them in the quiet dark afterwards.”

The DHS official who spoke to TPM explained that they see accelerationism coming in “different ideological bins”

“We’ve seen discussions across the spectrum,” the official said, explaining that foreign terror organizations, anti-government activists, and what the DHS has termed “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists” (RMVEs) are all drawn to the idea that taking down the power grid could cause the “downfall of society.”

The term RMVE can encompass other racial identity movements. However, in recent years, data has shown that white supremacists are far more active than other racially motivated groups when it comes to domestic terrorism.

Hayden, who has researched and written extensively about the far-right accelerationists,  agreed that white supremacist accelerationists have proven to be the most capable of doing real-world damage.

“Accelerationism is not exclusively a white supremacist ideology. We refer to that specifically as white power accelerationism,” Hayden explained. “There are people who believe that, like, we need a fall of society in order to build a communist utopia and things like that. I just don’t know to what degree they’re organized in the same way.”

INSIDE ‘TERRORGRAM’

Accelerationism is not a new idea. The DHS official noted the concept has existed “for decades.” However, the official said the availability of tools like Telegram has been crucial to its recent growth and to the dissemination of ideological material and instructions for violent attacks.

As an example, the official pointed to “The Turner Diaries,” the 1978 book authored by neo-Nazi William Pierce that inspired multiple terrorists, including Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.

“When you’re talking about ‘The Turner Diaries’ or something 20, 25 years ago, someone had to go out and actually buy the book,” the official said. “Right now, everyone can get on there and pass stuff around.”

McVeigh is one of several terrorists who are venerated as “saints” on “Terrorgram,” the name both researchers and extremists have embraced to describe the more extreme and violent corners of the Telegram app. Kaczynski, the “Unabomber,” is another “Terrorgram” icon, who is often referred to as “Uncle Ted” by his fans on the app.

The magazine that detailed methods for targeting substations and identified potential targets features a smiling portrait of Kaczynski in prison. After listing off the locations of various substations, the magazine concluded with an ominous accelerationist poem of sorts:

“we will be free.

we will find peace.

we will have our revenge.”

Telegram, which was created by a Russian tech billionaire whose libertarian attitude towards free speech led him to clash with the Kremlin and flee the country in 2014, is encrypted and largely unmoderated. As a result, it has become a haven for the far right and for discussion of terrorist activity.

Hayden described Telegram as “sort of a free for all” and said many far-right extremists had made a “huge migration” there after losing access to more mainstream social media networks in 2019 and 2020.

“It has really become the home base for anything that is against society, outside of society, and so extreme that it is criminal,” Hayden said of Telegram.

Spokespeople for Telegram did not respond to a request for comment on this story.

A recent spate of incidents in North Carolina demonstrated both the persistent threats to the grid and the way neo Nazi online accelerationists are excited by the idea of attacks on power stations.

On Dec. 3, 2022, there was a high-powered rifle attack on a pair of power stations in Moore County, North Carolina that caused 45,000 people to lose power, some for days.

While investigators have not identified a suspect or motive, the incident coincided with a drag show in the county that had drawn death threats and far-right protests. Days after the attack, CNN reported that law enforcement was investigating links to extremist writing online that encouraged targeting the power grid and the recent rise in threats and armed protests against the LGBTQ community and drag shows in particular.

A spokesperson for the Charlotte, North Carolina field office of the FBI, which is investigating the attack with the Moore County Sheriff’s Office, told TPM aprobe into the incident is “ongoing.”

“It would be fair to say we are looking at any investigative leads or tips,” the FBI spokesperson said.

While the DHS official who spoke to TPM stressed that law enforcement has not identified a link between the drag show and the power station attack, they noted white supremacists have also targeted the gay community.

“I don’t have any information on the motivation of the actors in Moore. I think that’s still being investigated, which is part of the challenge here,” the DHS official said, adding, “I think, intuitively, one of the things we see with racially, ethnically motivated violence here, strictly on the what we call white supremacist side, is they have a very structured view of how the kind of ideal society should be. Certainly we’ve seen the LGBTQ community be an enduring target of people with that ideology based on their perception of how they are corrupting their ideal of a white society.”

Hayden, the SPLC investigator, said anti-LGBTQ extremism has had a “unifying” effect on the right of late. He suggested this is due to the fact it is increasingly a focus of more mainstream conservative politicians and because, after extensive backlash to racism in recent years, the fringe has seen it as a topic where they can gain “a little bit of ground.”

“Things around gender and sexuality right now … are animating extremists on the right more than race,” Hayden said. “That reverberates from the White House when Trump was there all the way down to these accelerationist cells.”

After the Moore County blackout, North Carolina continued to be a flashpoint. On Dec. 18, 2022, just 15 days after the attack, a banner was unfurled on a highway in a town just to the east of the two power stations. The banner advertised a chat room on the encrypted chat app Telegram. A local news station, WGHP, reported that the chat room contained graphics showing slogans “superimposed over a picture of what appears to be an electrical substation.”

Major Andy Conway of the Moore County Sheriff’s Department told TPM they are investigating possible links between the threats to the drag show and the power station attack as well as links between the incident and the banner drop. No suspects have been identified.

“We have not excluded anything at this point,” Conway said in a phone call on Wednesday afternoon. “I can’t say that they are linked, but I can’t say that they are not either. … We have multiple agencies working on this, so it’s quite the work in progress.”

Along with the Telegram address, the banner that was dropped in the county was festooned with swastikas. It also featured an ominous accelerationist slogan: “BRING IT ALL DOWN”

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High‑profile figures who warned about AI’s risks, such as Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking, have been labeled with the “Luddite Award,” showing how critiques of AI safety are sometimes dismissed as anti‑tech.

Some groups, like the large Antiwork community on Reddit, press for higher wages and unionization and critique work norms that they believe are reinforced by technology.

Title:

Content: Sunday: Questioning at the cash register
Post Date: December 05, 2021
Imagine that when you are working in front of a cash register, the receipt printed by the cash register asks you, “Why are you so low? ”
Two days ago in the NO ONE WANTS TO WORK group of facebook saw a news, some netizens in the United States claimed that the receipt printer in the store was hacked, and printed the "Anti-work Manifesto" (Anti-work Manifesto), the content can be thought provoking.
According to a photo circulated online, the receipt reads like this:
Time is your most valuable asset.
Not only can you not get more, you don ’ t know how much you have in the first place.
Why are you selling your time at such a low price?
Join our “25 or walk ” campaign and tell your boss that your time is worth no less than $25 an hour, and they ’ re willing to pay that price before they come back to you.
Don't quit!
Then spend your time with your family, then spend your time with your friends, then spend your time rediscovering your interests, and then take your life back! ”
Similar receipts can also be found on Twitter and reddit, such as calling on wage earners to organize labor unions to fight for their rights and interests; exchanging wage information with the same workers, and immediately asking for a raise when they find that their labor is lower than their colleagues.
After these photos appeared online, some people suspected that they were fake and a mischief by employees, but vice.com quoted Andrew Morris, founder of GreyNoise, a cybersecurity company, as saying that his company did detect an increase in traffic to an undersecured receipt printer, and it appeared that someone was issuing a large number of printing instructions to an Internet-connected cash register.
These inciting anti-worker messages are also directed to the antiwork group on reddit.com (https: / / www.reddit.com / r / antiwork /). The Antiwork group has been established for 7 years, but popularity has soared during the epidemic, especially the Great Resignation in the United States this summer. The post was widely reported in the mainstream media. The number of Antiwork groups has soared during the epidemic, and now exceeds 1 million people.
However, the rapid rise in popularity also made the elders of the group unhappy, thinking that the new members often did not understand their philosophy, and the group's philosophy was "anti-work", not "reform work".
One of the group ’ s founders, Doreen Ford (whose online name is Doreen Cleyre, in honor of the American anarchist Voltairine de Cleyre), has been running the group for seven years. Last month, in an interview with slate.com, she said that the group ’ s popularity has soared and that those “domineering ” posts have flooded.
“Antiwork is not just about firing bosses, ” she stressed.
She has done a lot of retail work, and is deeply aware of how work can burn the soul, and said that Antiwork was founded not only to improve the treatment of work, but to completely change the system, so that people can have the freedom to work less, even if not work.
However, she is still at peace with her philosophical differences, saying that the most important thing is that people who have suffered from work can find support in the group and find useful information about the possibility of asking for a raise, disobeying the unreasonable demands of their boss, and so on.
Does human value come from productivity?
The big resignation wave in the United States this summer has already caused a lot of discussion. The focus of the discussion is whether the reflection on work in the epidemic is only occasional, or a preview of deeper cultural changes? After all, even if work is bullshit, we still have to bite the teeth in order to live.
In January of this year, Devon Price, author of Laziness Does Not Exist, spoke to members of the Antiwork group.
In the book, Devon Price says that American culture has always been obsessed with work and productivity, and there are so-called "lies about laziness": (1) your value lies in your productivity; (2) you can't trust your feelings or needs; (3) you can always do more.
This lie, he said, stems from the Puritan belief, “Today, hatred of laziness is used as a reason for oppression, and people are bombarded with information even when they are idle. ” Some netizens asked him, how can the system change time, how can we live in the current system without being crushed? Price ’ s prescription is not radical, encouraging everyone to work with colleagues to improve the working environment; Try to give up the so-called" should do ", make time to do the most valuable activities, care about the surrounding community, do some small but meaningful things, so that they are not so desperate," if the state of the world makes you feel powerless, this is a way to reposition yourself. "
Wen Kang-chi Lam
Photo: Online Photo
Editors • Au Yang Dezhi
fb: http: / / www.facebook.com / SundayMingpao

Other cases show extreme actions, such as a lab manager faking a bomb threat to protest a university VR lab’s “metaverse” vision and its potential for surveillance and control.

Title:

Content: The Unabomber Hate Hoax

The hate crime hoax is an underappreciated genre of performance art. There have been well over a hundred in the past decade—from Muslims setting fire to their own mosques, to LGBTQ-types baking their own hate cakes, and the black actor Jussie Smollett duping the entire news media with his fake MAGA-hat beat down. Yet half the country pretends these hoaxes don’t exist.

Recently we saw what appears to be a new, anti-tech variation of this art form with the arrest of Jason Duhaime. On Sept. 13, the Northeastern University virtual reality lab director allegedly called in a fake bomb threat to police. Authorities shut down half the school while response teams investigated.

Had a disciple of Ted Kaczynski resumed the attack on industrial society? Not quite.

At the time, Duhaime told Boston police and federal agents a remarkably stupid story about an exploding hard-shell case—without even bothering to fake the explosion. He also provided a frantic letter, supposedly contained in the case, which called for the university’s virtual reality lab to be closed. Unsurprisingly, federal authorities found digital copies of the letter on Duhaime’s personal computer, leading to his arrest on Oct. 4.

In a stroke of demented genius, Duhaime allegedly combined that ruse with another underappreciated genre—the crazy uncle email. Typically forwarded from an anonymous source, it is marked by hysterical capitalization, amusing typos, and an apocalyptic sense of urgency. Duhaime’s apparently phony letter is a decent satire of this style.

“It has come to our attention that this VR lab is trying to change us as a world!” it read. “Trying to get us to live in a world that we only communicate through headsets and live in a called the METAVERSE! … You are trying to change the fabric of the ideology of a peoplee [sic].”

“You are not the creator!!!!!!!! You think you are!!!” it continues. “We know you are the anti-christ sent to this world to change everything!!! We will stop you!!!”

Maintaining this quirky literary form, the letter writer accused the lab director of colluding with “Mr. Mark Zuckerberg and the US government” to surveil the world, build robots, and treat the entire population as “human test subjects” in a twisted experiment. He charged this axis with plotting to “destroy US all AS A SOCIETY,” and warned that they had “2 months to take operations down or else!!!!!”

It’s possible that Duhaime actually received emails of this sort and just snapped. Or maybe, after 25 years as an IT guy, he really needed a day off. In any case, he’s now facing two federal charges, each carrying up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Why would a person do something like this? Perhaps to discredit genuine concerns about the dark reality described in the hoaxer’s letter. For instance, in 2016 Facebook hired former Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) director Regina Dugan—a vocal advocate of digital tattoos for kids and swallowable digital pills—to oversee their secretive operations at Building 8. DARPA is aptly known as the Pentagon’s brain.

Just last year, Facebook’s Project Steno funded the implantation of an advanced brain-computer interface (BCI) at the University of California, San Francisco. The implant allows a stroke victim to translate his thoughts into text onscreen. This study was used to advance Facebook’s own BCI ambitions. The team was led by Edward Chang, a DARPA-funded neuroscientist.

The Northeastern University operation that Duhaime oversaw is on a similar wavelength. According to the Experimental Technologies Lab webpage, their projects include “using modalities such as eye tracking and biometric tools for capturing user data including electrodermal activity, heart rate, EEG, and facial expression analysis.” In other words, digital surveillance is going under the skin.

The lab is also developing AR/VR (augmented and virtual reality) to propagandize issues like “climate change” and “social justice.” By using 3D sensory simulation to impose a synthetic model of the world onto a subject’s brain, virtual reality may be the most effective mind-control system yet devised. It’s basically TV plus LSD.

“Students are going through an experience teaching them about Islamophobia,” Duhaime wrote in an Instagram post. “We’ve had people crying. It becomes an emotional response because they’ve never had that sort of experience.” Imagine a distant future, circa 2025, where an entire generation is turned into left-wing droids by way of VR “education” technologies.

The threatening letter found at Northeastern University seemed to have been inspired by the real “Unabomber Manifesto”—properly titled Industrial Society and Its Futuregiven its anti-tech stance and signature capitalization. In his tract, the murderous Kaczynski put forward two legitimate insights which were unfortunately obscured by his actual mail-bomb campaign.

First, he argued technology is creating a digital cage that threatens all organic freedom on the planet. Second, the self-hatred, virtue-signaling, and repellent weakness exhibited by “leftists” is driving the acceptance of this digital cage.

“It is a mistake to argue for powerlessness and passivity, because people NEED power,” Kaczynski wrote. “Instead of arguing for powerlessness and passivity, one should argue that the power of the INDUSTRIAL SYSTEM should be broken, and that this will greatly INCREASE the power and freedom of INDIVIDUALS and SMALL GROUPS.” No one remembers this insight, though. They only remember the bombs.

Regardless of which identity group stages them, all hate hoaxes serve one purpose: to vilify “evil white conservatives” as the single greatest threat of our time. It is the genre’s defining feature. The caricature written into the bomb hoax letter is indistinguishable from the MAGA hat-wearing attackers described by Jussie Smollett. And because these hoaxes are never thoroughly debunked—and liberals need to believe in a white villain—these fictions are used to justify the digital panopticon being erected all around us.

This perpetual hate hoax hysteria is a form of virtual reality—illusions in a digital cage where powerless people can simulate a sense of control. Meanwhile, actual power accumulates in the hands of those who develop and deploy these technologies of surveillance and suppression.

Kaczynski warned about this reality. Duhaime’s alleged hoax was a poor attempt to make us forget it.

Certain extremists inspired by the Unabomber have targeted infrastructure under a neo‑Luddite banner, while others advocate nonviolent simplicity, such as Satish Kumar’s “small is beautiful” ethos that urges technology to serve human creativity. [19].

Title:

Content: Supplement
Sunday WorkShop
Undirected Classroom: How Happy Is Modern Society?
A true connection to nature.
Peace and ecology activist Satish Kumar returned to Hong Kong after four years at the invitation of KFBG.
Born in India, he has been a monk since the age of 18 and has joined social movements, and has not stopped advocating since the age of 87.
At this time, Satish is invited to share a simple and beautiful philosophy of life, hoping that it will come in time.
The reporter sat with him beside the tree, talking from the sunset to the early darkness, the details of his face gradually blurred, but his bright and firm expression dazzled in the dark.
"Human nature is simple."
Satish published Elegant Simplicity in 2019, and the traditional Chinese version of “Simple Aesthetics ” has been published recently.
In the book, he shares the experience of life, advocating that human beings should live simply, celebrate the creation of their own intrinsic values, rather than become slaves to physical desire.
At the launch of the new book, he explained that industrial civilization complicates everything, but to live a good life, there is no need for technical knowledge and a college degree.
He said simplicity is the most fundamental truth of human existence, "nature is simple, and human beings are simple by nature."
Satish believes that the economy of modern society is not a real economy, but a money-nomy that pursues money growth.
The economy is supposed to serve human well-being and happiness, but the situation is reversed.
As an example, each company also has a human “resources ” department, which can be seen by its name as a tool to promote economic growth, as well as natural“ resources. ” Satish, at the age of 26, embarked on a peaceful pilgrimage with friends from India to four nuclear-armed countries to promote nuclear abolition.
Along the way, he witnessed the workings of industrial agriculture in Europe and America: deforestation, overfishing, and poisoning the earth with chemicals, reflecting the invasion of the earth and the fight against nature.
This experience made him not only a parallel activist, but also an ecological activist.
Governments are currently working to reduce carbon emissions in response to climate change, but Satish stressed that this is not a cure unless people are prepared to live simpler, more “beautiful ” lives.
What is simplicity?
What is simplicity? Satish describes a lifestyle that spans all aspects of spirituality, emotions, relationships, as well as clothing, food, and housing, such as reducing the amount of material you own in your life, without the need to go through a complicated packaging process and buy food directly from the field.
However, urban people who have lived in the concrete forest since childhood are accustomed to the convenience of supermarket shopping and car travel, and it seems difficult to live simply. Satish believes that this is a gradual process, the key is to ask yourself: "How to make life simpler?" Specifically, the first step is to realize that everyone's necessary conditions for survival, first of all, clean air, water and soil.
By extension, the act of polluting the environment will ultimately only be passed on to humans and should be banned.
“Small is Beautiful ” Community
Satish advocates “small is beautiful ”, the smaller a community, the better, so that people can participate, organize, influence, and focus on this relationship.
When someone asked, “How much is small? ” he replied,“ If you can understand the business or every member of the community, then the organization is the right size and right size. ”
Satish believes that in an ideal city, shops, clinics, schools should be walking distance, and small cities encourage people to communicate more with each other, "but when the city is only a trading center, an industrial center, and a commercial center, rather than a human center, it lacks something."
The concept of the city has been around for a long time, and Satish does not deny its importance in human society, nor does he simply exhort everyone to return to the metropolis.
It ’ s hard for Hong Kong people to be in a foreign country with a backyard or a large field at home, but Satish points out that people still have ways to connect with nature. “When we start a journey, we don ’ t want to be somewhere else, but where we are. ”
He suggested that whenever you go for a walk in the mountains on weekends, you can think about how to reduce the impact on the environment and teach the next generation about nature.
Become a manufacturer Technology Assisted Living Non-dominant
Satish looks forward to the day when society is made up of creators and artists, and education should foster craftsmanship and creativity.
He wrote in “Simple Aesthetics ”:“ We are qualified to consume only if we are personally involved in the process of handmade manufacturing. ” When consumers become manufacturers, the system will not regard human beings as the owners of natural resources, and all that has been received from nature will be returned to practice sustainable living.
How does he see the development of science and technology?
"I am not against technology, technology should be the servant of (human)."
"He believes that technology should not replace human creativity, if technology makes people redundant and useless, it is bad technology. For example, the telephone is under the full control of human beings and facilitates communication, he does not resent this; but artificial intelligence is different," I do not agree with artificial intelligence, because it will reduce human nature and let the computer think for us. "
His principle is that craftsmanship and art should not be destroyed, and that the maker should be human, not technological, anti-customer.
Since the birth of civilization, human beings have tried to overcome the challenges of nature, but repeatedly proved that the mountains and the sea these natural things, not human beings can change, the social system has undergone changes, Satish has a belief: "Our system is created by human beings, and man-made things can be changed by human beings."
Starting with education, he founded Schumacher College in the 1990s, with ecology as the core of a holistic education.
College students are not just sitting in class, but also cooking, farming, connecting life and learning.
Satish believes that this shows that modern education has a big problem, so it is necessary to reform education and cultivate young people ’ s hands (handicrafts), both sides of the brain (not just the left brain of logical thinking) and spiritual development.
Satish wants people to become manufacturers, and even urges college graduates not to work, to create their own jobs and livelihoods.
The reporter asked Satish, “So what do you think you ’ ve created for the world? ” The writer and environmental peace advocate ’ s answer was somewhat unexpected:“ I ’ m a maker, especially a gardener. ” Then for a minute and a half, he talked about his family ’ s two acres of produce, such as 15 apple trees, which produced 200 bottles of apple juice this year for distribution to friends and family.
At home, he would walk out of his study after 5pm every day to enjoy the fun of cooking. Satish ’ s assessment of machine-made bread will be echoed by many people, “It is not good to buy bread, and the quality of the bread bought is generally poor. ”
From time to time, he was invited to share with the rest of the world, what about the garden at home? He laughed and said that he was very relieved to have someone to take care of him: "I am very lucky, very lucky, I married a gardener."
Protest is based on love that does no harm.
Environmental awareness is gradually rising, but in recent years there have been environmentalist protest methods that have provoked criticism, such as the group Just Stop Oil destroying famous paintings in the museum, hoping to awaken the government and people's attention. Satish does not agree with any protest that causes harm and inconvenience, insisting that all protests should be out of love, "I can be sentenced to prison, but not bring pain, hardship or inconvenience to my fellow human beings."
This is related to the theme of his other book, Radical Love, which mentions that radical activists should protest, protect, and create, but everything must be based on love, even love your enemies.
Violent actions attract only brief attention.
Journalists can ’ t help asking whether they are using extreme measures because they are frustrated with the current situation? At the launch of the new book, a woman mentioned that Satish ’ s previous speech was thought-provoking, but the online audience was only 300 people.
Is peace more difficult to attract attention?
“It ’ s not true, ” he objected,“ it ’ s not true. ”
Looking back at history, you will find that history was changed by peaceful protests, powerful peaceful protests.
"Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., all stood by the road of peace and became household names, so Satish believed that peaceful struggle can bring real change, so that the majority of people listen, women, children, and the elderly can participate in the movement.
On the contrary, the attention of the violent action is only a flash, "short-term media attention is not real attention, some people make violent action, the news reported for a day, and then forgotten."
Give the idealists a chance.
The world depicted by Satish feels out of step with the direction of the development of modern society. To completely change this system, it seems like heaven and earth.
He describes himself as an idealist, writing: “I ’ m here to ask you: ‘ What have the realists achieved? War? Poverty? Climate change? ’ Realists have been in charge of the world for too long, so it ’ s better to give the idealists a chance. ’
One of the teachings of Hinduism is “behavioural yoga ”, which guides people to act without being attached to results. Satish likens behavioural yogis to a radiator,“ I want to be with you (the audience), to communicate and spread information. ”
Some of them will like it, and some of them may say, “Oh, that ’ s idealistic. ”
It doesn ’ t matter, I ’ ll still get hot. ” Not just the advocates, he also sends a message to all the actors, the makers, to make the action as beautiful and creative as possible, but don ’ t worry about the results, “the action itself is its reward. ”
Even if the world is not ideal, the hope in Satish ’ s heart has not wavered. “If you have no hope, you will do nothing. ”
You have to be an optimist to do something. ”
He emphasized that hope and action complement each other, not just optimism, but active hope.
At the time of the interview, Satish, after a whole day of activities and sharing, still did not see fatigue on his face, and talked about each issue.
The octogenarian said that the action is out of love and passion, and takes a nap when the body is tired, but the spirit is never tired. "I am 87 years old, and I hope to serve humanity as an activist until the last breath of life."
“I don ’ t want to retire, now I ’ m re-fire. ”
Wen Ying-yun Chu
{Photos} Annie Chu, courtesy of Kadoorie Farm & Botanic Garden
{Art} Chang Yu-chi
{edit} Wang Cuili
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Environmental and health critiques also feature, with activists like Vandana Shiva opposing technologies such as genetic modification and artificial fertilizers.

