AI's Paradox - Or How Are We Being Coerced Into Freedom?

The AI generation hasn't graduated high school yet, but the whole world needs to rethink what work means. We're contemplating a wave of commoditization that has diluted to nothing an entire set of mind-numbing skills. And the question seems to be — if all that's now worthless, then what are the skills that are insanely valuable now?

The Physics of Change

The laws of physics tell us that for every action on Earth you get a reaction in the opposite direction. Destruction is always paired with creation. The destruction is sudden — like volatility in the markets. Creation feels slower, at least it takes time to become obvious. Initially those at the edge of value creation are the biggest beneficiaries. But with this AI revolution, the velocity of change is such that we should expect a propagation of value that is faster, broader and deeper than every other one from the past.

The rate of change took everyone by surprise. It likely took AI engineers also a bit from left field. They just threw a few extra billion data points at a model and all of sudden it could speak — sort of. The AI field is certainly not new, but as always progress is first very slow and then very fast. The question to which no one can claim to have the answer today is: what are the deeper societal impacts of the coming of LLMs?

Though the answer is not clear, we should definitely make every effort to understand what this means.

The Malaise

The first reaction on the receiving end of these tools — as users — is an initial awe that is pretty quickly replaced by a malaise. What just happened?

A task that required hours can be done in the blink of an eye with higher quality output. Within a matter of a few weeks, with light-speed bottom-up adoption, people were able to see before their eyes output being created fast and virtually free. The awe initially came from the acknowledgement of technical prowess. Then came a moment of hesitation that could split in two parts:

1. What does that mean about the self-worth that I derive from my work? Purely idiosyncratically.
2. If everyone has access to that same tool, then what does that mean from the simple law of supply and demand? Likely it means that a whole spectrum of things I was doing yesterday are now commoditized and thereby virtually worthless.

The malaise is deep because there is this layer of unease that settles about self-worth and then about simply getting credit for our work. People are not sure if or how the field has been leveled — or even if we are playing the same game anymore.

When I started in management consulting 20 years ago, PowerPoint and Excel modeling skills were in high demand at the entry level, as well as a dash of logic, judgment and critical thinking. One could argue two things: that these skills are either worthless today or that they need to be thought of differently.

What Has Been Destroyed

What has been destroyed is fairly obvious to everyone, and contemplating it can trigger vertigo. Billions of hours of tasks that require seemingly little brain power — all these repetitive tasks that all of us could hide behind in our work because they required TIME — all of these can be automated.

That "automation" is the shiny tech word that means the value of that task is now close to zero. It also means there is nowhere to hide anymore at work. In your end-of-year evaluation, whatever time you spent doing this is no more, and if you ever spent any time doing it, you are destroying precious value. Some of your skill set has just been priced out.

Before the Industrial Revolution, the overwhelming majority of the population worked in the fields. Why? Because they had to. There was nothing else to do. And it ensured access to food. It was an agrarian economy. In the matter of a few decades, it went from 90+% to a few percentage points. The Industrial Revolution guaranteed a certain level of food security which allowed another sector to take off. People now needed to buy stuff in large quantities — cars, white goods, then came computers and cell phones. They also priced out a bunch of people and their skills.

What is happening now is much deeper. And it's at the root of where the AI value creation lies. It's subtle and terrifying.

The Deeper Shift

Whereas the last technological advances have only worried the masses, the AI revolution has had EVERYONE question their relevance. From the top to the bottom. Voices have raised saying even CEOs will take orders from a much more enabled AI.

So what we are all witnessing in real time is the largest, most profound wave of introspection, which will be followed by the largest wave of change in the way people think about work. The very meaning of work is about to get a new polish.

Hence the challenge today is also the biggest gift in the History of Humanity. What was only fathomable to a happy few just a few decades ago and unimaginable a century ago is now becoming not just possible but almost mandatory.

We are all being coerced into doing what we want to do. And that's the scariest thing of all.

It gets worse.

We are all being pushed into finding alignment. Finding "what feels like play to us" (Naval). We are being forced into finding what is our edge, what is our gift — what makes us exceptional.

The malaise, to my sense, comes from the fact that the overwhelming majority of us have been working for a long time in jobs that we had to do. For the rare ones that feel otherwise, a large chunk have felt that this was their calling because that's what school told them work was about. And now LLMs are calling the bluff.

What Has Been Created

You'll often read "AI won't take your job but someone using AI will." That's partially true. We need to characterize what "using AI" means because if it's just adding AI to your workflow — if it's just about being tactical — then AI will come and take that too.

So here is another way to look at it: AI is coming for your job if your job is misaligned with you.

There is a new frontier at work. Work itself has changed. You have to think differently not only to stay competitive but to find alignment. This is true for people and this is true for companies.

Executive coaches and consultants always ask this question: what is your CORE value proposition? This means what is your essence? If you can clearly articulate that core value, then AI will become a means to an end for you. You'll be able to iterate on the MEANS to deliver that core value proposition if you are a company — and if you are an individual, it will mean researching and studying that essential skill of yours.

So where does that lead us? To an imposed blessing to find your calling — FAST.

For companies, this means back to first principles. Think about AI strategically, not tactically.

At the individual level, this means that soon there will be nowhere to hide anymore. You will need to find what your special skill is, hone it and make it work for you. This means that we are being forced to jump-start likely our most precious and underrated asset: our creative engine. And go, do and discover.

AI makes that possible because it can be harnessed to search, discover, test, iterate infinitely — virtually for free.

The New Reality

By leveling the field when it comes to repetitive tasks that gave jobs to so many, AI is forcing us into hyper-specialization. Pricing out general studies and demanding something much more personal and authentic.

The path forward is clear: Dominate your niche. Do something so special, so essential, so playful and enjoyable to You that only You could bring it about in the best possible light.