How to win in the Age of AI

(No bullshit edition.)

A new category of intelligence will soon change everything.

AGI is a 400 foot tsunami barreling down on every knowledge worker.

It’ll hit us in 12 to 24 months. 36 if we’re lucky.

You can either paddle out and try to get on top of the wave.

Or wait around and be under it.

WAYS TO BE ON TOP OF THE WAVE
(Ways to still make money.)

- Be categorically different.
- Be entrepreneurial, creative and strategic (beware - the bar for what constitutes real creative thinking will go way up).
- Be articulate - know how to talk about ideas.
- Have taste. Be good at curation.
- Be good at human relationships.
- Be good at presenting to a group.
- Have a personal brand.

AI can’t take these things from you - not any time soon.

WAYS TO GET STUCK UNDER THE WAVE
(Ways to no longer make money.)

- Make stuff based on creative ideas
- Operate a computer the way we do it today (maybe 50% of all knowledge work right now)
- Act as an information sherpa, e.g. managing calendars, sending project updates, putting together spreadsheets.

So - be good at the top list, then be good at talking to AI for the bottom list.

For example, take creatives.

In our AI future, here's a creative's job:

- Go to clients who need creativity. Facilitate a great conversation to understand their needs.
- Go back and think.
- Bring AI in to make stuff.
- Curate what gets made, adjust with feedback. Most of this is spoken, not clicking around on a computer.
- Repeat until you (creative) are happy.
- Bring work back to clients. Get their feedback - facilitate great conversation about the work.
- Go back to AI, ask it to make stuff.
- Repeat until clients are happy.

That’s for creatives, but it's the same model for all knowledge work.

Human conversations, Thinking, Talking to AI, Curation…. Repeat.

Jobs like this will be in very high demand - as millions get laid off from the jobs AI is taking.

The competition will be fierce.

So yeah, pretty scary.

But if I'm right, it also means in the future, the jobs we have will pay us to do the human stuff - not operate apps.

For those that have a job, it's a better life.

TLDR; work on your top list skills.

It's best to get started now.

And bring a little swagger to it. Because you got this.

That’s it for now. I gotta shop for Halloween costumes for Ray and Eve now.

See you next time.