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Content: ‘Prejudiced, anti-science, anti-social stances’: Letter denounces University of Missouri lecture series speech invitation to anti-biotechnology activist-philosopher Vandana Shiva

Vandana Shiva, an Indian activist philosopher who maintains the Green Revolution was a failure and promotes small-scale farming to address the growing global food needs, is speaking at the University of Missouri-Kansas City on October 7 as part of its “Social Justice” series. According to Shiva’s website, she is paid $100,000 plus business class travel reimbursement to advocate on behalf of the poor. A group of almost 50 scientists, scholars and communicators, including a Nobel Prize winner and a former president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, have signed a joint letter addressed to the Chancellor outlining Shiva’s misrepresentations.

Below is the letter, the response from the Chancellor, and a response to the Chancellor from Nobel Laureate Sir Richard Roberts:

Dear Chancellor,

We are scholars of life sciences and social sciences who have published many scholarly papers and articles about agriculture, food and related biotechnologies.

Perhaps you are unaware of Dr. Vandana Shiva’s constant use of anti-scientific rhetoric to support unethical positions. We are very surprised that any science-based and ethically inspired institution would invite her to speak.

Here are some (only some) examples of her prejudicial, anti-science, anti-social stances:

1. Her astonishing tendency to nonsense

See the absurd statement regarding the supposed functioning of the Genetic Use Restriction technology (GURT), from her book Stolen Harvest (p. 82-83):

Molecular biologists are examining the risk of the Terminator function escaping the genome of the crops into which it has been intentionally incorporated, and moving into surrounding open-pollinated crops or wild, related plants in fields nearby. Given Nature’s incredible adaptability and the fact that the technology has never been tested on a large scale, the possibility that the Terminator may spread to surrounding food crops or to the natural environment MUST be taken seriously. The gradual spread of sterility in seeding plants would result in a globalcatastrope that could eventually wipe out higher life forms, including humans, from the planet

Same words in other documents in her websites.

One may need to read these statements twice because they are too bewildering to be understood at first sight. In fact, she claims that sterile seeds — which of course cannot germinate — can spread sterility. A middle school student expressing such views would fail the biology exam.

Follow the latest news and policy debates on agricultural biotech and biomedicine? Subscribe to our newsletter.

2. Her stunning ignorance

Somebody should explain to her that Bt proteins are toxic to some clearly identified classes of insects (plant pests), but not to fish, birds, or mammals. See also the scientific papers quoted in response to her delusional Twitter post, in particular, the “classic” study by Ames et al. which clarifies that plants naturally produce substances to defend themselves from pests and 99.99% of pesticidal substances in food are natural — and harmless to humans.

*******************************************************

This is the public announcement of Shiva’s talk

******************************************************

3. Her proclivity to offend

She is comparing farmers, who grow crops which are scientifically and legally recognized as safe, to rapists! It’s a grotesque insult to millions of honest workers who use modern technologies to farm sustainably and efficiently. Understandably, her outrageous abuse raised many angry reactions (see the replies to the same post).

4. Her rejection of technologies which help farmers (mostly women and children) to alleviate the painful, back-breaking labour of hand-weeding

Indian women selectively do weeding by hand, hereby preserving our biodiversity

(Photo and caption at p.21)

This is a preposterous statement; any act of weeding is exactly aimed at eliminating detrimental plant “biodiversity” which, in a field, stifles crops.

5. As a final treat, a ridiculous statement

“Fertilizer should never have been allowed in agriculture,” she said in a 2011 speech. “I think it’s time to ban it. It’s a weapon of mass destruction. Its use is like in war, because it came from war.”

Quoted in the New Yorker and in other websites.

Let us ask her if she is going to ban metallurgy, since it has been used to forge cannons…

We are confident that our reasoned remarks will be seen by the addressees of this letter, by their colleagues and students as constructive criticism.

Some of us may be able to attend the event to challenge Dr. Shiva in person. In any case, we would appreciate if you can make our letter available to the participants.

We would greatly value a point-by-point response to the important matters we raise.

Here are some links to articles that contained reasoned criticism of Dr. Shiva’s untenable stances:

Who is Vandana Shiva and why is she saying such awful things about GMOs? (Reprinted in Forbes: Vandana Shiva, Anti-GMO Celebrity: ‘Eco Goddess’ Or Dangerous Fabulist?)

Vandana Shiva: ‘Rock Star’ of GMO protest movement has history of opposing Green Revolution and agricultural technological innovation

The GMO-Suicide Myth

Seeds of Doubt

Vandana Shiva Compares GMOs to Rape

Vandana Shiva’s Myth Busted: Monsanto Didn’t Cause Farmer Suicides In India

Counterview: In GMO debate, Vandana Shiva has chosen fear-mongering and denialism

Vandana Shiva: Fearmongering in Oregon

Lies, Lies And More Lies

Activism and the gift of delusion

Vandana Shiva is confusing ideology for science – and getting rational people to believe her

Viewpoint: GMO critic Vandana Shiva’s anti-modernity crusade threatens world’s poor

‘Social Justice Warrior’ Vandana Shiva Is A Poor Advocate For The Poor

Sincerely yours,

Signatories in alphabetical order. Institutional affiliation is for identification purposes only and does not indicate institutional endorsement.

Philipp Aerni — University of Zurich, Switzerland. Director, Center for Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability, Geography, Public Policy.
Klaus Ammann — University of Bern, Switzerland. Professor Emeritus, expert in agri-food biotech regulation.
David J. Bertioli — University of Georgia, USA. Georgia Research Alliance Distinguished Investigator and Professor, Institute of Plant Breeding, Genetics and Genomics.
Peter Beyer — Albert-Ludwigs University Freiburg, Germany. Professor (retired). Co-inventor of the Golden Rice. Member of the Golden Rice Humanitarian Board.
Borut Bohanec — University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. Biotechnical Faculty, Plant Biotechnology and Breeding.
Enrico Bucci — Temple University, Philadelphia,USA. Adjunct Professor in Systems Biology, Sbarro Health Research Organization.
Trevor Charles — University of Waterloo, Canada. Professor in the Department of Biology, Director, Waterloo Centre for Microbial Research.
Bruce M. Chassy — University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. Professor Emeritus, expert in agri-food biotech regulation.
Felice Cervone — University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Italy. Full Professor, Dept of Biology and Biotechnologies, M.A.E.(Member of Academia Europaea).
Pellegrino Conte — University of Palermo, Italy. Full Professor, Agricultural Chemistry.
Gilberto Corbellini — Italian National Research Council (CNR), Rome, Italy. Director, Department of Humanities, Social Science and CulturalHeritage.
Terry Daynard — Ontario Agricultural College, University of Guelph, Canada. Former Professor of Crop Science, former Associate Dean of Research and Innovation.
Thomas R. DeGregori — University of Houston, USA. Professor of Economics; Books, articles and field experience in agricultural economic development.
Roberto Defez — Italian National Research Council (CNR), Naples, Italy. Senior Researcher, Microbial Biotechnology laboratory.
Adrian Dubock — Former Global Head M&A, Ventures and Licensing, Syngenta, Switzerland. (Retired) Member & Executive Secretary, Golden Rice Humanitarian Board.
Jon Entine — Genetic Literacy Project, Cincinnati, OH, USA. Executive Director.
Nina Fedoroff — Penn StateUniversity, USA. Emeritus Professor of Biology; former President of the American Association for the Advancement ofScience (AAAS).
Edgardo Filippone — University of Naples “Federico II”, Italy. Full Professor, Department of Agricultural Sciences, Section of Plant Genetics and Biotechnology.
Kevin Folta — University of Florida Department of Horticultural Sciences, USA. Professor and Chairman.
L. Val Giddings, PhD — PrometheusAB, Inc.,USA. Expert in agri-food biotech regulation.
Jonathan Gressel — Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel. Professor, Plant & Environmental Sciences.
L. Curtis Hannah — University of Florida, USA. Professor Emeritus, Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology & Horticultural Sciences.
Klaus-Dieter Jany — Wadi International University, Syria. Vice-President for Teaching and Research.
Jonathan D. G. Jones — FRS The Sainsbury Lab, Norwich, UK. Professor and Senior Group Leader.
Drew L. Kershen — University of Oklahoma, USA. Earl Sneed Centennial Professor of Law Emeritus.
Marcel Kuntz — University of Grenoble-Alpes, France. Director of Research at Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS).
Christopher J. Leaver CBE FRS FRSE — University of Oxford, UK. Emeritus Professor of Plant Science.
Alan McHughen — University of California, Riverside, USA. Botany and Plant Sciences, expert in agri-food biotech regulation.
Bruno Mezzetti — Marche Polytechnic University, Italy. Full Professor, Dept Agriculture.
Henry I. Miller, M.Sc., M.D. — Senior Fellow, Pacific Research Institute, San Francisco, USA. Founding director of the FDA’s Office of Biotechnology.
Giovanni Molteni Tagliabue — Como (Italy). Independent researcher in philosophy of life sciences, political science.
Piero Morandini — University of Milan, Italy. Researcher in Plant Physiology, Environmental Science and Policy Department.
Domenico Pignone — National Research Council, Italy. Emeritus Researcher, Plant genetics.
Ingo Potrykus — ETH Zurich, Switzerland. Professor Emeritus, Institute of Plant Sciences, Co-inventor Golden Rice, Chair Golden Rice Humanitarian Board.
Channa Prakash — Tuskegee University, USA. Dean, Arts & Sciences.
Sir Richard John Roberts — Chief Scientific Officer, New England Biolabs, Ipswich,USA. 1993 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine.
Daniele Rosellini — University of Perugia, Italy. Associate Professor of Agricultural Genetics.
Eddo Rugini — Università della Tuscia, Italy. Past Full Professor in Fruit Tree Science and Biotechnology.
Donatello Sandroni — PhD in Ecotoxicology. Science Journalist, Italy.
Angelo Santino — Institute of Sciences of Food Production, National Research Council (CNR), Lecce, Italy. Senior Scientist.
Francesca Sparvoli — National Research Council (CNR), Milan, Italy. Senior Researcher, Institute of Agricultural Biology and Biotechnology.
Teemu Teeri — University of Helsinki, Finland. Professor in Plant Breeding.
Donatella Tramontano — University of Naples “Federico II”, Italy. Full professor of Applied Biology, Dpt of Molecular Medicine and Medical Biotechnology.
Roberto Tuberosa — University of Bologna, Italy. Professor in Biotechnology Applied to Plant Breeding, Department of Agricultural and Food Sciences
Ignazio Verde — Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA), Rome, Italy. Senior scientist on Plant Genetics and scientific advisor.
Richard G.F. Visser — Wageningen University & Research, The Netherlands. Chair & Head Plant Breeding.
Alessandro Vitale — National Research Council (CNR), Milan, Italy. Lead scientist, Institute of Agricultural Biology and Biotechnology.
Robert Wager — Vancouver Island University, Canada. Molecular biology, Biochemistry.

The University of Missouri responded:

Response from one of the signers, Sir Richard John Roberts:

Dear Chancellor Agrawal:

Frankly, I am appalled by your response (attached) to Dr. Giovanni Tagliabue and his colleagues. You seem to consider Vandana Shiva’s views as merely controversial, when she continuously spews lies and falsehoods to support her views. Has the University of Missouri lost faith in the value of the truth?

Controversy implies opposing interpretations of facts, not pitting facts against fabrications. By exposing your students to blatant lies and giving them equal credence with truth you do them a great disservice.

It is not too late to rescind your decision to invite her to speak.

Rich Roberts

Sir Richard J. Roberts Ph.D. F.R.S.

1993 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine

Chief Scientific Officer

New England Biolabs

240 County Road

Ipswich, MA 01938-2723 USA

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Some communities, such as Indonesia’s Badawi, have rejected internet access to preserve local traditions and reduce perceived mental health harms.

Title:

Content: Due to the negative impact of smart phones...
Indonesia ’ s indigenous Badawi group calls for internet blackout in its region
Saturday ، 10 June 2023 04: 49 PM
A smart phone.
Books by Muhammad Jamal
Leave a comment and read the comments of the readers.
Indonesia's indigenous Badawi group has asked to disconnect its area from the Internet to "minimize the negative impact of smartphones and the virtual world" on its members, Sky News reported.
The community of 26,000 people in Banten Province, Java, is divided into two parts: a peripheral group that partly adopts new technologies, and a centralized group that tries to avoid the dangers of modern life.
The central group called on authorities to cut off the internet and divert nearby communications antennas so that the signal could not reach them, according to a letter seen by AFP.
Telecommunications antennas built near their area could threaten residents ’ lifestyle and the mental health of young people who may be tempted to use the internet.
Officials in Lipak district of Banten province told AFP they received the letter on Monday and agreed to speak with Indonesia's information ministry to try to respond to the request.
Bodi Santoso, a Lipac official, told AFP on Friday: "Above all, we want to adapt to what the people of the Badawi community want, and we have to preserve their local traditions and knowledge."
Residents in the periphery of the Badawi community need the Internet to run businesses they have set up online, but authorities fear that visitors or tourists may access the network and publish content they deem unsuitable for the Badawi community, according to Santoso.
The secluded Badawi community chose to live in the forest and rejected traditional technology, financial services and education.
Members of the community live in three villages spanning 4,000 hectares, a few hours' drive from the capital Jakarta.
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At the individual and organizational level, technology resistance is shaped by psychological and sociological factors such as fear of change, fear of loss, and even associations of digital transformation with staff cuts.

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Lessons Learned Selling Digital Transformation In A Risk-Averse Industry

Michael W. Levin, CEO and co-founder of Ideon.

In a 2018 McKinsey survey, 80% of respondents said their organizations had undertaken a digital transformation in the preceding five years.

And that was before the pandemic, which has, to say the least, accelerated such changes.

Of course it has. I’m preaching to the choir when I posit to this audience that digital change is necessary for the survival of almost any organization today, business or otherwise. That’s certainly the case for the industry in which my company operates—health insurance and employee benefits—and especially so for carriers, in part because of the rapid rise of InsurTech, which is helping to drive digital innovation throughout the industry.

And yet.

All too often, selling digital transformation within large organizations is an uphill battle. That’s especially the case at organizations in established industries—with ways of doing business that can sometimes date back decades—and is even more a truism if those organizations have a predisposition to manage risk. There are many reasons for this, of course, but three fears play a key role.

• Fear Of Change: It's human nature to favor the familiar over the unknown. We prefer what we know, even when shown a superior alternative. So it’s understandable that executives accustomed to analog processes may be wary of digital ones. There’s an entire field of study, behavioral economics, built around the status quo bias.

• Fear Of Loss: Digital transformation requires investment. And as a general rule, humans react twice as strongly to the loss of a given amount as they do to the gain of the same amount. So unless the ROI for a digital transformation project is clear and convincing, certain colleagues will tend to resist spending money.

• Fear Of Mortality: Not literally, of course. But bosses and employees alike often associate digital change with staff reductions. But even though such relationships are unclear, some executives resist change if they believe it will lead to a loss of headcount or otherwise erode positions of power.

The Way Forward

So how can an organization’s evangelizers persuade colleagues to embrace change? There’s no simple answer, but my experience over the years helping insurance organizations embrace data transparency and connected ecosystems suggests that four strategies—on their own or in combination—can help break through most institutional roadblocks:

1. Align proposed changes with business goals. Change for modernizing’s sake is one thing. Change that helps achieve already established goals is something else entirely. Good leaders are generally driven by big-picture aims. Tying digital transformation to company priorities allows evangelizers to harness existing momentum rather than requiring them to start from scratch.

