The World Economic Forum has published its biannual survey on the Future of Jobs. Or in other words, how employers around the world expect their companies to behave in this important area. I’m sure you won’t be surprised that much of the attention is focused on generative AI and the job cuts it may cause: 41% of respondents says that expects to reduce the number of staff that you employ as AI automates more tasks at work.
The WEF survey report includes the opinions of 1,000 employers around the world, representing more than 14 million workers in 22 different industry groups. One of the big problems emerging from the survey is that employers believe that many of their workers do not have the skills necessary to do their jobs as technology evolves. In this regard, a majority of business leaders (77%) hope to help train their current staff to work with AI.
The Future of Jobs and the influence of AI
According to the report, Artificial intelligence and big data top the list of fastest growing skillsfollowed closely by networks and cybersecurity, as well as technological literacy. Complementing these technology-related competencies, creative thinking, resilience, flexibility and agility, along with curiosity and lifelong learning, are expected to continue to gain importance during the period 2025-2030.
The report appears to be bad news for professionals such as graphic designers and legal secretaries, two jobs that employers will apparently need less of in the futurepresumably due to artificial intelligence capabilities. «The presence of graphic designers and legal secretaries just outside the top 10 of most declining jobs, a first-of-its-kind prediction not seen in previous editions of the Future of Jobs Report, may illustrate GenAI’s growing ability to make these jobs”.
The decline in jobs in both positions is considered to be driven by both the artificial intelligence and information processing technologies as well as the expansion of digital access. This is a significant change from the 2023 edition of the report, when graphic designers were considered a moderate growth job and legal secretaries were not on the list of projected growth/decline jobs.
And generative artificial intelligence tools can now create elaborate graphics with just a few text prompts, although the technology is controversial since until now the general opinion is that it is “little more than a plagiarism machine”.
And the good news beyond AI
The survey predicts a net growth in the number of jobs created over the next five yearseven with the advances of AI. «Extrapolating the predictions shared by respondents to the Future of Jobs Survey, based on current trends over the period 2025 to 2030, job creation and destruction due to the structural transformation of the labor market will amount to 22% of total jobs current».
This is expected to involve the creation of new jobs equivalent to 14% of current total employment, which would add 170 million jobs. However, this growth is expected to be offset by the displacement of the equivalent of 8% (or 92 million) of current jobs, resulting in a net growth of 7% of total employment, or 78 million jobs.
