Soft Skills May Be the Secret to Competing Against Robots and Artificial Intelligence

By Melita Wallace | October 2018

According to Fortune, “Robots may steal as many as 800 jobs in the next 13 years.” In our increasingly Digital Age, it is important to remain aware of the rise of technology integration in the workplace and how we will be affected by these drastic changes. With the inevitable rise of robot automation and Artificial Intelligence (AI), many studies show that workers will need to change and refocus their skills in order to adapt to this upcoming transformation of the professional landscape.

AI and Robots now, and in the future, have the ability to do a lot of awesome things, but one thing they don’t have is soft skills. According to Forbes, “A future-proofed way to support advancing in your career,” may be developing soft skills such as leadership and management. No matter how smart we are, our level of education or the number of degrees we’ve acquired, computers will always be undoubtedly smarter than us. To distinguish ourselves from our upcoming “Jetson-esque” counterparts that we’re bound to encounter in the workplace, we must develop soft skills to compete.

“Only when humans and machines solve problems together… can the full potential of AI be achieved”(BCG Henderson Institute 2017.) The transformation of the workplace by way of AI isn’t something to be discouraged by. It is instead, an opportunity to be encouraged to prepare ourselves to adapt to our future professional environment. The best way to prepare is to capitalize on our strengths by perfecting our soft skills. Before a robot threatens to take your job,  make sure you have the soft skills certifications that will never appear on a robots resume.