2. Create your own stakeholders. Whatever their personality, human beings are much more likely to support an initiative if they feel invested in it. Quite frankly, we value something more when it's ours. And the best way to create investment in the idea of change is to involve colleagues early in the transformational journey. Ask the appropriate decision-makers or influencers for input about their problems and possible solutions. If the digital transformation you seek is the logical conclusion to that process, otherwise resistant colleagues will more likely support the idea because they had a hand in getting there.

3. Marshal your facts. Before investing resources in digital transformation, decision-makers want to know that it will pay off. Prepare information—statistics, research findings, anecdotes—on the ROI of digital transformation. Seventy-six percent of employees surveyed said having the digital tools they need makes them more productive. Additionally, Harvard Business School technologists report (paywall) that companies with the most effective digital transformations have higher net income than those with less-successful digital transformations. Data points like these can motivate leaders to prioritize tech imperatives.

4. Leverage FOMO. Regret aversion is a powerful thing. That is to say, many people are not as afraid of making a bad decision as they are afraid of feeling bad about a decision they made. It’s one reason people follow the crowd. We don’t necessarily believe that other people are smarter than we are. But many of us do believe (if only nonconsciously) that if we follow the lead of others we will have company if our decision turns out to be unwise. Regret aversion bias can be leveraged powerfully when selling digital transformation by framing a failure to adopt change as leaving an organization alone in the dark while the rest of the industry—or even its cutting-edge leaders—moves toward the light.

I know there is a reliable path to digital transformation because my firm has seen dozens of clients and partners complete such journeys. But accounting for the inevitable challenges, both structural and psychological, is key to achieving success.

Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?

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Learning resistance can be driven by low interest or fixed mindsets, and external factors like socioeconomic status, demographics, and personal attitudes also influence adoption. [11].

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Citation

Sarker MAA, Rahimi A, Azimi G, Jin X. J. Transp. Eng. A: Systems 2022; 148(9): e04022054.

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(Copyright © 2022, American Society of Civil Engineers)

DOI

10.1061/JTEPBS.0000715

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Abstract

This paper presents the results of a study that explores the desired monthly cost savings that would motivate older adults to change their regular mobility choices to ridesourcing. Using data from a stated preference survey, various socioeconomic and demographic attributes and personal attitudinal factors were examined to investigate their impacts on older adults' ridesourcing adoption decisions. Random parameter ordered logit models were developed for older adults (age 65 and older) and young adults (age 64 and younger) separately to investigate whether and how the contributing factors differ. The potential heterogeneity in the impacts of these variables was also examined. Model results showed significant differences between older and younger adults' motivations for ridesourcing adoption. For older adults, those who were less educated or sensitive to travel costs required lower economic incentives, and were therefore easier to persuade to switch to ridesourcing. In contrast, older adults who had a positive view about private vehicle utilities, had trust issues with traveling with strangers, used private vehicles for regular trips, and shopped online regularly showed higher expectations of monthly cost savings to switching to ridesourcing. While these attitudes played a significant role in older adults' decision-making, socioeconomic and demographic attributes, such as age and income, were more influential in young adults' ridesourcing choices. The results provide a better understanding of the older adults' motivations to switch to ridesourcing for monthly cost savings. The findings could be helpful for planners and policymakers to better plan for older adults to meet their mobility needs.

Language: en

Keywords

Cost savings; Older adults; Random parameter ordered logit model; Ridesourcing; Stated preference survey

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Perceived usefulness and perceived risk predict acceptance, while risk‑averse consumers avoid new tech and often rely on social proof to reduce uncertainty. [13].

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How can companies address consumers who are averse to products using a novel technology?

Researchers from IE Business School and Indian Institute of Management Shillong have published a new study that examines why certain consumers are averse to products using a novel technology and what strategies marketers can use to remedy this aversion.

The study, which appears in the Journal of Marketing, is titled "Adoption of New Technology Vaccines" and is authored by Laura Zimmermann, Jeeva Somasundaram, and Barsha Saha.

In October 2023, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted emergency-use authorization for the COVID-19 vaccine produced by Novavax. This was the third coronavirus vaccine available to Americans, but the only one not made with messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. The shot was marketed as an alternative for those who were skeptical of vaccines made with mRNA technology.

The COVID-19 vaccines produced by Pfizer and Moderna introduce a piece of mRNA that corresponds to a viral protein, usually one found on the outer membrane of the coronavirus. The recognizes this foreign protein and produces antibodies to fight it. These antibodies remain in the body even after the pathogen has been destroyed. If exposed to the virus after receiving an mRNA-based vaccine, antibodies can quickly recognize and fight it before it causes serious illness.

The skepticism about mRNA centers around claims that it could spread itself throughout the body and alter the basic DNA of those vaccinated. This belief persists despite several leading scientists and policymakers assuring the public that the mRNA is broken down shortly after vaccination and does not stay in the body.

This new study finds that certain consumers are surprisingly averse to products described as employing a , like vaccines based on mRNA technology. The researchers investigate how consumers react to technological innovations that have the following specific features:

  • When consumers cannot test and trial the new product to reduce uncertainty
  • When the new product might lead to a health loss
  • When other consumers' adoption of the might undermine the importance of the new technology

Examples of such innovations are mRNA vaccines and other pharmaceutical products, and also products such as nanoparticle pesticides, lithium-ion battery technology, and hydrogen energy.

Zimmermann explains, "We find that consumers demand higher vaccine efficacy to offset the higher perceived uncertainty that surrounds a new technology compared to a traditional vaccine. On average, our participants required a 19% higher vaccine efficacy to adopt a new technology vaccine."

This aversion was more pronounced among certain consumer segments, such as people who have little trust in their government. Consumers less inclined to embrace new technology in general were also more likely to avoid a vaccine employing new technology. Finally, consumers who are risk-averse, especially regarding small probabilities of losses, tended to show a stronger aversion to adopting a new technology vaccine.

Nudges to 'follow the herd'

One way to reduce this aversion is with a social proof nudge: to communicate that other consumers have adopted the new technology.

"When we communicated that a higher percentage of the population had adopted the new technology, people saw it as a proxy trial experience, which reduced their uncertainty. They were therefore more likely to 'follow the herd' and adopt the new technology," says Somasundaram.

But this strategy can be a double-edged sword: When people know that a high percentage of the population has taken up a vaccine, they might be less likely to vaccinate because they believe they are protected due to herd immunity.

Saha says, "Our research indicates, however, that a social proof nudge has an overall net positive effect in this context and reduces aversion to new technology vaccines." The same pattern applies to other domains such as novel energy-efficient technology (i.e., hydrogen energy heating, lithium-battery cars), nanoparticle pesticides, and other pharmaceutical products.

Lessons for marketers and policymakers

  • Marketers can identify consumers with low trust in government, low technology readiness, and high aversion to risk based on their willingness to pay for , past purchases of high-tech products, and their age and education level.
  • Companies can adjust their communication strategies to better connect with different groups of consumers by predicting how each would respond to the introduction of new technologies.
  • Consumers can make more informed choices about new technology by understanding how their personal beliefs and attitudes, such as trust in government and risk preferences, as well as social proof nudges influence their choices.
  • Policymakers and marketers must carefully consider the potential (long-term) risks of new technology and respect the autonomy of decision makers. This is because social proof nudges might bias information processing in ways that lead consumers to overlook uncertainty when they should not.
  • When a technology's greatest need lies in communities prone to distrust (e.g., new technology pesticides for farmers in ), marketers should understand the root causes of distrust, seek feedback, and focus on reducing the perceived uncertainty in a transparent fashion because exaggerated claims may contribute to further distrust.

More information: Laura Zimmermann et al, Adoption of New Technology Vaccines, Journal of Marketing (2023). DOI: 10.1177/00222429231220295

Journal information: Journal of Marketing

Citation: How can companies address consumers who are averse to products using a novel technology? (2024, April 16) retrieved 16 April 2024 from https://phys.org/news/2024-04-companies-consumers-averse-products-technology.html
This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

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Demographics matter—age and education correlate with willingness to adopt—and prior high‑tech purchases can signal openness to future technologies.

Multiple risk types shape decisions, including physical, operational, economic, social, and psychological risks, and mitigations like safety measures and alerts can ease concerns.

Title:

Content: Sensitive Design: How to reduce the "resistance" of new technology products, so that consumers no longer worry about security and privacy?
Photo Credit: iStock
What we want you to know is
Reducing resistance is not about convincing consumers to accept your product, it ’ s about developing better products so that consumers don ’ t have to worry and there ’ s less resistance.
The ability to anticipate and resolve how much resistance may exist when designing a product will affect the speed of adoption and overall success of the product.
Written by Deborah Nass
Reduced resistance
Consumers often resist new technology products.
The unproven benefits of these products, the potential for unintended side effects, or the rapid obsolescence of these products have led consumers to worry about the risks associated with buying and using them.
Most resistance can be traced to various risks associated with purchasing or using a product, including: physical risk, that the product is harmful to our health, property or the environment; operational risk, that the product is not working or reliable; economic risk, that the product is not worthy, needs to be repaired or completely damaged; and the risk of time loss, which allows consumers to invest time and effort without satisfactory results.
Other less obvious risks include social risk, fear that others will not identify with the product and those who use it; and psychological risk, fear that the product will not conform to one ’ s own values or self-image.
Reducing resistance through product design requires a deep understanding of consumer values, belief structures, needs, risk perceptions, and their perceptions of potential shortcomings. Engaging consumers throughout the innovation process reveals the negative impact a product can have on consumers ’ lives, society, and the planet.
Reducing resistance is not about convincing consumers to accept your product, it ’ s about developing better products so that consumers don ’ t have to worry and there ’ s less resistance.
The ability to anticipate and resolve how much resistance may exist when designing a product will affect the speed of adoption and overall success of the product.
This part of the design strategy will help you identify these resistance, you will find that by combining and applying design strategies to reduce resistance, you will become stronger.
Understanding resistance can help you develop better products and thus reduce resistance.
Maintain personal safety
In 1865, Britain enacted the Red Flag Acts, which limited the speed of cars to no more than five kilometers per hour, and even required a person to walk in front of the car to warn pedestrians of approaching vehicles. The label of a killer machine.
The following strategies can reduce people ’ s fear of physical or psychological harm:
• Designed to include automatic safety measures
If the product is focused on safety features, it should protect the user. Some innovative products come with protective measures, such as automatic safety features such as the ABS system, which is now standard safety equipment in all vehicles.
The recent rise of high-speed electric bicycles (Speed Pedelecs) in Europe also requires automatic safety, a new type of electric bicycle that can reach speeds of up to 45 kilometers per hour.
The Dutch parliament is discussing a speed regulator combined with GPS that automatically limits the speed of electric bicycles in areas with large traffic flows.
Cycling company Gazelle teamed up with Delft University of Technology to develop a smart steering assist system to prevent falls while riding an electric bike.
As soon as the rider is detected to be at risk of falling, the smart motor of the handlebar adjusts its direction.
• Designed to contain alarms that are impossible to ignore
Human error is the main cause of traffic accidents, and while self-driving cars are expected to reduce accidents, the current technology is not perfect.
Tesla ’ s Autopilot mode constantly evaluates the car ’ s ability to handle the current situation. If you think the computer can ’ t be safely controlled, you will use a flash that you can ’ t ignore and a very loud beep to remind the driver to “take over immediately. ”
To ensure that the driver remains alert and awake, Subaru uses cameras and infrared sensors to monitor eye movements and alerts the vehicle whenever it detects that the driver is asleep or not looking at the road.
• Designed with attractive safety accessories
Many people are afraid to use products or services in their daily lives because of fear.
Some people worry about getting hurt by riding a bicycle, and riding an electric bicycle deepens this fear.
Although the speed is faster and allows us to get to our destination faster, it also increases the risk of injury.
Electric bicycle manufacturers can include helmets when selling cars to lessen people ’ s fear of accidents.
However, most people don ’ t like wearing a helmet and think that looks silly and destroys their hair.
Swedish company Hövding, developed airbags for cyclists to solve this problem.
Surround your neck with stylish airbags that are barely noticeable and open only in an emergency.
“The safest bicycle helmet in the world is not a helmet, ” says Hövding. They use sensors and algorithms to give users peace of mind when riding at high speeds without having to wear a helmet.
Hövding made the helmet invisible, and Livall was designed to be cool and cool.
Their helmets look high-tech and are perfect for tech homes.
The Livall Commuter is equipped with a number of smart safety features, including a remote control that controls the steering light of the helmet, plays music and answers phone calls, reads GPS directions to you, and provides a 270-degree visible taillight for night riding.
If the helmet ’ s three-axis gyroscope detects a fall, it notifies a pre-configured emergency contact. The Livall helmet features eliminate the reason for not riding and reduce the chance of an accident.
• Designed to include self-protection
While security measures can improve overall security and help address consumers ’ reluctance to use products, they often leave some people feeling overly complacent.
Some people think that with the automatic driving mode, you can not see the road at all, but the automatic driving technology is not perfect, and the driver must pay attention to the road.
In this regard, Tesla forces the driver to have at least one hand on the steering wheel in autopilot mode, the steering wheel sensor will detect whether the driver is applying slight pressure, and if no movement is detected for a period of time, the car will remind the driver to "tap the steering wheel", flashing lights and increasingly frequent beeps to attract attention until you do so.
Samsung ’ s In-Trac Reply app automatically answers messages received while driving.
The phone ’ s sensor automatically detects when the user is driving or riding a bicycle, turns it on automatically, and replies with an interesting default message, indicating that you can ’ t respond until you reach your destination.
• Designed to include restricted safety devices
Consumers resist certain products out of fear of harm to themselves or others. Quooker developed a three-in-one kitchen faucet that drains cold, hot and boiling water, and they understood that boiling water directly from the faucet could worry parents, so they addressed this issue in product design. Flowing out to avoid serious burns.
What ’ s more, Quooker noted that taps don ’ t turn over like hot water kettles, emphasizing that their products are safer than traditional water kettles.
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Trust and data privacy worries are common, particularly among older adults, and trust building can facilitate learning and adoption. [12].

Title:

Content: Learning Resistors
Dr. Alaa Jarad
Have you ever met someone who made you believe that there is no use, that the person will never learn, will never change?
There is no doubt that we are faced with individuals who seem opposed to or resistant to learning.
Today ’ s article reviews the characteristics of individuals who cannot learn or have resistance to learning, the possible reasons for their resistance, and strategies for fostering a supportive learning environment for these individuals.
What are the characteristics of learning resistant individuals?
First, we agree that there are two conditions for learning, first: desire or will, second: ability, so that a person learns must have the desire and the will to learn, a student can be forced to go to school, or attend a lesson, but can not be forced to absorb and learn the content, and therefore learning is a « choice », and the person is free to choose to learn or ignore.
The second condition of learning is ability, that is, ability, mental and sensory competence, perception, assimilation, remembering, thinking, forming, criticizing, expressing, understanding and retrieving ideas, where the individual can have a desire to learn, but his mental potential is weak, or has slow learning, or even a learning disability, all of which have different methods of treatment unless the person resists learning.
As for the traits of these learning resistant individuals, they may exhibit a lack of interest, apathy, or negativity toward educational endeavors.
Some individuals may also show a lack of motivation, consistently avoid challenges, or exhibit a fixed mindset that limits their belief in their ability to learn and grow.
These traits can manifest across different age groups and learning environments, posing serious challenges for teachers, parents, mentors and managers.
Why do people resist learning?
In addition, external influences such as personal circumstances or social pressures can contribute to resistance to learning, and psychological barriers, such as fear of failure, low self-esteem, or a fixed mindset can also play an important role.
What are the strategies for overcoming learning resistance?
Adopting the right strategies breaks down barriers and fosters a positive learning environment, where trust is built, and showing genuine interest by teachers or coaches and managers can facilitate and adjust the learning process according to learners ’ individual needs, interests and strengths, resulting in increased engagement and motivation.
Practical activities, real-life applications and interactive discussions can also be used.
Providing a supportive and inclusive environment for everyone is critical, and encouraging, positive reinforcement, and celebrating small successes can boost these individuals ’ confidence and help them develop a growth mindset.
By identifying the underlying factors that contribute to learning resistance and implementing customized strategies, growth potential can be unleashed within these individuals.
Everyone can have the ability to learn and grow, if given the right support, encouragement and opportunities.
Through patience, empathy and innovative methods, an inclusive learning environment can be created that fosters the success of all learners, including those who may initially seem unteachable.
Garad @ alaagarad.com
@ Alaa _ Garad
To read the author ’ s previous articles, please click on his name.
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Workplace concerns include lack of technical expertise, insufficient customization, and high costs, which can stall adoption and fuel resistance.

