A survey of 1,500 executives has revealed that business managers believe Generative AI will have a positive impact, allowing the creation of new roles and the possible expansion of middle management.
Far from resulting in the loss of larger numbers of white collar jobs, the survey from business consultancy Capgemini’s Research Institute painted a positive picture of the impact of Generative AI.
Most business leaders see entry-level roles becoming more autonomous, evolving into frontline managerial roles in three years.
Most employees (71%) predicted that the impact of GenAI will be rapid, facilitating a third of entry-level tasks over the next 12 months, making roles more autonomous and progressively shifting them from creation to review.
Half of the leaders and managers thought that this change will accelerate career progress for entry-level workers.
The proportion of managers in teams across functions could expand from 44% to 53% in the next three years, with only 18% of leaders and managers thinking that Gen AI will reduce middle management.
In the longer-term, GenAI has the potential to create new job roles, transform organisational structures, drive human-AI fusion teams, and allow managerial roles to evolve to become more specialist.
The report said that GenAI is transitioning the view of future leadership and managerial roles toward becoming more strategic, focusing on decision making and fostering innovation.
Capgemini Invent CEO Roshan Gya said: “Generative AI tools are becoming more adept at assisting with complex managerial tasks, which could challenge the status quo of organisational structure and ways of working.
“The technology has the potential to shift from a co-pilot to a co-thinker, capable of strategic collaboration, adding new perspectives and challenging assumptions.”
He added: “This shift could unlock significant value when tailored to specific business use cases but is dependent on several factors, including organisations prioritising building the skills and readiness of employees, and taking proactive steps around talent acquisition and development.”
Approximately 1,500 respondents from 500 organisations across 15 different countries and 11 key industries with annual revenue of more than $1 billion took part in the Capgemini Research Institute’s survey, conducted in May this year.
Each organisation taking part was represented by three executives, one each at leadership level, middle-management level, and front-line management level.
The report did point to significant challenges that remain to be solved. Adoption remains low and employees lack the training they need to develop GenAI skills.
While almost two-thirds (64%) of workers already use GenAI tools for their work, only 20% of employees use Gen AI tools daily.
Employees also lack proficiency in key skills, with only 16% believing they are getting the support they need to develop GenAI skills.
Only 13% of employees say they are well-versed in machine conversational skills and only a third say they can manage GenAI risks.
