This week I completed my UK tax return in just 90 minutes. A task that used to take up to an entire day or cost several hundred pounds to an accountant. I allocated an afternoon for it and was left with a sense of ‘this should have taken a lot longer,’ able to turn my attention to something more productive. Next year I aim to do it in under 30.
The rule of ‘good, fast and cheap—choose two’ no longer applies universally. With the influx of AI into the public market it is now possible to complete countless existing tasks faster, for a fraction of the cost and to a higher quality. It’s a project manager’s dream. But what gives?
Every technological revolution has necessarily brought about terrible downsides, many of which are unthinkable now. In 19th century England amid the industrial revolution, children were made to work, and not only that but for 10+ hours per day in dangerous conditions, often 6 or 7 days per week. Being naturally smaller-bodied, they were able to reach pieces of machinery that a grown adult could not. Meanwhile factories produced emissions leading to smog that was an entirely new environmental problem and caused hundreds of thousands of premature deaths in Britain alone, possibly over a million.
The disruption to the labour market at the time—to the extent that there was a ‘labour market’—was catastrophic for many, dealing with the messy reality of being forced to upskill, change roles, change their mindset or drop out of productive life entirely. Notably the Luddites were a group of cloth makers who took it on themselves to destroy factory machinery in early 19th century England for fear of it taking their jobs. Many of them were executed or cast off to forced labour in Australia.
Yet despite these tragedies, how many people today can say they believe the world would be better had the industrial revolution not happened? And not do so from inside their brick built home on a mobile device connected to the internet.
I remember my mother taught me the value of working efficiently back in my early teens. As I was shovelling dirt in the garden, she commented that I was ‘creating work for myself,’ by rotating through too wide an angle to the wheelbarrow. She rightly corrected my form and it made all the difference to my perceived exertion and capacity to get work done. But at least I had a wheelbarrow.
I then worked a number of physical jobs throughout the rest of my teens including as a chef in a chain restaurant. This especially taught me valuable lessons that I later took with me into white collar work. To this day I have met few who can match the fortitude and technical prowess of the more experienced chefs I worked with back then. They used all available tools to their full capacity, and would surely not turn down any new one that relieved some of the pressure. Working physically under time pressure in such an intensely optimised environment is one of the most immediate ways to connect your workflow to an outcome, with direct felt consequences for poor technique or fitness. It revealed to me just how inefficient much white collar work is by comparison, and how resistant to efficiency it often is. It was clear this was a situation that was going to be disrupted sooner or later.
All of the second order impacts of the industrial revolution—exploitation, environmental damage and workforce disruption—have analogues that apply to the AI revolution today. But while the second order effects are real and must be reconciled with, the past solution was never to reject the technology; it was to make conscious what the technology reveals and come to terms with it in all its painful reality.
There are many misplaced objections to the adoption of AI. Much of which arises from confusions of the means of work with its ends and overall purpose. There are concerns that many of the tasks people find meaningful are ripe for replacement. But how ‘purpose driven’ can you really claim to be if you deny the opportunity of a machine to do your task better than you can? What is the real ‘purpose’ being served here? Philosophically, many of these arguments can be reduced to ‘if there’s a pile of dirt to move, you shouldn’t be using a wheelbarrow.’
It is nonetheless very understandable that anyone might struggle to fully relate their daily activity to a wider purpose. While the scale of individual perspectives vary, the truth is that no single person has the full picture or fully understands how their contribution serves to, in the words of Khalil Gibran, ‘fulfil a part of earth’s furthest dream.’
Indeed what is ‘work’ even for, really? Is it about producing something in support of life and existence? Creating something that couldn’t exist before? Or about doing the hard emotional and intellectual labour of stewarding spirit forward? So far it has been any and all of those things. Those of you familiar with my Seven Habits model will know that I prefer the word ‘contribution’ as a way to frame what it is you show up and do every day. Because you’re not merely doing ‘work.’ A horse can do work, and so can an LLM. Your role as a human is something more. But it still takes energy. Lots of energy.
AI is already disrupting existing roles and will continue to do so to an extent beyond which any of us can clearly imagine. But this is not an inherently bad thing. When humans do human things and machines do machine things, people and organisations thrive—and AI is forcing us to confront the question of what it actually means to be human, and to a higher degree than previous revolutions. The question of what actually constitutes ‘human things’ vs ‘machine things’ will not only be answered philosophically but felt directly through lived experience and market forces. The real potential of AI is not towards abundance per se, or ‘making life easier,’ but towards freedom—that is precisely in freeing humans up to be truly human.
Don’t get caught making cloth by candlelight. AI is happening because it needs to happen. Whatever your role is, there are ways you can delegate to it long before you are made to. Conducting a personal task analysis is a good place to start, but even more important is setting your intention. This will open your awareness to opportunities throughout your working day to benefit from the speed, quality and cost benefits that AI can provide. How about this—use AI itself to explore how to use AI.
An offering I have created to help with this project is the Personality Dynamics Assessment. The initial results are free and the full report gives insights into how your personality type specifically might use AI at work, as well as what uniquely human powers you should embrace fully.
Join me in next week’s Friday Reflection where we will explore the disruptive effects and opportunities of AI that go far beyond doing the same things better. Sign up by taking the PDA.