Title:

Content: What is ERP and its relationship to SMEs
Enterprise resource planning, or ERP, is a comprehensive software solution that integrates and automates core business processes to help organizations manage resources more efficiently.
The primary function of ERP systems is to act as a central repository of all business information, enabling seamless data exchange between different departments and facilitating informed decision making.
Small and medium-sized businesses, or small and medium-sized businesses, are companies with up to 500 employees and annual revenues of less than $100 million.
SMEs, like their larger counterparts, face challenges in effectively managing resources and processes to ensure competitiveness, profitability and sustainable growth.
As such, ERP systems are becoming increasingly relevant to SMEs, providing them with a comprehensive toolkit to streamline processes, enhance information sharing, and drive data-driven decisions.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems for SMEs typically consist of different modules that meet the unique needs of different industries and business functions.
These units may include finance and accounting, human resources, supply chain management, procurement, inventory control, and customer relationship management, among others.
By integrating these units, SMEs can achieve a unified and unified vision for their entire business, facilitating better decision making and providing valuable insights to drive growth and success.
Benefits of ERP Systems for SMEs
There are several key benefits that ERP systems can offer to SMEs, some of which are described below:
• Process Automation: ERP systems help automate many repetitive and time-consuming tasks, such as billing, order processing, and inventory management.
This automation frees employees to focus on more strategic and value-added activities, boosting overall productivity.
• Cost reduction: By simplifying processes, reducing manual labor, and reducing errors, ERP systems can help SMEs achieve cost savings.
In addition, ERP software provides improved inventory control, reduces inventory levels and reduces waste, further contributing to cost reduction.
• Improved efficiency: Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems allow SMEs to monitor and manage their operations in real time, improving efficiency and reducing operational delays.
Identifying and correcting bottlenecks becomes easier, and the integrated nature of the system ensures that changes and decisions are quickly deployed across the entire organization.
• Data-driven decision making: Through the ability to access real-time data and analytics, ERP systems provide SMEs with the insights needed to make informed strategic decisions.
This data-driven decision-making process can help identify areas for improvement, discover new growth opportunities, and enable better planning for the future.
• Improved collaboration: Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems promote better collaboration between different departments by providing a single source of truth for business data.
This centralized access to information ensures that all team members work with the same data and insights, preventing miscommunication and fostering collaboration across the organization.
Scalability: As SMEs grow, their business processes and requirements evolve.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are designed to be compatible with the organization, ensuring that companies can seamlessly adapt to new challenges and take advantage of emerging opportunities.
The modular nature of ERP systems allows SMEs to add or remove components as needed, effectively auditing their operations in the future.
Challenges faced by SMEs in adopting ERP systems
Despite the above benefits, SMEs may face different challenges when adopting and implementing ERP systems.
Some of these challenges are listed below:
• High costs: ERP systems can be expensive, especially for small and medium-sized businesses with limited resources.
The initial costs of software and hardware licenses and implementation, as well as ongoing expenses for maintenance, upgrades, and training, can be a significant financial burden for small and medium-sized businesses.
• Insufficient customization: SMEs often have unique processes and requirements that off-the-shelf ERP solutions may not meet.
While ERP systems are highly customizable, customizing software to suit the specific needs of SMEs can be complex and expensive.
• Fear of change: Implementing an ERP system requires significant changes in business processes and employee workflows.
This can be a frightening prospect, and many SMEs may be hesitant to embrace this change due to concerns about disruption, downtime, or perceived risk of failure.
• Lack of technical expertise: Many SMEs do not have dedicated IT departments or extensive technical expertise, which can make the implementation and management of an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system difficult.
This lack of experience can lead to longer execution periods, unexpected complications, and higher total cost of ownership.
• Resistance to change by employees: The adoption of enterprise resource planning (ERP) always affects employees, who may resist the changes brought about by the new system.
They may see ERP implementation as a threat to their job security or feel overwhelmed by learning new processes and tools.
Overcoming this resistance is critical to successfully adopting an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system.
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How to overcome ERP implementation challenges
Adopting an ERP system can be a difficult process, especially for small and medium-sized businesses with limited resources.
However, there are strategies that can help overcome these challenges and ensure successful ERP implementation.
Here are five key steps to help SMEs adopt ERP systems with confidence:
Carefully assess the appropriateness of an ERP system
Before investing in an ERP system, SMEs must make a thorough assessment of their business needs and ERP solutions available in the market.
They must take into account factors such as scalability, ease of integration, customization options and technology used in an ERP system.
SMEs should also consider the total cost of ownership (TCO) of an ERP system; this includes initial implementation costs, ongoing maintenance costs, and any potential hidden costs.
By identifying an ERP system that is truly right for their business requirements, SMEs can reduce overall costs and maximize the benefits that the system provides.
Set clear goals and return on investment expectations
Setting clear goals, timetables, and return on investment (ROI) projections for ERP implementation is critical for small and medium-sized businesses.
They need to identify key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure the success of an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system based on their specific business objectives.
This provides a clear roadmap for the implementation process and helps ensure that all stakeholders align with goals and expectations, reducing the risk of conflicts and misunderstandings.
Allocation of resources for implementation
SMEs must be realistic about the resources needed to successfully implement ERP.
This includes budget allocation, staff dedication, and investment in training and change management efforts.
ERP vendors may offer support and consulting services, but it is also important for SMEs to build in-house capacity.
Proper resource allocation not only helps ensure a smoother implementation process, but also reduces the risk of delays, cost overruns and other challenges that may arise during the project.
Engaging key stakeholders and staff
Engaging key stakeholders and employees in the ERP implementation process is important to ensure engagement, increase user acceptance, and facilitate a smooth transition.
SMEs should establish an ERP implementation team composed of representatives from various departments, such as finance, operations, sales and IT.
This team should be responsible for collecting requirements, collaborating with an ERP vendor, and providing feedback during the implementation process.
Employee training and open communication are essential to address potential resistance to the new system and enable employees to embrace the changes brought about by the adoption of enterprise resource planning (ERP).
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Ask for expert advice and support
Seeking outside expert advice and support can help SMEs overcome any technical or strategic challenges during the ERP implementation process.
This can include collaborating with ERP consultants, working with ERP vendor support services, or leveraging resources such as discussion forums and webinars to gain valuable insights.
One growing trend in the adoption of ERP is the use of code-free and low-code platforms such as AppMaster that allow companies to customize their ERP system without the need for extensive programming skills.
This can facilitate the implementation process and reduce barriers to entry for SMEs.
Popular ERP Systems for Small and Medium Enterprises
Many ERP systems are specifically designed to meet the needs of small and medium enterprises.
Here is a list of common ERP systems that meet the needs of SMEs:
SABB Business One
SAP Business One is a popular ERP solution designed for small and medium-sized enterprises.
It provides a comprehensive set of tools to help businesses automate their processes, boost productivity and gain real-time visibility of their operations.
Udo
Odoo is an open source ERP software that provides a highly customizable and scalable solution to meet the diverse needs of SMEs.
The platform provides a wide range of modules, including CRM, sales, inventory management, accounting and human resources.
Microsoft Dynamics 365
Microsoft Dynamics 365 is a suite of cloud-based ERP and CRM applications that cater to different industries, including SMEs.
Dynamics 365 provides a range of functions for finance, operations, sales, customer service and more.
Oracle NetSuite
Oracle NetSuite is a cloud-based enterprise resource planning platform designed specifically for growing businesses.
NetSuite offers a comprehensive suite of tools for businesses to manage their finances, inventory, customers, e-commerce, and more, all under one platform.
AppMaster
AppMaster is a powerful, code-free tool that allows businesses to create web, mobile, and backend applications.
It offers SMEs the flexibility to develop customized ERP solutions without the technical complexity of traditional software development.
It enables organizations to streamline their processes and improve overall efficiency by visually creating data models, business processes, and APIs.
Embrace the future of ERP systems for SMEs
As the need for efficient business processes and data-driven decision-making in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) increases, enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems are increasingly evolving.
Modern ERP systems are increasingly designed to meet the unique requirements of SMEs, helping them adapt to ever-changing business environments and achieve growth.
In this section, we ’ ll explore future trends in enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems for SMEs, including cloud-based systems, artificial intelligence-based analytics, improved mobility, and the increasing use of no-code / low-code platforms such as AppMaster.
Cloud based ERP systems
The shift towards cloud-based ERP systems is an important trend that simplifies the overall implementation and operation of these systems.
For SMEs, this means reducing upfront costs and reducing the need for in-house IT expertise.
Cloud-based ERP systems offer many benefits, including:
Scalability: These systems can easily scale as your business grows, allowing SMEs to add new features, users, and modules as needed.
• Accessibility: Cloud-based systems provide remote access to ERP data from any Internet-connected device, enabling SMEs to monitor and control business processes from anywhere.
• Data security: Cloud-based ERP systems often come with robust security measures that protect sensitive business information.
• Low maintenance: With constant updates and improvements managed by the service provider, SMEs can focus on their core business functions.
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Artificial Intelligence-based Analytics in ERP Systems
Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing the way enterprise resource planning systems analyze and process data.
AI based analytics can automate data analysis, pattern recognition, and predictive modeling – providing SMEs with actionable insights that help drive growth.
Integrating AI into ERP systems enables SMEs to:
• Improved decision-making: Using real-time insights, companies can make informed decisions based on accurate data and forecasts.
• Improve process efficiency: AI can help automate repetitive tasks and processes, freeing resources for more strategic initiatives.
• Driving innovation: By exploring large datasets of patterns and trends, AI-based analytics can reveal new business opportunities and areas for improvement.
Risk Mitigation: Predictive analytics can help SMEs anticipate potential problems and take preventive measures to avoid negative consequences.
Enhanced Mobility in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Systems
With the advent of mobile technology, ERP systems are increasingly embracing mobility, allowing SMEs to access critical business data and perform essential functions on the go.
ERP solutions compatible with mobile devices can help SMEs to:
• Stay connected: Access real-time data on smartphones or tablets, enabling faster decision making and instant problem-solving.
• Empowering employees: Enabling employees to work remotely, helping to improve work-life balance and employee satisfaction.
• Improved collaboration: Facilitate seamless communication and collaboration between team members, regardless of their location.
• Increased productivity: Mobile ERP can help boost overall productivity by reducing downtime and simplifying workforce management.
Lack of low-code / ERP systems
The advent of no-code platforms and low-code platforms, such as AppMaster, is a game changer for SMEs looking to implement enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems.
These platforms significantly reduce development time and costs, allowing companies with limited resources to build customized ERP solutions that match their unique requirements.
With low-code ERP systems, SMEs can:
• Application customization: Adapt ERP systems to specific business needs, ensuring seamless compatibility with current processes and workflows.
Empowering National Developers: Enable non-technical users to create and maintain applications, and reduce reliance on IT staff and specialists.
Accelerate development: Create and rapidly deploy new features and modules, ensuring SMEs remain flexible and competitive in a fast-paced business environment.
• Lower costs: saving development resources and reducing the financial burden of traditional ERP applications, making these systems accessible to SMEs.
In conclusion, the future of ERP systems for SMEs promises significant advances in technology and capabilities, enabling SMEs to maximize their operational efficiency and streamline their decision-making process.
By adopting cloud-based systems, AI-based analytics, enhanced mobility, and low-code platforms like AppMaster, SMEs can remain competitive in an ever-evolving business environment.

Employees are especially wary of digital surveillance and monitoring that erode autonomy and freedom at work.

Title:

Content: How the Trucking Industry Became the Dystopian Frontier of Workplace Surveillance

A new book describes how intrusive monitoring technologies have upended truckers’ way of life—and what that means about the expansion of workplace surveillance for all of us.

A truck driver navigates a rain-covered highway on the outskirts of Chicago in Hinsdale, Illinois.Scott Olson/Getty

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The coronavirus pandemic has ushered in a new era of workplace surveillance that will extend well beyond our current crisis. Companies are increasingly monitoring employees who work from home, citing worries about security concerns or the need to boost employee productivity. In Amazon warehouses and UPS delivery trucks, surveillance technologies are being built into workplace infrastructure to monitor workers’ every move. In many industries, employers can easily access phone calls, texts, browser histories, emails, and even GPS locations with very little effort.

These exploitative surveillance practices are rooted in a historical mistrust of workers, especially low-wage workers, that can arguably be traced back to slavery and the exploitative “scientific management” practices that emerged from it, as bosses became obsessed with tracking workers’ every move to maximize productivity and profit. Earlier forms of surveillance, like in the 19th century when companies hired Pinkerton private detectives to spy on workers, required a lot of labor. But modern technological advancements mean that the cost of surveillance today is very low. Contemporary workplace surveillance is often conducted under the pretense of enhancing workers’ productivity, minimizing distractions, or improving their health and wellbeing

Nowhere is this new surveillance regime more apparent than in the trucking industry. Often called the “lifeblood” of the US economy, the trucking sector is valued at close to a trillion dollars. As Karen Levy writes in her new book, Data Driven: Truckers, Technology, and the New Workplace Surveillance, truckers have long valued their industry’s culture of autonomy. But as new digital technologies develop, truck drivers are being increasingly watched as they do their jobs, a change that has significantly affected the average trucker’s autonomy on the road. Federal law now requires most workers to purchase and install digital trackers that record information about their movements and behavior, enabling extra monitoring by their employers and third-party companies.

These surveillance technologies are designed to solve the persistent issue of driver fatigue by restricting the number of hours truckers spend on the road, but as Levy writes, they’ve also eroded the culture of independence and freedom that truckers value—and paradoxically, they’ve made the roads less safe. I called Levy, an associate professor in the Department of Information Science at Cornell University, to learn more about what the trucking industry tells us about the future of surveillance, and about how we can both protect the public interest and uphold the dignity of workers in the digital age.

Data Driven is a great title. What inspired you to write the book?

It used to be called The Automation of Compliance, and one of my friends very gently said to me, “Karen, that title is terrible.” And I was like, yeah, okay. I think the title is better now.

But why did I write this? My training is in law and sociology, and my research interest has always been in rules and digital enforcement, and what happens when we take a rule that is out in the world and decide to start enforcing it using technology. How does it affect power dynamics within different professions and industries, including trucking? I wanted to explore what it looks like when workers find themselves confronted with systems that are collecting data about them. How does that change how they relate to each other and to management?

And is there a reason why you chose the trucking industry in particular?

Quite frankly, it was kind of a fluke. I had just heard a story on the radio—this was in 2011—saying that truckers were really upset about a proposal for a new surveillance regulation in the United States that was going to require them to install these digital tracking devices in their trucks. These ELDs, or electronic logging devices, would be installed to make sure that they were complying with “hours of service” regulations by the federal government. These regulations would essentially cap how much truckers can drive on any given day and in any given week. These rules have been in place since the 1930s in one form or another, but what was going to be different about this new rule was that truckers would no longer use paper and pencil to log in their work times. Instead, they would be tracked digitally, and those records would be kept electronically by management.

There was a lot of concern in the industry about what this would mean for their work. Eventually, it did become mandatory in 2017. When I heard the story on the radio, I thought, “Oh, wow, that’s kind of an example of this thing I’ve been really interested in. Maybe I can learn more about this.” That very day I went to a truck stop to talk to truckers about their work and their lives. And it was great, they were so easy to talk to. I enjoyed learning about this corner of the world. It’s a huge industry that touches my life and everyone’s life in so many ways, but it wasn’t something I had ever really thought much about. So I was kind of hooked as soon as I started talking to them.

Tell me more about the state of trucking today. What are the biggest challenges facing truckers?

By far the biggest challenge is that truckers are overworked and underpaid. In long-haul trucking, in the 1980s, wages used to be about $110,000 in today’s dollars. Now they’re about $47,000. Over the past 40 years, wages have completely plummeted and have not bounced back very much at all. They work lots and lots of unpaid hours. Trucking is mostly paid by the mile. That means that they’re not paid when they’re doing things like waiting at terminals to load products or unloading as they’re doing truck inspections, or when they’re taking breaks that are required by the law. There are all kinds of other things that are really important in the work of being a truck driver that don’t involve driving, and those things are usually uncompensated. They’re tired and they’re incentivized to just keep going because that’s how they make money.

But the other thing that often gets discussed as a challenge in the industry is what is frequently referred to as the “labor shortage,” that trucking companies can’t hire enough truck drivers. The turnover rate in trucking in a large firm is about 100 percent a year. Which is crazy to think about, right? However, truckers will very quickly tell you that the problem is not a labor shortage—there are plenty of people who are qualified to drive trucks. The problem is what you could call a wage shortage—that truckers aren’t being paid the money they deserve for doing this very dangerous but important work.

In the book, you trace this back to economic deregulation in the 1980s, which created a race to the bottom in terms of wages. Could you explain how this wage shortage relates to deregulation?

Absolutely. Trucking in the United States was deregulated in the early 1980s. Before that time, the federal government created barriers to entry for the industry, capped the number of companies that were licensed to drive trucks, and set standard freight rates. Companies weren’t that competitive with one another because they all had to charge the same rates. That changed with deregulation, which created a pure market and a big race to the bottom within the industry, in terms of companies becoming much more competitive with one another. The working conditions plummeted, salaries tanked, and conditions in trucking became much more unsafe and unhealthier for drivers. It was already a difficult job, but it became all the more so.

And what kinds of surveillance are truckers being subjected to today?

Truckers are kind of under the eye of everyone all at once. The electronic logging device, the ELD, collects data about where truckers are and where they’re moving, how fast they’re changing lanes, how hard they’re braking, how much fuel they’re using, whether they’re checking their mirrors often enough, are their eyelids fluttering too much, indicating they need sleep—all of this for the government to inspect.

It also provides a scaffolding for other kinds of surveillance. Companies buy logging devices that also have the capability of tracking a whole bunch of super fine-grained stuff about what truckers are doing. Insurers are always really interested in data like this just because it gives them much more detailed information about what drivers are doing and how they’re behaving. They can potentially use data to create better predictive models that help them set financial rates and generate profit.

That’s one thing. Another thing companies sometimes do is use data from electronic logging devices to try to sell truckers parking spaces. A common thing that truckers have started to do is pay ahead to reserve a parking space at a truck stop. Using this electronic logging device data on where all these truckers are across the country, companies that want to sell that real estate have an easier time doing it because they have information from electronic logging devices that can indicate available parking spots.

Why exactly are these methods so unpopular with truckers? Aren’t they supposedly meant to address workplace problems like trucker fatigue and overworking?

Good question. There are about 2 million truck drivers and a diversity of views between them, but by and large, I would say they’ve been unpopular because it doesn’t really address what they see as the root of the problem, which is an underpayment problem. It also facilitates much broader performance monitoring and surveillance practices from companies that don’t end up helping drivers all that much.

And a lot of it is cultural. If you talk to truckers, these surveillance devices send a message to them: “We don’t trust you anymore.” They’ve prized their job in the trucking industry for its very strong culture of autonomy, and these devices really fly in the face of the way truckers think about themselves, their work, and their lifestyle.

Why has the federal government turned to digital monitoring instead of actually addressing the challenges truckers face by restructuring pay and reducing incentives to overwork?

Quite honestly, I think it’s because it’s easier. It doesn’t take as much political will. It’s very often the case that we turn to technology as a policy solution, as a Band-Aid, to try to fix a very difficult social or economic or political problem rather than addressing the root cause. Oftentimes policymakers will tend to find a way that’s palatable, like digital monitoring, because it’s a way to address this overworking problem in trucking without addressing the reasons that trigger the overworking. The pay structure, and the fact that truckers are exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act, take more political will to change. Digital monitoring doesn’t disrupt the power structure in the industry, and it’s impacting the people who have the least power in the industry: the truck drivers. More meaningful reform would address the root causes.

Large trucks are involved in quite a few fatal crashes, and I think naturally, truckers care about both their own safety and the safety of the people around them on the road. Have they talked to you about how they might go about balancing public safety with preserving their dignity and autonomy on the road?

Yeah, this is such a good question. I think it might be very reasonable if we thought that, okay, safety is obviously really important, and some degree of worker monitoring is necessary to ensure public safety. But what’s really striking, in this case, is that it doesn’t actually come down to being about safety versus privacy, because electronic monitoring leads to less safe roads.

There are a couple of reasons this happens. One of them is that it drives old hands out of the industry. In talking to truckers, those who resist most strongly against surveillance technology are older truckers who have been driving for decades, who did not get their Commercial Driver’s License just yesterday, who have millions of safe miles under their belt. The technology, in many ways, is an affront to those drivers in a way it isn’t to, say, an 18-year-old who just got their CDL. And when it comes to safety, the drivers who you actually want to be driving next to on the highway are the folks who’ve been doing it the longest, right?

The studies that we have on the rollout of electronic monitoring and trucking show that truck crashes increased after the mandate. Truck crash fatalities actually hit a 30-year high the year they were introduced, even though the fatality rate went down for passenger cars. There have also been a bunch more citations for unsafe driving and speeding. Truckers will tell you that they feel way more pressure when they’re being monitored than when they’re not. If you tell people that because of these electronic surveillance devices, you now have less flexibility about how long you can drive and a very hard deadline to follow, you have to get from point A to point B in no more than 2 hours, what do you think is going to happen? What they will do is speed.

You refer to truckers as “canaries in the coal mine” when it comes to digital surveillance. Can you compare what’s happening in the trucking industry to other workplaces?

Yes, I think we definitely see the proliferation of quantification and digital tracking across a whole range of workplaces: in retail, in warehouses, in the financial sector, in education, in professions like law and medicine—really all over the place across not only low-wage work but also increasingly, in more professionalized settings. In some sense, trucking is this piece of the broader whole.

As work has become more distributed and hybridized during the pandemic, managers get anxious about whether employees working from home are really working. Often, a lot of managers are turning to performance management software, which is really easy to come by and is built into a lot of existing office work products, to track more about what workers are doing. I think that’s just going to become a feature of work going forward for a long time. And there are a lot of good questions about whether those types of measurement systems are measuring the right things, or whether they’re measuring things like how many emails you send or something, which is maybe not the greatest indicator of whether the work you’re doing is super worthwhile.

You write that the “future of work” is seen in either “dreamy or dystopian terms.” It’s a term that has been widely adopted by pundits to describe either a future where workers have more time for pleasure and leisure, or a darker alternative where workers are watched all the time, monitored and optimized for greater productivity purposes. How does your book fit into the conversation around the future of work?

