AI TAKES CENTRESTAGE IN MICROSOFT 2024 WORK TRENDS INDEX
An AI revolution is sweeping through the Australian workplace and one of the world’s biggest tech companies says hiring is going to change forever.
A growing number of Australian employers will preference skills and AI aptitude over more traditional markers of value such as experience and job titles, a leading tech giant says, as the AI revolution sweeps through the workplace.
Microsoft’s latest Work Trend Index, which tracks changes in work practices for knowledge workers around the globe, suggests the white collar world is swiftly concentrating around AI and everything from hiring to daily team meetings will be impacted.
The Index finds 75 per cent of Australian business leaders would baulk at taking on a job seeker without AI skills, above the global average of 66 per cent.
LinkedIn ANZ managing director Matt Tindale said the new approach to hiring reflected the growing importance of “skills” and the ability to upskill as managers navigate a world of rapid and endless change.
“We are seeing much more of a move generally because of skills changing so much, that employers more now are employing for skills,” he said.
“So they are employing less around experience, less around tertiary education, less around job titles which can be proxies for your success in roles and they are hiring much more for skills.
“Skills now and into the future and also adaptability and the ability to learn in the future.”
The Index also finds 80 per cent of leaders believe AI adoption will be critical to remaining competitive in the marketplace.
The data shows Australian workers are eager to ride the AI wave, which exploded into public consciousness with the release of generative AI model ChatGPT in late 2022.
Learning basic skills such as how to effectively “prompt”, or instruct an AI model, would be crucial for Australia’s current and emerging workforce.
“What the Work Trend Index has taught us is ‘prompting’ is hard,” Ms Debono said.
“We’ve all become experts at talking to a search engine but this technology (Generative AI) has only really been around for sort of six to 12 months for most, and therefore it is learning a new skill.
“The purpose here is to make prompting more impactful, to perfect the art of the prompt, and to help people get a faster return.”
She said you had to find a way to talk to it in a way you might talk to an employee when delegating a task.
“You are almost talking to another human.”
