CHENNAI: Amid high concerns about humans losing their jobs to automation, experts say the year 2018 will be a crucial year in furthering this vision of the future of jobs based on a deep understanding of how humans evolve through change. Most predictions about the job scenario in the future involve automation, artificial intelligence (AI) and increasingly-redundant humans.
Nasdaq listed IT services major, Cognizant has envisioned 21 hitherto unimaginable jobs that would provide sustainable employment to scores of people in the coming decade. The company said that the foundation may well be laid in 2018.
Manish Bahl, senior director, Centre for the Future of Work, Cognizant, said, “There are still many traits of the human intelligence that a machine cannot match.” The current work that is tedious and repetitive will get automated, but machines will need humans — always, he added.
Jobs such as master of edge computing, data detective, quantum machine learning analyst, AI-assisted healthcare technician, cyber city analyst, chief trust officer, financial wellness coach, walker/talker, digital tailor, genomic portfolio director, augmented reality journey builder and genetic diversity officer are expected to be on the HR’s radar in the coming five years, said Bahl. “While technology will upgrade all aspects of the society, it will create new problems which again would require humans.”
A joint report by FICCI-Nasscom and EY states that 37 percent of Indian workforce will be employed in new job roles and nine per cent will be working in the jobs that do not exist today. All the new forms of employment are expected to add a further 20-25 percent to the workforce of the current defined ‘organized’ sector in 2022.
Noting that the roles demanding higher non-cognitive skills would have increasing prominence and demand, Rituparna Chakraborty, co-founder and executive vice-president of employment services provider Teamlease said, “With environment changing so rapidly, this shift was bound to happen and human progression may just have increased the prominence and demand.”
The catch would be ‘right’ talent which HR experts broadly defines as those who are able to upskill and re-skill themselves as per the dynamic work profile requirements. “Knowledge in artificial intelligence and machine learning is going to be premium and jobs that involve social skills and creativity is likely to remain untouched in the mid term,” said Aditya Mishra, CEO of CIEL, an HR services company.