Often, the discourse on the future of work, when it comes to increasing technology, is about how many people are going to lose their jobs when the robots take over. That’s a very common framing, and I think it’s very limited. I talk about this in the book—this point of view obviously gets at something real, which is the threat of unemployment, definitely something to worry about. But it also is a little bit reductive because oftentimes, the existing technology is not adequate to actually replace people at their work.

It also suggests that the only thing we should care about is how many jobs people have. Truckers’ experience with workplace surveillance can help us to understand that it’s not just about whether someone has a job; it’s whether that job has dignity. It’s whether that worker has a high-quality job. Trucking has been a job that has, even though it’s a very difficult and dangerous job, one that people have been very proud of for a very long time. And when you look at the way surveillance technology is deployed in the industry, you see how it just chips away at that pride in very real ways. It really does reduce the dignity that workers feel and what they’re able to accomplish with their bodies, the decisions that they’re able to make when they’re subjected to invasive and rigid surveillance tech at work that doesn’t account for the way humans actually work, live, and conduct themselves. So I’d like to see the conversation about the future of work and about automation more explicitly account for the fact that, sure, we should care about how many jobs people have, but also about whether they’re good jobs.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

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Some people worry about technology’s mental and social health impacts, including increased isolation tied to higher tech reliance.

Resistance is also influenced by low trust in leadership, disengagement, and skepticism about leaders’ understanding of frontline realities.

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Rekindling Trust In Post-Pandemic Leadership

Michael McFall is the co-Founder and co-CEO of BIGGBY COFFEE as well as author of the Inc. Original books GRIND and GROW.

As leaders navigated their companies through the challenges of a global pandemic, pivoting to accommodate a red-hot consumer economy and then recalibrating for an ever-allusive "new normal," something surprising happened: They lost the room.

This is supported by a recent Gallup survey, which found that only 21% of U.S. employees say they "'strongly agree' that they trust the leadership of their organization." It seems that after leading the charge into their companies' post-pandemic future, many business leaders are looking behind them and finding few followers.

As Gallup explains, "Trust begins to build when employees feel inspired by senior leaders and see strategic actions leading to business success." However, as companies cut costs, embrace new priorities and reconfigure their teams, many employees feel their leaders are neither inspiring nor strategic.

This may help explain why more than half of employees are disengaged at work and 42% are looking for new job opportunities.

Put bluntly, trust is a foundational component of effective leadership, and bosses or supervisors who haven’t earned their teams’ trust are leaders in name only. Addressing this challenge requires decisive action, and I believe it’s imperative to creating sustainable, thriving organizations at every level.

Steps To Restoring Trust

I believe that repairing the damage should be an urgent priority for leaders at every level, in companies big and small. Here are three steps to begin restoring trust in your leadership today.

1. Establish Your Core Values

Trust within an organization stems from the establishment of and adherence to core values. These values serve as the guideposts that shape the behaviors and interactions within a team. When an individual joins a team, understanding these core values helps them recognize the team's priorities and behavioral guidelines.

As a leader, it is crucial to exemplify these core values consistently. Failure to live by the set values can lead to a credibility gap, and your team can perceive a disconnect between what is professed and what is practiced. This can erode the trust your team members have in you and in the organization.

Every company can have its own set of core values, but example traits with broad application include:

• Openness

• Respect

• Compassion

• Accountability

• Integrity

• Teamwork.

Core values serve as the team’s North Star, informing actions and stipulating standards in any scenario.

2. Expect People To Be Themselves

Establishing an environment that encourages authenticity is critical for the well-being and productivity of a team. This means creating a space where team members are free to express not only their best, but also their less favorable traits, and making them feel comfortable enough to bring their whole selves into the interaction.

This inclusivity necessitates a supportive leadership approach that fosters an atmosphere of trust and safety, allowing individuals to operate in their true essence.

In unhealthy organizational structures, employees often find themselves investing significant amounts of time and energy deciphering their role within the team, figuring out team dynamics and trying to interpret the expectations of their superiors.

This constant self-adjustment and evaluation, the equivalent of constantly trying to solve a complex puzzle while performing professional tasks at a high level, can take away from their ability to focus on the challenges at hand and problem-solving.

In contrast, removing identity-based stressors allows people to focus on tasks, fostering improved productivity and more meaningful professional and cultural outcomes.

3. Create A Culture That Accepts Different Perspectives

In an increasingly polarized and reactionary cultural and business environment where even a marketing campaign can create an intense cultural backlash, people are often afraid to bring their authentic selves to work.

One employee survey found that 64% of people are "fearful of being authentic around others in the workplace," with 70% saying they "adopt an entirely different personality when they’re at work." This is a serious challenge for today’s leaders. When people feel they can’t bring their authentic selves to the office, I find that mistrust is a natural next step.

In reality, biases, or the viewpoints and preferences that collectively comprise our authentic selves, are natural and ubiquitous. Everyone has biases forged from their preferences, experiences and expectations.

Bias is perhaps better understood as perspective, and I believe that accepting people’s biases as part of their authentic selves is an important part of a safe, trust-filled work environment.

Leaders can help their teams experience this reality by creating an environment where biases can collide and empowering people to leverage their unique perspectives and authentic selves to build better businesses and cultivate thriving teams.

How To Take The Next Step

As leaders adapt to a continually changing global business landscape, many are losing their employees’ faith. Addressing this challenge requires decisive action.

To take the next step, leaders must foster a culture of engagement, facilitating open dialogue and extending unconditional support to their team members, even when faced with what may seem like unconventional ideas.

I am a firm believe that every opinion must be respected and acknowledged, which can help ensure that every team member feels seen and heard. This practice is deeply connected to the concept of "loving unconditionally," which may seem unusual as a corporate value but is integral to the trust-building process.

Most importantly, trust is built brick by brick as leaders’ consistent words and actions create an environment that values authenticity and diverse perspectives. It takes time to build but can be lost in a moment, making now the perfect time to begin rebuilding or reinforcing trust as a foundation for future success.

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Effective approaches to address resistance emphasize early and sustained involvement of end users in technology decisions to uncover requirements and build ownership.

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5 Mistakes To Avoid When Replacing Your Communications Technology

After working on projects replacing hundreds of phone systems over my years as a consultant, I have noticed some common trends in the projects that are the most challenging.

Here are the top 5 most common mistakes we see when replacing a telephony system:

  1. Skipping the needs assessment. Often a move to a new telephony solution occurs when the existing system reaches end of life. In these cases, it’s easy to think that your goal in replacing your existing solution is to simply duplicate what you have. But you are missing a big opportunity for improvement.

Communication technology has changed considerably in the last few years. New solutions go beyond telephony to include collaboration tools and support multiple forms of communication. Users can move seamlessly between devices and incorporate SMS text messaging and IM in addition to voice. There are usually opportunities to improve outdated workflows caused by limitations of the old technology.

If you are looking at a replacement due to inadequacies of the existing technology, a thorough needs assessment is still a good idea. Most organizations have some percentage of power users who will benefit from higher-level “tools,” and the most successful implementations recognize these users and provide the tools to make them more effective. Standard users can benefit from enhancements such as voice mail messages in their email, and the ability to work remotely, if they don’t already have these capabilities.

It's useful to document your common user requirements in addition to the more complex special requirements. When you understand the workflows of your users and how they utilize the features in your current telephone system, it will help you select a better replacement technology.

  1. Not involving business users in the decision. When a system is selected only by the IT team, it often does not fully meet the needs of the wider group of end users. We once saw a solution selected based primarily on what would be best for enhancing the IT team’s resumes.

Including end users in your needs assessment will help to uncover both business and technical requirements. This has multiple benefits:

  1. Reveals productivity enhancements offered by mobility and collaboration capabilities not available in the current system.
  2. Uncovers communications issues. Often, we find that many user complaints can be resolved through changes in business processes.
  3. Improves system acceptance. When business users have had input into the process, they are less likely to resist adoption of the new system.

Involving business users in the selection process results in a better decision in the end, although a larger group can slow the process. Business users often help to clarify what is truly needed versus what is nice to have. They typically aren’t swayed by the coolest new toys, and offer insight into areas where true productivity gains can be achieved.

  1. No end-user communications plan. End users are much more likely to accept and adopt a new technology tool when they understand how it can benefit them. A good communication plan can go a long way in reducing resistance to the change. The best communications plans take a custom approach and target messages to specific groups of users, explaining the benefits of the new tool that are most relevant to each group.

You can download an eBook that explains the adoption and change management process in greater detail

  1. Skimping on user training. UCaaS providers typically don’t offer “classroom” training on live phones. They offer virtual classes with live instructors, recorded sessions, and train-the-trainer options. While these methods save a lot of labor for the vendors, they can be insufficient for the users. On the surface it seems OK. After all, how hard can it be to use a new phone?

But new telephony solutions bring many new capabilities that users may have never been exposed to previously. They may not know how to manage calls and features using a computer instead of the hard phone.

And there are cell phone apps, collaboration tools, and presence and status information. There may be multiple tools that offer the same capabilities. Your new tool may offer chat, or video conferencing. Which tool should they be using?

All of this complexity creates confusion for your users. If your new solution has any feature depth, then there will be complexity. In order to get full use of the new capabilities, users must be trained on them, and given guidelines on which tools are to be used.

  1. Underestimating the difficulty of porting numbers. This process can be quite dysfunctional, especially if you have been with your carrier for several years. Records can be inaccurate, and the entire process is based on this information. At times, this can be a headache (or worse). For a breakdown of common problems, check out this article

Often the process takes longer than expected, so build extra time into your process to allow for that.

For more tips and advice from people who have gone through this process, check out these sessions at Enterprise Connect:

Tuesday, March 26 | 2:00pm - 2:45pm

UCAAS CASE STUDIES: HOW YOUR PEERS MADE THE MIGRATION

Moderator: Melissa Swartz(Swartz Consulting)

Panelists: Steve Panton (Gannett Fleming), Brian Harrison (Broward College), Karen Gordon (King & Spalding)

Wednesday, March 27 | 2:00pm - 2:45pm

ENTERPRISE LEADERS SPEAK OUT: VOICE MIGRATION--CRITICAL ISSUES FOR A (STILL) CRITICAL CAPABILITY

Moderator: Melissa Swartz (Swartz Consulting)

Panelists: Scott Johnson (Cargill), Georges Habalian (HCA Healthcare), Eric Zweigbaum (Conair)

Clear, transparent communication plans that address concerns, set expectations, and explain benefits are consistently linked to higher acceptance.

Robust training and support reduce confusion, improve skills, and help employees collaborate effectively with AI and other tools. [35].

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Three Change Management Priorities For Seamless GenAI Deployment

President & CTO at ContractPodAi.

There is no question that generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is emerging as a powerful, transformative force in today’s business. In its 27th Annual Global CEO Survey, PwC looked at how GenAI would significantly change how organizations operate. They concluded the technology is "approaching a critical juncture, seemingly poised to transform business models, redefine work processes and overhaul entire industries."

In the next year, more than 50% of CEOs surveyed said they expect GenAI to "enhance their ability to build trust with stakeholders," while roughly 60% expect it to "improve product or service quality." Within the next three years, nearly 70% also anticipate that GenAI will "increase competition, drive changes to their business models and require new skills from their workforce." The lasting business impacts that CEOs expect from the technology include boosted efficiency and increased time-to-revenue.

Generative AI comes with a low barrier to entry, empowering organizations to start small and grow their usage of this technology over time. Because of this, I recommend starting with a particular use case and scaling it to the greater organization from there. The secret to the scaling process is for senior leaders to keep a close pulse on their change management efforts. After all, if your organization does not have a smooth adoption and implementation process and is neither aligned nor trained sufficiently around new technology, you'll likely fall short of reaping the full ROI from your digital investment moving forward.

Here are three change management strategies to keep in mind if you’re planning to embrace GenAI in your organization.

Taking A Phased Adoption Approach

Integrating AI into the day-to-day work of the organization necessitates a simple and seamless adoption process. To foster this digital transformation, senior leaders should consider a phased approach that sees AI deployed gradually and refine processes as needed. This gives employees time to familiarize themselves with the technology to maximize its benefits and minimize its disruption to the business.

Additionally, they can build a digital infrastructure characterized by robust digital resources, dedicated support teams and user feedback loops. All of this goes a long way in preventing the problems that typically arise in the adoption process.

Fostering A Culture Of Trust

Another change management strategy is mitigating organizational resistance around AI. This is achieved through clear and direct communication about the business objectives and expected outcomes of AI adoption, and an open discussion about the collaborative partnerships that can form between employees and the technology.

Transparency is key here. On top of establishing these lines of communication, senior leaders should ensure that AI solutions are designed with security, transparency and accountability measures in place. It’s also important for employees and customers to be assured that their data privacy will continue to be top of mind as the technology becomes further scaled to be used within day-to-day workstreams. Be sure to communicate that protocols and guidelines will evolve in the spirit of fostering an ethical and socially responsible AI culture. All of this translates to more support and buy-in across the enterprise.

Redesigning Career Paths And Skills

The advent of GenAI does not have to mean the disruption of traditional job roles but rather a redesign of professional skills and career paths. As AI is gradually integrated into everyday operations, employees should be taught new skills, allowing them to leverage the technology to its fullest.

Some examples of this include advanced training in applied AI, machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP). As AI scales to take on both repetitive and complex tasks, organizations should concentrate on bolstering employees' built-in business instincts and reinforcing their natural human skills. This involves nurturing areas such as business creativity along with strategic and critical analytical abilities and enhancing emotional intelligence within the workplace. This effort should be coupled with a special focus on fostering employees' continuous improvement.

At the end of the day, having a successful digital transformation journey calls for prioritizing the change management strategies mentioned above and exploring other best practices.

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A phased adoption approach, redesigning career paths and skills, and continuous human‑machine interaction can lower anxiety and optimize outcomes.

Framing adoption as human‑machine collaboration, supported by ethics guidelines and data protection, reduces replacement fears and builds trust.

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6 Strategies To Alleviate Employees’ Fears Of AI In 2024

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The rise in AI has caused a mixture of excitement and fear as it becomes a standard part of our lives. Some say it’s a risk to civilization as we know it, while others insist it will transform the way we work, live and interact with one another. The part that is not debatable is that not only is AI not going away, it’s on the upswing. You can get that tattooed. So it’s important to develop a reasonable comfort around its use.

Is AI Coming For You Or To You?

One way to do that is to consider that AI is coming to you, not for you. The stigma and fear around the technology has caused some employees to shy away from a tool that can enhance productivity and certain mental health benefits like cognitive re-framing for anxiety. On the flip side, studies also show that workers who frequently use AI are at higher risk for burnout.

However, the opposite findings are reported in a new global survey from Sage. Out of over 1,000 HR leaders, 95% have experienced a workload increase over the last year, and 91% noted an increase in their responsibilities. Yet, instead of fearing AI usage, 77% of the respondents cite AI as having the potential to revolutionize their work processes by reducing time-consuming tasks and ultimately easing burnout.

Taylor Blake, senior vice president of new initiatives at Degreed, told me by email that there’s a lot of fear about AI, but avoiding the technology won’t make the risks go away. He explains that employees need to know what the AI tools are capable of, and they need to be experimenting. He also said that many companies want their employees to adopt this technology, adding that many workers are left wondering if AI will take their jobs in the next two years and what this means for their careers.

How Companies Can Help Assuage AI Fears

Mismanaged fear is responsible for most poor communication in organizations. It’s important that business leaders consider the psychological safety of their employees and how their mental health impacts the company’s bottom line.

The human mind is like Velcro for negativity and Teflon for positivity. Work-life’s inevitable uncertainties instantly arouse our fight-or-flight reaction. Our survival brain is constantly updating our world, making judgments about what's safe and what isn't. It will do almost anything for the sake of certainty because we’re hardwired to overestimate threats and underestimate your ability to handle them. Here is where business leaders can step in and offer a helping hand, according to the experts.

“Some companies are going all in on AI, wanting their employees to start adopting this technology, leaving employees wondering if AI will take their jobs in two years and what this means for their careers,” Blake says, adding that in this new reality, companies should be helping their employees navigate where they can best apply their skills and develop new ones simultaneously. “Many of us have the mindset that learning is something we do early in our careers, but we need to shift that to a mindset of being lifelong learners. Learning is the new competitive advantage in today’s AI-powered job market.”

According to Rick Hammell, founder and CEO of Helios, leaders play a crucial role in alleviating employees' fears of AI. He shared with me six strategies companies can implement to mitigate fear and misunderstanding

  1. Providing comprehensive education and training programs. By offering employees a deeper understanding of AI technologies, their benefits and limitations, Hammell suggests that leaders can demystify AI and address misconceptions that often fuel fear and uncertainty.
  2. Fostering open communication within the organization. Hammell believes that creating a culture where employees feel comfortable expressing their concerns about AI allows leaders to actively listen to these fears and address them with empathy and clarity.
  3. Emphasizing the concept of human-machine collaboration. Hammell advocates highlighting how AI can complement and enhance employees' skills and productivity rather than replace them. He insists that this will enable leaders to help employees see AI as a tool that can improve their work experiences.
  4. Establishing clear ethical guidelines and policies for the use of AI in the workplace. Hammell sees this as crucial in addressing common fears related to AI. He acknowledges that employees often worry about job loss, privacy concerns, skill obsolescence, bias and discrimination and a lack of control when it comes to AI. To assuage these fears, he advises that leaders reassure employees about job security by emphasizing that AI is meant to augment their work, not replace it entirely.
  5. Implementing robust data protection measures and transparent data handling practices can help address privacy concerns. Hammell recommends offering upskilling and reskilling programs to help employees adapt to the changing skill requirements in the age of AI to alleviate fears related to skill obsolescence.
  6. Promoting diversity and inclusion in AI development and deployment. Hammell argues that it is essential to address concerns about bias and discrimination. “By involving employees in the design and implementation of AI systems and providing opportunities for feedback, leaders can empower employees and help them feel more in control of AI processes,” he concludes.

A Final Wrap-Up

Companies are developing technology to help people feel more confident with the inevitable technology. A study by Genesys, for example, finds a consensus among most employees who say they don’t fear AI replacing their jobs. Only 10% of GenZ/millennials and seven percent of GenX/boomers worry about this in the long run. Instead, 23% of GenZ/millennials and 19% of GenX/boomers see its potential to make their jobs better. The study concluded that organizations should seize this opportunity to educate and train their employees on AI’s benefits.

Bill Salak, the CTO and COO of Brainly, is on a mission to ensure the country’s future workforce is well-educated and ready to wield AI properly. His company has validated its commitment to the future workforce with the launch of Test Prep, an AI-driven tool that builds good time management skills and bolsters their overall understanding of AI use. The new Brainly feature uses AI to generate personalized study experiences—boosting confidence and reducing anxiety.

The conflicting findings that are emerging around AI reflects our human inability to accept uncertainty. It shows that some workers have fear; others have appreciation, which raises the question, “Is AI a sword or a shield?” Too much or too little of anything can be harmful. In the final analysis, it’s how corporate America uses the technology to improve humanity that ultimately matters.

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Change management with visible, authentic leadership and a culture of continuous learning is vital to realizing ROI from digital investments. [36].

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Why CEOs Need A New Playbook In The AI Era

To ensure that human touch remains at the forefront of technological transformation, top executives need a deliberate strategy for maintaining trust and authenticity.

Let’s thank AI, in part, for the volume of information already written about how companies can tap into the power of this technology to unlock new sources of value, drive efficiencies, or improve the customer experience. And that’s only scratching the surface. Add to the mix much, much more on managing disruption, threats and risks, plus governance, education and employee upskilling. Given the magnitude of the impact, it’s easy to understand why the conversation has shifted to all AI, all the time, inside many organizations.

