Is My Job in Jeopardy? Unpacking AI’s Impact on the Caribbean Workforce

“Will AI steal my Job?”

WEF reported that employers expect to create 69 million new jobs by 2027 and eliminate 83 million positions. That will result in a net loss of 14 million jobs, equivalent to 2% of current employment.

Goldman Sachs economists estimated that as many as 300 million full-time jobs around the world could be automated in some way by GPT models. 18% of work globally could be computerized, with the effects felt more deeply in advanced economies than emerging markets.

Today, we’re navigating the uncharted waters of AI and jobs in the Caribbean. Grab your life jackets; it’s going to be an insightful ride!

Here are three Key Findings from the StarApple Research Group (SRG) – workplace insecurity, repetitive roles, and the human touch. SRG looked at 85 Jamaican companies and asked staff about AI and job security.

Workplace Insecurity: 54.6% are uneasy about their job’s future because of AI.

These days, the worst case AI will take over the world if you listen to Elon Musk, or, a more local takeover is you being replaced by some AI system.

Much of this is hype and fear, but I will admit we are expecting job losses across industries globally. This won’t hit the Caribbean immediately; because something that isn’t given as much attention is that AI needs Digital systems in place to work effectively.

 Some of our viewers may be used to ChatGPT; you log in, type in requests, and get outputs; easy peasy.

 In companies, it’s not that simple, you have to worry about data protection, cybersecurity, and making sure you don’t upset your clients or get cancelled. AI integration in an organization is easier when the organization is fully digital, unregulated, and has a very good understanding of all of its processes. Very few meet all these criteria. 

Very few businesses meet all these criteria, meaning most aren’t at the maturity level to utilize 100% of the benefits of AI, meaning Job Security for most jobs is at a medium to high,… for now.

This isn’t to say you shouldn’t prepare for AI disruption, you never know, it may take a few years or one depending on the appetite of the decision-makers in your organization a few quarters.

It’s important to stay educated and upskilled, no matter your role or industry. 

Now, if you have a younger sibling, a child or nieces/nephews you should plan for their Job security because they are the ones who will feel the impact of AI on the job market before they enter the workforce.

Now let’s discuss a sector that is being eyed as a high-value target for AI automation, BPO (or the business process outsourcing sector). 

Countries outside of the Caribbean set up offices or use local businesses to take over a specific business function, usually customer care, but not limited to any business line. These companies, which reside in more technologically developed countries with more resources than us, could shut down local offices in favour of using smaller AI-powered satellite offices in their home country or a country with lower costs than us; all to reduce their operating costs.

They would have to run a cost-benefit analysis to determine if it makes sense, A big part of that is customer satisfaction, it’s not intangible, and it affects the bottom line.

People don’t usually like talking to robots, but today’s robots sound very convincing, though not completely human sounding, yet…. The Caribbean has to prepare to present a huge value proposition to retain BPO cash flow in the region. Human touch or Cheaper using AI.

Now let’s get into the core of what makes a job replaceable by AI, automation, and creativity:  

Repetitive Roles: On average 33.7% of the workforce’s tasks are repetitive in nature—prime targets for automation.

The more repetitive a task is, the easier it is for AI to replace the person who did it. AI is all about creating learning machines; we as humans are biological learning machines. Next time you see a baby, consider that all that baby does is eat, poop, and learn.

 With a third of workloads being repetitive, this poses a few questions for employers, “Ohh, I can reduce staff by a third?”, or “Ohh, I need fewer working hours to get the same output”, or “Ohh, I can replace that effort with AI and get my staff to do more value-generating things?” These could lead to layoffs or better working conditions. Be assured that what they will start with is an audit of ROI by task, department, and staff. The more you generate in unique value, the safer you will be from AI replacement.

Now, our final statistic.

Human Touch: A promising 66% believe their jobs hinge on human cognition, creativity, or emotional connection.

It’s only recently that AI has become good at being “Creative”, with GPT models and diffusion models creating text and images, respectively. These AI models learn from large datasets of human works (the reason for all the lawsuits about copyright infringement and IP theft) and then mix and mangle them to generate something new-ish. The exact process is for another video.

These AI definitely provide a lot of value, but their creativity is capped from the start, they rely on what humans have done and can only go so far without humans and new data. That is why I believe this recent AI boom will spark a reevaluation of the value of Staff. Look at the recent SAG and Writer’s strike, I stand with the actors, writers and special effects professionals. To me this is the oddest situation, large studios that benefit from creativity are starving the creators. There has been mention of using AI in many of their roles, but again these AI feed on and learn from human creators. Its like depriving your car of gas because you want to save as much as possible to travel farther down the road. No Sense. 

Creators need the ability to create, and that means fair wages.

Now back to the stat: A promising 66% believe their jobs hinge on human cognition, creativity, or emotional connection.

We are humans; we aren’t made to do boring, monotonous tasks. We are made to create inventive, history-changing things. With AI, we can delegate the boring to them and focus our efforts on what makes us human, this has compounding effects on operational efficiency and profitability through innovation. 

In the Caribbean, we have a limited workforce compared to other regions and limited usable land, but we have unlimited Creativity due to our melting pots of culture, opinions and heritage. 

AI can drive a revolution of Caribbean creativity for economic growth. Will it steal your Job? Unlikely but it could provide the next generation with more fulfilling career paths.

Now I will leave you with this acronym to prepare yourself…. and your kids to be AI replacement-proof.

I call it SHINE

Skill up: Continuous learning is key.

Humanize: Emphasize the tasks that require human empathy and connection.

Innovate: Think of ways to integrate AI in a beneficial way.

Navigate: Stay updated with AI trends.

Empower: Encourage workplaces to provide AI-related training.

Stay Insightful Friends.