Even so, what may be missing from the conversation is a focus on how this impacts C-level leadership, particularly when it comes to the executive behaviors that accelerate execution and drive action.

In an era where conversations about bots and ChatGPT dominate, how do senior leaders demonstrate authenticity, grow trust and show even more of their humanity in order to accelerate performance or drive change? Consider the following:

1. Take a ‘do not interfere’ approach. It’s fitting that renowned film director Steven Spielberg quoted a line from “The Godfather” when discussing AI at a June 2023 Yale CEO Summit: “I’m very much for AI as long as, as Vito Corleone said in the first ‘Godfather’ movie, ‘as long as your business doesn’t interfere with mine.’”

Spielberg may have been referring to the role AI should play in the creative process for writers or directors, but the sentiment equally applies to how executives must uniquely lead in the workplace. When it comes to the qualities of leadership that engage, inspire and move others to act, AI should not interfere.

At BTS, we’ve conducted more than a decade of research into the specific set of executive behaviors that accelerate execution and drive growth. Some of the most important qualities fall under the dimension of character and how executives create trust, including authenticity, integrity, humility and restraint. It’s areas like these where executives might be tempted to rely on AI to boost their impact, but here is where a “do not interfere” rule should apply. When it comes to strengthening character, a favorite quote by the motivational speaker Jim Rohn comes to mind: “You can’t hire somebody else to do your pushups for you.”

2. Use AI tools selectively to build skills. Several 2024 studies on trust, including the 2024 Edelman Trust Barometer,  highlight unsettling trends across society, including a decline of trust in authority and in companies. Add in more concerns about the risks surrounding AI, and it creates an even higher bar for senior leaders to clear when it comes to gaining trust with employees, stakeholders, the media or members of the community. This is where executives can leverage AI, using coaching bots and tools to evaluate aspects of their communication style, impact and body language, providing real-time feedback that can help leaders make helpful adjustments in their approach.

Transparent communication also requires a clarity of message to help others understand the rationale behind decisions or changes, and tools like generative AI can find new ways of expressing familiar concepts so messages feel fresh and differentiated to employees. The options are endless, but the “do not interfere” principle stands: You are the message, and the minute your message starts to sound like it came from AI instead of you, the words lack soul. Another quote from Spielberg captures the idea: “I think the soul is unimaginable and is ineffable. And it cannot be created by any algorithm, it is just something that exists in all of us.”

3. Understand whether others see you as genuine. In the AI era, employees need to see even higher degrees of honesty, transparency and authenticity from their leaders. This raises the question of how your employees see you. Would they describe you as authentic, transparent, genuine?

Research shows just how important these qualities are today inside companies: Employees who describe their leaders as authentic are often more committed, engaged and satisfied. With engagement rates hovering around 33 percent, executives have an opportunity to take a deeper look at these aspects of their own leadership. Go beyond standard questions about trust in leadership and ask others to provide examples where they experienced you as authentic, genuine and real so you appreciate what is working and where more is needed.

4. Create an updated ‘trust and authenticity’ playbook. AI isn’t only disrupting ways of working; it is also disrupting ways of leading, which is why the pre-AI playbooks on “growing trust” or “leading authentically” require updates to lead change. Consider the case of one CEO who was a strong champion for AI, providing additional resources and investments to fast-track progress at his company. In spite of these efforts, months later, little progress had been made on the AI front, frustrating senior leadership, who wanted to understand what was getting in the way.

It turns out that employees were generally enthusiastic about the benefits of the technology, but they did not believe the organization would “have their backs” when changes were implemented. To address these concerns, the CEO recognized that his standard playbook to align employees and drive change wasn’t working. No matter how quickly he wanted the organization to move ahead with AI initiatives, the trust foundation needed strengthening first.

Says this CEO today: “The ‘slow down to speed up’ idea applies. Before, I focused on speed of execution, but to get traction on AI, we had to address trust gaps first. We created forums for employees to share where we let them down in the past, and we do a better job of listening and creating solutions together. I also share my own hopes and dreams about the future and talk about my fears, too. This is a process, but they know I hear them, I get it and I feel it, too. I say far less about moving fast, but today, we’re moving much faster.”

In the age of AI, where technology profoundly influences how organizations operate and innovate, leadership at the C-level must evolve to maintain authenticity, trust and humanity. Executives are encouraged to adopt a “do not interfere” approach with AI, using it selectively to enhance skills without compromising the unique human qualities that inspire and drive teams. By focusing on genuine interactions, communicating transparently and building a culture of trust, leaders can effectively navigate the complexities of digital transformation, fostering an environment where both people and technology thrive together.

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Trust is a critical foundation, yet only 21% of U.S. employees strongly agree they trust their organization’s leadership.

Leaders can build trust by modelling openness, respect, and integrity, creating psychological safety, and fostering honest two‑way communication. [72].

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Why The Workplace Should Be A Safe Space

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How and why do managers need to create psychologically safe spaces at work? originally appeared on Quora: the place to gain and share knowledge, empowering people to learn from others and better understand the world.

Answer by David Garcia, CEO New Stand, on Quora:

According to researcher Amy Edmondson (who coined the phrase “team psychological safety”), psychological safety at work is a shared belief by members of a team that it’s okay to take risks, express their ideas and concerns, to speak up with questions, and to admit mistakes - all without fear of negative consequences.

Years of research have shown its positive impact on a team’s performance, how free they feel to innovate, their creativity, improved decision-making, and learning. The downsides of lacking safety are also very clearly researched and have shown a negative impact on employee wellbeing - including stress, burnout, turnover – as well as on overall company performance.

Leaders play a pivotal role in cultivating psychological safety for their team.

They set the tone through their actions, words, and attitudes, thereby significantly influencing behavior.

Here are some leadership practices to effectively foster psychological safety at work:

  • Honesty/Integrity Always, No Exceptions Uphold honesty and integrity even if it means missing results. Straying into gray areas damages trust and undermines safety.
  • First Impressions Matter A leader’s first 30 days in role are critical for setting the stage. Every action, word, and movement has an impact - leaders must understand this and act accordingly.
  • Transparency is Key This involves consistent vulnerability and the sharing of ideas, and fostering an environment where the best idea wins – regardless of its source.
  • Listen for Understanding Don't just go through the motions. Address issues head-on, resolve them, or at the very least, understand why they exist.
  • Maintain a Positive, Hopeful, Forward-Looking Approach Don't dwell on yesterday's problems. Focus on future objectives and inspire hope in your team.
  • Encourage Innovation, Achieve Results, Have Fun Foster a culture where individuals feel empowered to innovate, achieve, and enjoy their work.
  • Make Time for Reflection Allow moments of pause where discomfort can be embraced, it provides an opportunity for learning, growth, and enhancing mutual understanding within the team.
  • Be a Great Peer Pick up the phone, learn from others, and maintain open lines of communication to build strong relationships.
  • Offer Help and Advice Remember, you're not expected to have all the answers. Encourage dialogue and provide support to your team.

These lessons, when implemented effectively, create an environment where everyone can be their authentic selves. Teams can truly thrive in such a psychologically safe space, marked by mutual respect, openness, and constructive feedback.

For further resources on psychological safety, consider the following:

  1. Amy Edmondson's TEDx Talk: Building a psychologically safe workplace
  2. Book: The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation, and Growth by Amy C. Edmondson
  3. Harvard Business Review: High-Performing Teams Need Psychological Safety. Here’s How to Create It

Remember, cultivating psychological safety is a continuous journey, but the benefits for individuals and the team as a whole make it a worthwhile endeavor.

This question originally appeared on Quora - the place to gain and share knowledge, empowering people to learn from others and better understand the world.

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Transparency and empathy are essential for AI adoption, and governance and cybersecurity practices strengthen confidence in AI‑driven decisions.

Title:

Content: The landscape of leadership has undergone a significant transformation in recent years, shifting away from the traditional authoritarian model towards a more coaching-oriented approach.

The emphasis now lies on empowering employees to realise their full potential and supporting their personal growth journeys.

Today, employees seek leaders who prioritise creating a collaborative culture and embrace flexible, remote work options. However, the evolution of leadership is not solely driven by employee preferences. Technology, particularly artificial intelligence (AI), plays a pivotal role in reshaping the leadership landscape.

AI is undeniably reshaping the terrain of business leadership, prompting a profound shift in how organisations operate and thrive. Whether hailed as a beacon of progress or viewed with apprehension, the influence of AI on humanity and the workplace is a topic of heated debate.

For some, the emergence of the AI era heralds a promising future characterised by enhanced productivity, employee satisfaction and profitability. But alongside the optimism, there exists a palpable sense of caution - understandably so - as leaders grapple with the implications of integrating AI into their organisational frameworks.

One thing is certain: AI has firmly entrenched itself in our collective consciousness and is poised to become an indispensable tool for forward-thinking leaders. Rather than displacing traditional skills, the imperative for leaders is to adapt and evolve alongside this transformative technology.

According to a 2022 Deloitte report, 94% of business leaders recognise the critical role of AI in driving success. Yet, mere acknowledgment is not enough; true leadership in the AI era demands a sophisticated understanding of when to leverage it and when to rely on human judgment.

AI is here to stay. And for leaders at the helm of business, the imperative is not to supplant existing skills, but rather to adapt and evolve alongside this transformative technology.

Gone are the days of unfounded fears about AI replacing human jobs; instead, a more nuanced discourse has emerged, emphasising the symbiotic relationship between humans and technology. Senior leaders must cultivate their interpersonal skills and harness the power of human intuition to complement AI's analytical capabilities.

Embracing a culture of bold decision making and experimentation is essential for leaders seeking to harness the full potential of AI. By challenging conventional decision-making paradigms and leveraging data-driven insights, leaders can navigate uncharted territory with confidence and agility.

PwC's 2023 Trust survey underscores the importance of governance, interpretability, performance monitoring, and cybersecurity in fostering confidence in AI-driven decision-making processes.

Yet, amid the technological advancements, leaders must not lose sight of the human dimension of AI adoption. Transparency, empathy and proactive communication are essential in allaying workforce concerns and fostering a culture of trust and collaboration.

The era of AI leadership beckons us to chart a course guided by innovation, resilience, and ethical stewardship. By embracing AI as a powerful ally in our quest for organisational excellence, leaders can inspire teams, delight customers and propel their organisations toward a future defined by limitless possibilities.

Gavin Bryce is the chief executive of Constant Progression and group chair of Vistage UK

A culture of transparency—supported by regular contact, visible leadership, and accessible information—helps mitigate resistance and sustain adoption.

Title:

Content: HR Essentials Culture

How to Create a Culture of Transparency in a Virtual Work Environment (and Why You Should)

February 14, 2018

The number of employees who telecommute is growing rapidly—increasing by as much as 115% over the last 12 years, according to a recent report from FlexJobs and Global Workplace Analytics. Startups and small businesses can benefit by hiring a remote workforce because it helps cut down on overhead costs and on the expense of relocating new employees from other cities. Remote workers also help recruitment efforts by enabling companies to conduct national or even global searches for talent instead of being limited to the local applicant pool or to those prospects willing to relocate to your city.

While it’s important to take care to incorporate remote employees into your organization’s culture, it is also important to consider the type of culture you have and whether it’s conducive to having a remote workforce.

The importance of transparency to a remote workforce
As part of my graduate thesis for Pepperdine University in 2015, I made the case for transparency being the most important cultural attribute for an effective remote work environment. This is because transparency is paramount to employee engagement. And, as we know, employee engagement is paramount to a business’s productivity. In the rest of this post, I will share some of the tips from my thesis for creating transparency with remote employees

A successful virtual work environment requires specific technology
Technology has made it possible for colleagues to stay connected, even if they’re thousands of miles apart. And many of these tools are very accessible and affordable. It is important for companies with remote workers to take advantage of technology that lets remote workers feel like they are as immersed in the organization as onsite team members.

Below, I will discuss more ways in which technology contributes to other individual methods of building transparency. Some ideas for using technology to help create a culture of transparency include:

  • Colleague communication in real-time through instant messaging tools like Skype.
  • Face-to-face interaction through video conferencing tools.
  • Having the entire team access and collaborate on the same documents simultaneously through cloud-based drives and storage systems, such as Google Docs.
  • Creating an internal eboard, intranet or social media page where employees can chat, share ideas and communicate informally, the way they would in a break room or in the halls of your office.

Virtual employees benefit from having a social presence with the use of telepresence tools.  When communicating, virtual employees tune in to their sense of sight by viewing a photo or a live stream of a person, which gives both parties the sense that they are in the same room.  This can help give the remote employee a feeling of interpersonal connection with their colleagues, which is crucial to a cohesive office culture.

Accessibility
There are two types of accessibility important to fostering a culture of transparency, especially when it comes to remote workers: 1) accessibility of information and 2) accessibility of people.

To set your virtual teams on a path for success and keep processes smooth, all employees should have the same access to important documents. Giving remote employees the same access to knowledge and information that other colleagues enjoy—including documented project details, written policies, project blue prints and historical data—is key to allowing all employees to learn from past failures and successes, and crucial to streamlining efforts for maximum productivity. Again, shared drives that allow mutual document collaboration can be effective for making sure nobody—whether local or remote—misses an important document.

One of the most challenging aspects of not working in the same space is losing the daily interaction with coworkers, such as the ability to step into someone’s office or cubicle for a quick question or brainstorming session. However, through regular contact and feedback, team cohesion and transparency can still flourish.

In a Gallup poll from 2014 on effective collaboration of remote workers, Google Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist Vint Cerf stated that “companies must strike a balance between the advantages online collaboration tools offer and the need for personal or informal interactions that boost workplace cohesion.” In other words, technology can’t replace personal interactions when it comes to building successful and transparent teams. This is why it’s important for all members of your organization—whether remote or not—to be committed to a collaborative and transparent work environment by making themselves accessible to their colleagues, even if it isn’t face to face.

In addition to the technology recommendations above, virtual workers should have access to the following (including their manager and direct reports):

  • Cell phone number for calling/texting
  • Video or voice conferencing capabilities that can be set up quickly as needed for ad hoc team calls or meetings (such as through Go to Meeting)
  • Regular standing meetings on at least a weekly basis with the whole team, as well as one-to-one meetings between remote workers and their individual managers/direct reports
  • A plan for touching base either on a regular basis or when the employee needs contact with their manager, either through IM, text messaging, or a quick phone or video chat.

A majority of the remote employees I interviewed for my thesis stated that they appreciated knowing their managers were easily accessible for questions or urgent matters. Having instant messaging technology available allows employees to feel empowered.

Additionally, virtual tools that allow remote teams to get in touch with each other any time (mobile phones, Facetime, WebEx, etc.) can be powerful supports for the creation and maintenance of trust, accountability, and communication among leaders and employees.

Communication from leadership
Leadership plays a critical role in fostering any type of company culture. If your goal is to create a culture of transparency, then leadership must be transparent.

Organizations must ask if their leaders are visible to all employees and if the company’s vision is resonating with all employees in all locations. Do your remote employees have the same opportunities for immersion into your organization’s culture, values and vision as in-office colleagues? Do they have opportunities to share in this spirit through peer-to-peer interaction and interactions with management, even if those interactions take place mostly online?

If not, there may be a lack of leadership, which can be detrimental when building the trust needed to create a culture of transparency. Leadership can be enhanced with increased communication. Communication methods that allow leaders and employees to interact include weekly leadership calls, town hall forums and open door policies that give employees easy access to any person in management. The important thing is that these communications between leaders and employees are honest, transparent, frequent and are a two-way street that allows leaders to listen as much as they talk.

Leaders play a fundamental role in creating transparent cultures. It is essential that current and aspiring managers are adequately trained to carry out the responsibility of sustaining employee engagement. Once in the role, leaders should be encouraged to evaluate the level of transparency among their remote teams and within their organizations, and to consider what interventions may be appropriate for enhancing this transparency.

In summary, engaging virtual employees requires careful design of the workplace environment so that it reflects a culture of open communication that incorporates technology, social presence, knowledge presence and leadership presence.

This communication is for informational purposes only; it is not legal, tax or accounting advice; and is not an offer to sell, buy or procure insurance.

This post may contain hyperlinks to websites operated by parties other than TriNet. Such hyperlinks are provided for reference only. TriNet does not control such websites and is not responsible for their content. Inclusion of such hyperlinks on TriNet.com does not necessarily imply any endorsement of the material on such websites or association with their operators.

The opinions and views expressed by authors of the TriNet blog are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of TriNet or any of its affiliates or partners.

By Jason Kujanen

Jason Kujanen is a principal human capital consultant at TriNet.

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Job security fears are real and widespread, with estimates of 85 million jobs eliminated by 2025 but 97 million new roles created if training and reskilling keep pace.

Title:

Content: Automation and the future of jobs.
The technological challenge for the world ’ s workers and governments
Automation will fill more than 11 million jobs in the United States alone in the next decade, according to a report released by Forrester.
That ’ s the bad news, but the good news is that automation will simultaneously create 9.63 million new jobs, and on that basis the net loss of jobs will be 1.42 million.
According to a recently published report by the World Economic Forum, the rate of reliance on machines in all types of jobs will rise to 52% by 2025, and automation, robotics and artificial intelligence will eliminate 85 million jobs globally in the same period.
But what is optimistic is that automation will also create 97 million new jobs in the future, and this is something to hope for, although these jobs will be completely new, many of which have not yet existed, and in any case these are large numbers and huge changes will occur in the future labor market in different countries and societies, which requires quick and practical intervention by governments, companies and workers themselves.
What can we do to meet this challenge?
To answer this question, John P. Mello, an American technology journalist and writer, polled a group of experts on Tech News World, including Forrester vice president J.P. Gounder and one of the authors of the report, and began by saying, “This will mean that employees need to be rehabilitated and acquire new skills, which is not something that every worker can do on their own. ”
“However, the ability of countries ’ public policies to succeed in meeting this challenge will vary from country to country, for example in Germany, where there are strong links between universities and employers, it will be easier to succeed than in the United States, where employees are often expected to find their own solutions. ”
The Importance of Rehabilitation and Skills Enhancement
Jayant Narayan, director of the World Economic Forum ’ s Global AI Action Alliance, told TechNews World that job losses will create challenges in both the public and private sectors “at the level of governments, it raises questions about social safety nets, investment in lifelong learning programs, training citizens in science, technology, engineering and mathematics and other important factors. ”
"Some of these criteria, such as reskilling, will have a medium- to long-term horizon, and we should not expect a quick solution to reskilling skills.
In the private sector, this raises questions about helping workers move out of traditional jobs and occupations towards developing a broader set of skills that are in keeping with the spirit of the times. ”
Darryl West, vice president of government studies at the Brookings Institution, a nonprofit public policy organization in Washington, says “a lot of retraining is needed. ”
"There are retraining programs that are already in place, but they are often not good enough and do not qualify people for the new jobs that are created.
“We need better programs that are compatible with new jobs, and the problem is that many people who are threatened with losing their jobs don ’ t have the skills needed for these new jobs. ”
“Many programs focus on very specific tasks, but the workplace is changing so dramatically that it ’ s hard to find jobs for people who can only do one thing.
We need programs that understand what companies need and the skills they are looking for and cover them with the right training for workers. ”
Future Careers and the Importance of Coexistence between Humans and Robots
Back to Jayant Narayan, who told John P. Mello on the platform that universities can help re-hone skills by creating hybrid courses that combine humanities and technical sciences.
"Engineers need to understand the ethics and implications of systems before designing them," he said.
Darrell West said community colleges with only two years of schooling do a better job than four-year colleges at preparing students for jobs.
“Community colleges are more oriented towards the local labor market.
They are trying to give students the practical skills that will provide them with jobs in the future, while some universities are teaching and training students on professions that previously existed, not on new professions that are emerging now. ”
Forster explained that the new jobs created by automation will be in professional services and information technology, as well as in new industries, such as renewable energy, green buildings, smart cities and infrastructure.
Gounder said people working in new jobs should be aware of working alongside machines.
"Whether you have technical skills or not, you should be comfortable working in a mixed team of humans and machines in which smart software plays a key role," he said.
He added that the biggest impact of technology in the next phase will be the issue of “changing tasks ” that underpin any given job, not doing or taking over the job itself.
Forrester explained that waiving a specific task — such as automating expense reports, increasing the ability to solve data problems, or allowing a robot to scan the floor — changes the configuration of a particular function rather than replacing it.
Forster predicts that 80% of jobs will be affected by this method by 2030, improving the employee experience as specific tasks shift to machines rather than humans.
Leaders are changing their positions.
Forrester also found a change in attitude among senior leaders regarding automation.
Leaders and managers have stopped seeing it primarily as an opportunity to cut costs and now see automation as a wider range of potential benefits.
She cited company data showing that 41% of data and analytics decision makers described cost savings as an advantage of automation adoption in 2018, but only 25% said the same in 2021.
In addition, Forrester found a significant rise in the percentage of leaders who cited deeper insights and saw “competitive differentiation ” as advantages created by automation.
Other benefits of automation include bridging talent gaps, freeing employees to perform more advanced work, improving customer experience, quality and safety, and gaining deeper insights from data analysis to improve and develop tasks and processes within the workplace.
West told Tech News World: “Automation can be useful in relieving humans of dirty, dangerous jobs, and completely routine and inferior jobs. ”
Building Confidence
Concerns that the technology will destroy jobs that are still common among broad sectors of people may be justified, but the impact of automation on jobs will be much lighter than expected in the future.
Instead, technology and people will continue to increasingly engage in iterative and interconnected collaborations, forming human / machine teams that lead to new levels of quality and productivity, improved customer service and improved services for people.
Narayan commented on this point in his remarks to John P. Milo: “This is a process of building trust, and workers should feel like they are part of the journey. ”
“The most important thing companies can do is retrain their workers and staff.
If people see that an employer brings automation but trains employees and workers in his company for other types of new jobs instead of firing them, workers will be more receptive.
What the workers don ’ t want is to be fired from their jobs and remain without enough income to support themselves and their families. ”
Source: Al Jazeera + Websites

Supervisors should open dialogue to debunk automation myths, understand employee feelings, and involve workers in shaping how automation is used.

Title:

Content: Menu Close

The need for businesses to adapt to the workplace demands of the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of digital technologies, with clear implications for jobs and workers.

But just how much employees worry about the threat of automation – and how real those fears are – can have implications for workplaces beyond the technological change itself.

Our new research examined how employees feel about the introduction of “robotic process automation” (RPA) to the workplace. We also looked at how the willingness to embrace these new technologies influenced employees’ assessment of the software bots and their work.

RPA refers to software that interacts with different applications, such as a payroll system or a website, in the same way a human would.

Software robots – the so-called worker bees of RPA – can conduct mundane, repetitive and rule-based tasks such as transferring, entering and extracting data, accounting reconciliation, and automated email query processing. And they can do it at a fraction of the cost of employing real people.

The 24/7 worker

Unsurprisingly, organisations have embraced RPA for its cost and productivity benefits, but it’s not without its challenges. As RPA interacts with various applications, for example, it can “break” when one of the underlying systems is upgraded and the user interface changes.

RPA is also a double-edged sword for employees. On the one hand, with mundane and repetitive tasks outsourced to software robots, workers can focus on more complex tasks that require “soft” skills, empathy and decision-making capabilities.

Read more: Companies are mitigating labour shortages with automation — and this could drastically impact workers

On the other, some feel threatened by the software robots because they are generally more productive, make fewer errors and don’t cost as much as human employees.

Employees can also end up having to do additional tasks, picking up the work that used to be completed by the staff replaced by RPA. Paradoxically, fewer human employees can lead to an increased workload rather than the expected decrease.

Similarly, as employees shift from a mix of mundane and complex tasks to mainly complex ones, the variety in their work is reduced. This can lead to feeling alienated at work, or a sense they lack control over their role.

Fear and enthusiasm

These various perspectives on automation were clear in our research. We interviewed employees and automation team members at a financial institution in New Zealand about their perceptions and responses to RPA and software robots.

We found that reactions to RPA are influenced by what employees imagined would be the consequences of software robots on their jobs. In turn, this influenced their collaboration with the automation team, their attitude towards change in their tasks and work processes, and ultimately their interactions with software robots – including how they judged the bots’ performance.

Perceptions and responses to RPA can be categorised by employees’ views of software robots as either burdens and threats, tools, teammates or innovative enablers.

Those who considered software robots as a burden and threat before they were introduced tended to have a negative view of their experience with RPA. They were concerned about job security, had negative reactions to having greater responsibility added to their workload, and were dissatisfied with the robots’ performance.

Read more: Can machines invent things without human help? These AI examples show the answer is ‘yes’

Lessons for employees and employers

At the opposite end of the spectrum, those who viewed software robots as enablers of innovation saw the opportunities of RPA and the benefits of using robots to improve work quality.

Some eagerly accepted the robots as team members, even giving them human names and joking that the bot was taking a sick day when it stopped working. This group also appreciated the reduction in their own workloads through RPA.

Little surprise, then, that employees who view software robots as innovative enablers or teammates tended to collaborate closely with the automation team to find the best way to integrate robots and improve their performance.

Read more: Brain-computer interfaces could allow soldiers to control weapons with their thoughts and turn off their fear – but the ethics of neurotechnology lags behind the science

In the middle ground, employees who viewed software robots as tools tended to be accepting, but remained sceptical about changes to their workloads and robot performance. They were reluctant to offer full cooperation with the automation team to configure robots’ tasks that would have consequences for their own roles.

Some level of automation is inevitable for businesses. To harness the benefits of RPA without alienating staff, organisations should communicate clearly and often, debunking the myths of robots and their capabilities early to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings by employees.

Employers should take the time to understand how different employees feel about the introduction of automation initiatives. And they should consider incorporating employees’ ideas to increase the overall benefits of automation.

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Employees often perceive automation tools as threats or burdens unless managers clearly explain benefits, incorporate employee ideas, and provide training to refocus people on higher‑value tasks.

Creating safe spaces for candid discussion, championing team wins, and prioritizing people’s well‑being help teams navigate change without alienation.

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Empowering A New Class Of Agency Creatives

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Amber is the Co-Founder & CEO of Invisible North.

For leaders of creative agencies, the heartbeat of our success resides in our people and their ideas. Creating a balanced agency ecosystem demands that the team feels valued, supported and heard, equipped not only with the tools for their craft but also the empowerment to experiment, push boundaries and boldly innovate.

Today, a major shift is underway, marked by the integration of emerging technologies like AI and thus a fear of job security with automation. And with it, there is a persistent undercurrent—the sense among many creatives that their work is being undervalued.

As leaders steering through this transformative journey, we recognize that these new tools and processes, though intimidating, harbor the potential to spark increased creativity when truly understood and approached with intentionality. Over the years, I’ve uncovered a few tried-and-true methods to help empower teams to utilize these new tools, experiment and enhance their craft amid our evolving industry.

Create Safe Spaces

Agency leaders play a pivotal role in shaping the company narrative for their teams and uplifting them from within. It begins with fostering an environment for open communication in which team members are comfortable expressing their concerns, ideas and opinions, especially at a time when many have mixed feelings about bringing AI into the workplace.

To truly empower our communities, we must acknowledge these emotions and encourage a workplace where they can feel valued and motivated. In doing so, their best work can come to life.

We have a strong culture in our agency of show-and-tell, inspiration trips/research and challenges. If there are areas that team members want to learn about, we find time to dig into research, insights and workshops with best-in-class partners so that we can enhance collective brain trust and overcome the fear of unknown barriers to comfort and flow.

Champion Wins

In a creative field where individual expression and innovation are highly valued, it’s crucial for leaders to create an environment that fosters personal inspiration. Getting results from soup to nuts on a project is not an easy feat—so much goes into it across departments. Oftentimes, we move from one project to the next and forget to stop and celebrate the wins or embrace the learnings. By acknowledging the diverse efforts it took to bring the campaign to life, along with any new tools or methods used, you’re reinforcing the efforts needed to create success.

We use our monthly companywide newsletters, quarterly town halls and biannual all-team meetings to share individual, team and project accolades alongside other agency updates.

Embrace Change

The introduction of new technologies in any space often triggers a fear of the unknown. Teams should view these changes as catalysts rather than inhibitors. Through thoughtful integration strategies, leaders can help harness emerging technologies to enrich the creative process rather than impede it.

We’ve seen time and time again that when you curate a supportive environment to freely experiment, magic happens. It is imperative to encourage teams to explore with new tools and also hold space to share their discoveries. That’s where the real learning begins. It’s also essential to tackle any concerns or anxieties team members may have, leading with transparent communication throughout.

Foster Community

Emerging technologies will inevitably shape the way agencies and creatives approach their craft, ultimately opening new doors for how we tell stories, create experiences and personalize content. No matter the changes, the thing that must remain constant is continuing to prioritize the people who truly make the work special.

As the heartbeat of the creative process, we must protect our community above all else—recognizing their anxieties, celebrating their experimentations, championing their well-being and helping them navigate this new frontier. So, as we embrace a new year, let’s carry these principles forward into 2024—a commitment to cultivating a community that not only adapts to change but propels it. Let’s create a legacy of inspired, valued and empowered creative professionals.

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Targeted training and development opportunities build confidence and help employees see tangible benefits like improved productivity and efficiency.

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Why Technology With A Human Touch Is Crucial For Businesses In 2022

CEO at BrightHR and COO at the Peninsula Group, responsible for the global rollout of HR tech supporting over 44,000 organizations.

The last two-plus years have highlighted just how much we rely on technology. After all, where would we have been without Zoom calls or online shopping throughout lockdown? Thanks to recent strides in digital technology, we’ve all been able to live our lives with relative ease without leaving the comfort of our homes.

The world stopped for a long time, but technology kept things going as best it could. From online learning to 3-D printing, we were still able to access the goods and services we’ve become reliant on—and we got used to it. Now the technologies we thought we would only rely on in the short term are a part of our everyday lives. If companies wish to stay relevant, they need to adapt their ways of working.

Technology isn’t going anywhere, and as it continues down the unending path of innovation, it’s only going to become a bigger part of our daily lives.

Chief among the many benefits of technology is the ability to save precious time on repetitive tasks, boost productivity, track employee performance, and allow for swifter and easier communication. The downsides have also been well-documented, particularly the risk of making us feel more isolated, putting cybersecurity and privacy at greater risk and throwing the work-life balance slightly off-kilter.

Technology has eliminated much of the need for face-to-face human interaction, both between employees as well as between businesses and customers. In some ways, this has made things more efficient, but it’s also left many of us feeling lonely. Striking up friendships between co-workers has become harder due to the lack of face-to-face interaction. If employees get too used to working alone and feel isolated, it can have an obvious impact on their mental health and could potentially lead to them leaving the company.

The rise of instant messaging tools like Teams and WhatsApp can also strain relationships between co-workers. It’s easy to misinterpret someone’s intentions and meaning when you can’t see their face. Plus, it can make life pretty isolating especially if you’re working at home, doing a job that doesn’t require much human communication.

Because many of us have work phones, there’s a sense that we take the office home with us and never fully "switch off." And because many of us still work from home at least part of the time, the lines between work and home can often become blurred. It is easy to feel guilty for not responding immediately to work texts and emails, even out of hours. Because of this, many people report feeling that they constantly need to be on it as they still receive work-related emails and notifications well into the evening and night.

Never has the human touch been so important. HR leaders need to find a way to use technology to enhance their employees' work lives and make things easier while facilitating growth, social interaction and collaboration. It might take time to get this balance right, so you need flexibility and patience.

The key to understanding where the balance lies is in finding out which tasks and activities employees prefer to be digitized and which ones they would rather do in person. Statistics suggest that 40-45% of employees prefer meeting face-to-face for certain tasks like "performance reviews, getting help with difficult problems and asking questions of their Human Resources (HR) team." However, the same percentage of employees indicated that they would prefer these tasks to be partially or fully digitized. We should be grateful that automation has taken over some of these more mundane tasks, freeing up time to spend on tasks that require creativity and innovation.

Many companies are striking a technology-human balance by arranging group social events and more face-to-face meetings. This is certainly a good start. Not only does it help maintain morale and stop everyone from feeling atomized like islands, but it can also normalize socializing more often with colleagues. This is where technology is your friend. Platforms such as Teams that have team schedules, polls and calendars make it easy to find out who wants to do what and when people are available.

Implementing technology with a human touch is vital for your internal staff. When employees (and clients for that matter) engage with your company (leadership, co-workers, etc.) they want the respect and empathy they can only get from another human being. They want employers who can respond to their concerns in real time and demonstrate emotional intelligence. They see a human voice as more trustworthy, which could lead to an overall more positive experience. This shows that your company sees employees as individuals.

Every manager knows the benefits of technology when it comes to handling metrics and data to measure employee performance, social media reach and revenue. But managers still require people skills. There is no substitute for sitting down with an employee who may be underperforming and asking if everything is OK.

Technology has improved our lives in more ways than we ever could have imagined, but HR leaders should never neglect the human touch.

Through generous use of in-person meetings and social events and understanding the limitations of technology, you can keep a healthy people-first culture that builds strong relationships, both within the company and beyond. Not only can this help the company in the long run, but it could make everyone in it much happier.

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When well managed, digital tools can be productivity enhancers—76% of employees say digital tools make them more productive.

Cloud adopters often report increased revenue and significant value, though success requires strategic investment and follow‑through.

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Content: 85% of companies in the Middle East have already started their transition to cloud technology, and about half of them have achieved tangible value.
• 88% of companies that adopted cloud technology recorded an increase in revenue over the past 6-9 months, compared to 76% of companies that did not adopt it.
• The regional cloud technology market has the potential to generate significant additional revenue: 76% of companies have pledged to increase their technology budgets in 2024; 68% of countries in the Middle East plan to migrate the majority of their operations to technology by 2025.
Dubai, United Arab Emirates – The latest report by Strategy & PwC Middle East – “Cloud Technology in the Middle East: New Opportunities for Businesses and Cloud Service Providers ” – notes that adoption rates in the Middle East are well past their initial stage and are now poised for accelerated growth, with a large proportion of companies already reaping tangible value.
The findings are the result of a survey of 420 business leaders and technology professionals from across the two largest cloud markets in the Middle East: the UAE and Saudi Arabia *.
The analysis suggests that if the Middle East succeeds in catching up with Europe in terms of the maturity of the cloud technology market, technology suppliers could generate revenues of about US $5.6 billion.
If the region reaches the maturity of the North American market, its potential new revenue in this sector could approach $14 billion.
Adoption of cloud technology in the region
The Strategy & PwC Middle East report revealed that 85% of companies in the region have already started their transition to cloud technology; 32% of companies in the region are using technology in at least one area of their operations, 35% of companies are adopting it in multiple areas of their business, and 18% of companies are already expanding the use of technology across all aspects of their business.
Looking ahead, 68% of Middle East companies plan to migrate the majority of their operations to technology within the next two years.
To fund these initiatives, 80% of companies plan to increase their cloud budget over the next year.
In addition, 90% of companies have moved from a cloud-based approach provided by technology providers to employing the modernization, application development, and native cloud business models that were originally designed for cloud technology, in order to reap more of the benefits of their technology transformation initiatives.
Nicholas Leolis, Head of Sector at Strategy & Middle East, part of the PwC Network, said: “The Middle East is undergoing a significant shift in its approach to cloud technology, and the gap between it and global leaders is narrowing at an accelerating rate.
Thanks to proactive government investments and the growing proliferation of public cloud service providers, there is now an accelerated path for both public and private entities to take advantage of the technology ’ s tremendous advantages.
The value of cloud technology
The report also revealed that about 40% of companies have already achieved significant value from their cloud-based initiatives, including improved decision-making (40%), increased profitability (34%), or new revenue streams (30%), among other benefits.
The analysis indicated that despite the strong performance of technology-enabled companies in the Middle East, there is still considerable room for improvement in their performance rates in terms of value creation.
The comparison shows that American companies that rely on technology outperform them in extracting value from different areas of business.
According to the report, many of the challenges that Middle East companies face in achieving tangible value are external and can be addressed through vendor support.
For example, 47% of cloud-based companies said they had experienced problems related to cloud providers, such as quality-of-service concerns.
In contrast, companies that did not adopt technology were more likely to attribute their challenges to internal factors, such as budget constraints, limited technical capabilities, and management problems.
88% of companies that adopt the technology reported an increase in their revenues over the past 6-9 months.
According to Akilis Dritas, a partner at Strategy & Middle East, part of the PwC Network, “Our findings illustrate the tangible benefits of cloud adoption for businesses.
About 40% of companies surveyed reported high rates of improvement across different dimensions.
It is noted that there is a direct relationship between the adoption of technology and improved performance of gross revenue rates.
As part of the ways organizations are exploring this potential, our report provides a variety of recommendations from the practical experience of companies that have successfully leveraged the benefits of cloud technology. ”
Achieve the full value of cloud technology
Rajat Chaudari, partner at PwC Middle East, added: “Our results show that organizations can maximize the value of cloud technology by taking a systematic approach within a carefully planned technology adoption strategy.
In addition, this strategy should be based on business priorities, strong technology governance controls, and a proactive framework for a program that engages all executives with key stakeholders from the start of the project. ”
Specifically, the analysis also revealed four key steps that cloud-based companies are taking to optimize value from the technology:
1.
Adopting a comprehensive approach
Companies adopting cloud technology adopt a holistic approach based on a clearly defined vision and supported by a robust design roadmap and governance framework, in line with specific business objectives.
These companies often use cloud technology for a variety of purposes, including enabling companies to prioritize their infrastructure strategies and data migration mechanisms for each application, ensuring effective value creation.
1.
Building stronger alliances at the executive level
Companies that adopt cloud technology succeed in building strong alliances between business and technology executives, as CIOs and technology teams recognize that the transition to cloud technology requires a collective effort, and then collaborate closely from the early stages of planning, budgeting, and gathering requirements.
1.
Emphasize cloud technology controls and governance mechanisms
Companies that adopt cloud technology are more advanced than others, especially in terms of adopting leading practices in cloud governance, avoiding its risks and defining its controls.
These companies are more likely to allocate dedicated resources to cloud governance and establish strict technology deployment controls along with robust mechanisms to assess shared responsibility with professional and managed cloud service providers.
1.
Strictly strategizing data and analytics and applying AI technologies
Cloud-based companies often have an enterprise-level data strategy compared to other companies (73% for the former versus 42% for the latter).
This means that these companies have already developed a streamlined and efficient structure to update data for integrated presentation, create governance structures, develop the necessary skills, and make the operational changes necessary to transform into data-driven organizations.
The report also discusses five key considerations for professional and managed cloud service providers that want to remain competitive and successful in meeting their customers ’ changing needs.
The report ’ s recommendations focused on adopting original cloud technology, achieving excellence in various aspects of the industry, enhancing security in the first place, partnering with public cloud service providers, and highlighting unique strengths.
# Company Data
- Done.
About Strategy &
Strategy & is a global strategic consulting firm with a unique position and capabilities to help you shape the best possible picture of your future based on internal axes of excellence, in line with your needs and aspirations.
As part of the PricewaterhouseCoopers network, we work every day to build successful solutions to drive growth. We combine our insight with our tangible technical knowledge and the technologies we employ at your service, to help you craft the optimal strategy that can transform from day one.
As the only integrated strategic consulting firm in the world that is part of a global network of professional services, we combine our strategic capabilities with those of PwC ’ s field implementation teams to help you define your goal, the choices you need to make to reach it, and the best way to achieve it.
Based on the above, we adopt a realistic methodology to formulate strategies that combine strength to monitor possibilities and practicality to ensure efficient implementation.
The result is a strategy that helps the organization overcome the current changes and achieve the results that are reshaping its future.
With us, we ensure that you develop a strategy that turns the vision into a practical reality.

AI’s promise is substantial, but up to 60% of AI/ML projects fail due to inconsistent data, underlining the need for data quality and responsible AI practices.

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Preface
Since generative AI became a hot business topic late last year, the idea of “preparing for the future ” has become inextricably linked to the adoption of AI.
With this powerful technology, businesses can gain the speed, agility and more accurate decisions they need to take advantage of today ’ s rapidly changing environment.
AI was in full swing long before generative AI emerged. In a recent study by Economist Impact, AI and machine learning (ML) technologies accounted for two of the six technologies respondents have adopted or plan to adopt as they prepare for the future (see Figure 1). Cognizant conducted the study in collaboration with Economist Impact, which surveyed 2,000 executives in different industries around the world. “Ready for anything: what it means to be a modern business. ”
In our analysis of the data, nearly seven in 10 identified AI / ML as a top investment area, indicating that they believe AI / ML is critical to doing business effectively today.
AI is one of the six most widely used technologies
Q: Which of the following technologies has your company adopted or plans to adopt?
1.
Cloud computing (89%)
2.
Internet of Things (83%)
3.
Big Data Analytics (80%)
4.
Robotic process automation (74%)
5.
Advanced cloud computing (69%)
6.
Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning (68%) *
* Bundled with crowdsourcing and 5G (68%)
Survey: 2,000 business executives
Source: The Economist Impact Study
Figure 1
However, at the same time, only 39% of respondents said AI / ML has already contributed significant business value to their organizations.
In fact, while AI ranks sixth among the most commonly adopted technologies, it ranks second in the bottom of the list in terms of its perceived value (see Figure 2).
The truth is, whether it ’ s generative AI or other types of AI, successfully implementing AI / ML initiatives requires companies to make all sorts of unforeseen adjustments.
The good news is that many businesses are already beginning to realize the full value of their AI implementations.
The first is to put aside the AI hype and understand what it takes to successfully apply the technology.
Difficult to achieve full technical value
Q: To what extent did the technology you adopted bring strategic value to your operations? (Percentage of respondents indicating significant value)
Master the Five Elements to Prepare for AI
Based on our analysis and experience, we have five recommendations to help traditional businesses embrace AI.
The recommendations focus on harmonizing AI across the broader ecosystem, including data, technology, talent, responsible AI practices, and organizational culture.
By integrating these elements, businesses can pave the way for the future, with AI as the driving force for their success.
Modernizing the data infrastructure
Many businesses face the daunting challenge of inaccurate, incomplete, and inconsistent data.
Poor data quality can cripple the performance of AI models, resulting in wasted resources and missed opportunities.
Investing in AI without addressing data quality is tantamount to building houses on unstable foundations. AI systems rely heavily on high-quality data to generate accurate insights and help you make informed decisions.
Ignoring data quality can fundamentally undermine AI ’ s potential.
This can undermine trust in AI systems, undermine stakeholder confidence, and jeopardize expected outcomes.
Data modernization is key to effectively managing and leveraging data assets, paving the way for AI-driven insights and transformative decision-making.
> 60%
AI and ML projects fail due to too many data sources and inconsistent data
Source: O'Reilly
Here are the essential elements involved in modernizing the data infrastructure that powers forward-thinking companies to grow their AI careers:
Prioritize data quality over quantity:
The value lies not in the size of the dataset, but in its quality.
By managing high-quality data sets, organizations can lay the foundation for valuable insights and results that drive innovation and success.
Building a robust data governance framework:
Clear policies, procedures and guidelines lay the foundation for consistent data governance.
According to the Economist Impact study, the top three data governance guidelines that companies follow include: data quality metrics and thresholds (54%); data privacy management procedures (53%); and guidelines for data collection, storage, and use (53%).
Embracing the power of data virtualization:
Data virtualization can create decentralized data sources into an integrated view, enabling real-time access and analysis without the need for complex data integration processes.
Data virtualization breaks down data silos, so it can increase flexibility, speed up decision-making, and expand the impact of AI initiatives.
Expansion of data with external resources:
Integrate additional information such as demographics, social media insights, or industry-specific datasets to enrich the depth and breadth of data.
This expansion allows organizations to develop more robust AI models to make more informed decisions and drive innovation in the process.
These industry use cases illustrate the potential of a modern data infrastructure to leverage AI to unlock new opportunities, foster innovation, and generate significant advantages:
Medical care
By prioritizing data quality and leveraging AI, healthcare organizations can enable more accurate diagnostics, precision medicine approaches, forward-looking disease management, and better clinical decisions.
Financial services
A robust data management framework ensures compliance, protects customer privacy, and reduces the risk of data breaches.
AI models trained on financial data comply with standards such as GDPR or PCI-DSS to protect sensitive information in the financial services industry.
Insurance
By integrating external data sources and leveraging AI models, insurers can enhance risk assessment, streamline claims processing, personalize customer experience, improve fraud detection, and optimize underwriting and pricing strategies.
Overhauling traditional technologies
As AI applications grow, organizations must face a serious challenge: an outdated and rigid IT infrastructure.
The integration of the old system is complex, and the lack of standardized APIs makes it difficult to meet the computing needs of artificial intelligence and real-time data processing needs.
Old infrastructure also poses significant security risks.
These systems are built prior to the digital age and are not designed to withstand sophisticated attacks in today ’ s threat environment.
By embracing the future and working to modernize infrastructure, organizations can improve efficiency, accelerate innovation, and redefine possibilities.
$1.14T
Annual spending by U.S. companies on maintaining existing IT investments, including legacy systems
Source: Supplied
Mechanical Orchard, a U.S.-based cloud computing consulting firm
These recommendations will help organizations build a flexible and resilient IT infrastructure that can safely and reliably support the computational strength and massive amounts of data needed for AI:
Putting cloud technology at the heart of an infrastructure strategy:
Migrate legacy systems and applications to the cloud to take advantage of the power of scalable computing resources, rapid deployment, and pre-built AI services.
With cloud technology, organizations can take agility to the next level and tap into the full potential of AI.
Agile development practices:
Agile practices facilitate collaboration, continuous integration, and rapid deployment, enabling organizations to remain flexible and responsive in a rapidly evolving AI environment.
Upgrading networks and connections:
Leverage high-speed networks, software-defined networks (SDN), and reliable connectivity to facilitate the smooth exchange of data between AI systems, data sources, and users.
By upgrading network capabilities, organizations can ensure optimal performance, responsiveness, and reliability.
Implement strong security measures:
Because AI relies on sensitive data, robust security measures must be implemented to protect data and AI models from unauthorized access.
Protect your AI initiatives with encryption, access control, and advanced threat detection, ensuring compliance with privacy regulations and increasing trust among stakeholders.
These industry use cases demonstrate the power of modernization in achieving better outcomes, driving innovation, and gaining competitive advantage in today ’ s AI-driven digital environment:
Improving patient outcomes
By migrating legacy systems to the cloud, healthcare providers can leverage scalable computing resources to support AI-driven diagnostic models.
Healthcare professionals, with real-time insights into large volumes of patient data, are also able to make more accurate diagnoses, develop personalized treatment plans and improve patient outcomes.
Modernizing Retail
Through agile development practices, retailers can quickly deploy AI-driven solutions such as demand forecasting models, recommendation engines, and dynamic pricing algorithms.
This enables retailers to respond quickly to changing market dynamics, deliver personalized shopping experiences, optimize inventory management, and increase customer satisfaction.
Security AI in the banking industry
The banking and financial industry relies heavily on AI for fraud detection, risk assessment, and customer authentication.
By implementing encryption, access control and advanced threat detection, financial institutions can build trust in their customers, ensure compliance and reduce risk.
Invest in AI talent
Many businesses are struggling to find AI talent, including machine learning, natural language processing and computer vision, as well as soft skills such as creativity and problem solving.
However, finding such talent often means that companies pay a high price.
The rapid development of AI requires professionals to not only master existing skills, but also the ability to continuously learn and adapt.
Retaining these professionals has proved equally difficult.
Talented AI professionals are constantly sought after by new and exciting opportunities.
62%
Business leaders lack key skills to implement their AI strategy
4%
Business leaders believe they have all the skills needed to achieve AI goals
50%
Annual growth in demand for AI skills
20%
Annual growth in AI skills supply
Source: Google
Source: World Economic Forum
Overcoming these challenges requires a multifaceted approach to discovering and nurturing AI talent, ensuring a strong workforce that can drive innovation and deliver AI excellence:
Promote internal talent development:
Enhance their AI skills by providing comprehensive training programs, guidance, and other resources to identify individuals who show hope and enthusiasm for AI and invest in its development.
Unleash the power of diversity:
A diverse workforce fosters creativity and innovation, creating a collaborative environment that is inclusive of innovation.
It helps address the scarcity of multidisciplinary talent by expanding the pool of potential candidates.
Cooperation with strategic partners to obtain rich human resources:
Strategic partners complement the existing expertise and networks that go beyond the organization ’ s own.
Working with partners, you can access a diverse range of AI professionals with professional skills and experience through their extensive talent resources.
Here are three examples of how companies are working to overcome AI talent challenges:
LinkedIn has launched an internal AI academy to give its employees the opportunity to learn and develop AI skills.
By empowering people within the organization, the company is addressing the challenge of talent shortage from within.
Through telecommuting, GitLab can tap talent without geographical restrictions, and successfully formed a diversified global AI professional team.
Tesla offers AI professionals the opportunity to participate in cutting-edge projects related to autonomous driving and artificial intelligence manufacturing, attracting top AI talent seeking impactful opportunities.
Put responsible AI first
From algorithmic bias to privacy concerns, companies find themselves facing a new ethical challenge, from ensuring that AI systems are fair and impartial, preventing them from being used for harm, while ensuring that they are transparent and accountable.
Failure to address such issues as algorithmic bias, privacy violations, and ethics in autonomous systems can lead to a range of adverse consequences.
Promoting ethical use of AI is not an option, it is imperative.
84%
Businesses believe building responsible AI should be a top priority for management
25%
Enterprise has a fully fledged responsible AI project
Source: MIT Sloan Management Review
Businesses should see these ethical challenges as catalysts for growth, not barriers.
By firmly supporting responsible AI, businesses can lead to a safe and secure future.
Here are the basic steps organizations can take to forge a strong alliance with AI:
Application of AI model:
With AI models, businesses can assess the uncertainties inherent in their AI systems.
This approach not only enables organizations to measure the reliability and credibility of AI predictions, but also enables business leaders to make informed decisions based on a comprehensive understanding of the relevant uncertainties.
Utilizing transparent, inherently explainable AI systems:
Approaches such as rule set evolution can help businesses understand and interpret the decision-making process of AI systems, ensuring that models are transparent and explainable from the start.
This approach not only eliminates concerns about AI ’ s “black box ” problem, but also enables organizations to be pioneers in the responsible and ethical use of AI.
Define and measure unwanted biases and set goals to minimize them:
Clear guidelines and metrics must be developed to quantify bias in AI models to ensure fairness in outcomes.
By making minimizing bias a primary goal for AI system optimization, companies demonstrate a commitment to ethics and fair decision-making.
The following companies are integrating responsible AI practices into their operations and demonstrating a commitment to positive outcomes for customers, employees, and the wider society:
Johnson & Johnson is leveraging the power of responsible AI in drug discovery and development.
Companies use AI algorithms to analyze large amounts of clinical trial data to identify potential drug candidates more efficiently and accurately.
By prioritizing ethical considerations such as patient privacy and fair data use, the company aims to improve treatment choices and patient outcomes.
Mastercard uses responsible AI to enhance fraud monitoring.
The company ’ s AI systems analyze transaction data in real time, detect fraudulent activity and protect customer assets. Mastercard ’ s commitment to transparency and ethical data practices ensures the accuracy and fairness of its fraud detection algorithms.
Walmart delivers personalized experiences to its customers through responsible AI.
The company uses AI algorithms to analyze customer preferences and behaviors and provide personalized product recommendations. Walmart focuses on transparency and privacy to ensure that customer data is used responsibly.
Fostering an AI-friendly Culture
The path to AI readiness requires much more than technical prowess.
It requires a cultural transformation that fundamentally accepts change and dispels misunderstandings and fears.
For example, fear of job loss and uncertainty can fuel skepticism about AI ’ s potential, and limited understanding of AI can hinder its application because of skepticism or lack of trust in its insights.
Companies also need a strong cultural foundation to address the complex ethical challenges associated with AI, including developing guidelines and frameworks for responsible AI use, fostering open discussion and diverse perspectives.
77%
Consumers fear AI will lead to job losses in the next 12 months
Source: Forbes Advisor
By following these steps, businesses can foster an organizational culture that is ready for AI success:
Leadership from above:
Leadership sets the tone for an AI-friendly culture.
By championing AI initiatives, fostering open dialogue, and sharing success stories, leaders can inspire their employees.
Embracing transparency:
Clear and purposeful communication.
A vivid description of the important reasons for the adoption of AI shows that its potential lies in augmenting rather than replacing humans.
To assure them of the Organization's unwavering support during the transition period.
Improving AI literacy:
Conduct training programs, seminars and knowledge-sharing sessions to demystify AI concepts and terminology.
Develop employees ’ understanding and provide them with the skills to work seamlessly with AI systems.
These companies are effectively addressing the cultural challenges of AI adoption:
Moderna, a biotechnology company that produces mRNA therapeutics and vaccines, has partnered with Carnegie Mellon University to create an AI academy that aims to educate and empower employees at all levels to identify AI and machine learning solutions and integrate them into every system and process at Moderna to deliver mRNA drugs to patients.
Now, all team members must be trained in AI.
Johnson & Johnson has launched a talent marketplace platform that allows employees to list their skills and receive personalized learning, work, and mentoring that matches them.
Employees can list their proficiency levels, possible gaps, and skills they wish to acquire.
With the addition of new learning content and the use of J & J ’ s 150,000 employees, this talent market is adding thousands of employees each month.
Siemens aims to create a modern learning environment through its “Digital Industry Academy ”, to develop knowledge accumulation activities in the industrial sector and to support the urgent transition to a learning enterprise.
The Academy provides external and internal customers with comprehensive knowledge of Siemens industrial products – directly from the manufacturer, applicable to all industries and applications, for beginners and experts.
What to do on Monday?
As AI ’ s impact on change becomes more pronounced, forward-thinking companies recognize that AI is not just a buzzword, but a strategic tool that is key to unlocking innovation, efficiency, and growth.
The question is how to leverage AI to make this powerful technology work to its full value.
Here are our tips to make sure you are ready for the future:
Amplify Your Differentiated Advantage
You must first understand what makes your organization different in the marketplace.
What makes you stand out from the competition?
What unique value propositions can AI help amplify?
By identifying these key differentiators, it will help you develop a clear and compelling vision of how AI can elevate and highlight your strengths.
This vision will enable you to surpass your competitors and meet the changing needs of your customers, paving the way for great success.
Focus on value and KPI
With a bold vision, the next step is to develop a roadmap setting out the strategic steps and milestones needed to achieve an AI-driven future.
First, identify key performance indicators (KPIs) aligned with your organization ’ s goals and AI-enabled differentiators.
These KPIs will serve as beacons to illuminate your path and enable you to measure the success and impact of your AI initiatives.
Transforming business processes with AI
With AI technology, businesses can seamlessly integrate intelligent automation, data-driven insights, and advanced analytics into their workflows.
AI-enhanced processes enable data-driven insights that provide real-time information to decision makers, enabling them to make agile, informed decisions.
Relying on AI technology to achieve efficient operation, enterprises will surely open a new era of rapid growth in productivity and agility, and success is not far away.
To learn more about this topic, check out our AI Solutions page or contact us

Organizations report that AI can transform productivity and innovation, but many executives see gaps in employee readiness and talent strategy, which reinforces the importance of training and clear communication.

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12 / 04 / 2024
AI | 86% of enterprises invest in generative AI, employees can focus on analytical work! KPMG..
Employee knowledge, experience and engagement ensure successful integration of AI systems
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The impact of Generative AI on business operations is rapidly expanding, with KPMG U.S. ’ s Generative AI Survey showing that as many as 86% of companies have begun investing in generative AI capabilities to stay competitive in the digital economy; however, 39% of executives surveyed are worried that introducing AI will negatively impact their teams.
KPMG USA interviewed 225 US executives to learn about the state of generative AI in the enterprise and its impact.
The survey found that 72% of respondents believe that generative AI will significantly improve team productivity; 62% have recognized that AI can stimulate innovation and facilitate the development of new products and services; and 66% expect AI to transform the workplace in the future.
Felicia Lyon (photo), Head of Human Capital Consulting at KPMG, points out that the development of generative AI is still at an early stage. She suggests that companies should first develop attractive technology talent strategies to strengthen AI practices. (Photo courtesy of KMPG)
Felicia Lyon, head of human capital consulting at KPMG, said the results reflect the growing importance of AI in driving business growth, innovation and progress, especially in strategic tasks.
She explained that AI can help organizations automate planning tasks, giving employees more time to focus on acquiring and analyzing relevant information and enhancing their ability to perform tasks.
Helping employees understand and use AI to achieve their goals
But only 12% of executives believe their employees are ready to adapt to the new technology; 25% say they still don ’ t have a clear talent strategy to integrate workforce and generative AI capabilities; and 30% expect that the process of introducing AI will encounter resistance from employees or affect the development of AI.
In response to the above phenomenon, Lyon emphasizes the importance of shaping a culture of “responsible use of AI ” by recruiting and improving employee skills.
She believes that companies should help employees understand how to use AI to achieve business goals, so as to maintain market trust in the company and enhance the professionalism of their internal employees.
Moreover, the introduction of AI will also have different effects on different types of work, such as information technology (IT), software development, creative work, etc., which will tend to have a positive effect, but it will have a great chance of facing a negative impact on administrative work such as data entry and record keeping.
To smooth the transition, she recommends that executives clearly distinguish which skills, roles, and workflows can be completely or partially replaced by AI, so that appropriate hiring plans, training courses, internal reassignments, or layoffs can be developed.
Lyon also mentioned that to ensure that AI systems can be successfully integrated and operated, the knowledge, experience and commitment of employees is also critical, and enterprises should actively arrange training for existing employees to improve their skills and help adapt to the new needs of the company to retain their value to the company.
Felicia Lyon, Head of Human Capital Consulting at KPMG, said that the development of generative AI is still in its early stages. She suggested that companies should first develop an attractive technology talent strategy to strengthen AI practices. (File photo)
Proactively arrange training to meet new needs
As an example, she said, “Executive employees often have a broad understanding of the company ’ s internal operations, and if they learn new skills through retraining, they will be more likely to reposition and adapt to new changes in the company. ”
Taking a corporate stance can also greatly reduce the operational risks brought about by “blood exchange. ”
The content of the signed and / or unsigned articles published by Economic Times is the author's personal opinion and does not represent the position of Economic Times, and the role of Economic Times is to provide a free speech platform.
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