PETALING JAYA: The advent of generative artificial intelligence (AI) is set to replace or make some jobs obsolete, but it could also mean new job opportunities in other areas.
Speakers in a forum organised by Star Media Group Bhd ’s Leaders Council Power Breakfast yesterday said that there were pertinent concerns among the incoming workforce, who are mostly students now, about potential job losses from the wider adoption of generative AI, which is a much more advanced form of AI.The forum was titled “Shaping the Digital Future of Malaysia”.
Fabian Bigar, chief executive officer of MyDigital Corp, a government agency under the Digital Ministry, said the advent of generative AI is similar to another industrial revolution which is likely to shake up the job market.
The present sentiment towards AI appears to be more pessimistic with regards to potential job losses but Fabian noted there could be upside opportunities from this development. This was also echoed by other panelists at the forum.
“AI has been there a long time, but the development of generative AI feels like there is a revolution, as within a short span of time things have been transformed.
“There is a change in how we interact with the rest of the world or machines and it can generate new things,” Bigar said.
“In the past AI needed to be trained and programmed to do specific tasks. Right now, with generative AI, it can come out with new things by itself. It is self-learning and is able to create new things. That’s why it’s important to fact-check as the system can ‘hallucinate’, but if it is fed with enough accurate information it can actually give a reliable output,” he added.
Bigar cited previous technological developments, such as when automobiles became more widespread, which meant makers of horse-drawn carriages became obsolete. However, it also led to a new types of jobs such as mechanics and engineers.
“Generative AI could mean the displacement of menial or repetitive jobs that can be done by the technology. But then to maintain these systems still requires human intervention and judgement.
IBM Asean’s general manager and group technology leader Catherine Lian said that generative AI had already replaced jobs related to expense claims within the group.
“IBM has got about 450,000 employees globally. Jobs related to processing claims for things like travel expenses have been repurposed. We have taken away 5,000 such jobs worldwide as there is a 100% replacement here by generative AI at IBM.
“The jobs have been lost but the people have been repurposed to other roles such as marketing and human resources. A repetitive task is a 100% replaceable by generative AI,” Lian said.
Meanwhile, Siemens Malaysia’s president and chief executive officer Tindaro Danze said it is quite likely jobs in computer programming or coding would become obsolete within the next ten years.
“In 10 years from now, any person can programme a machine and coding is going to be obsolete,” Danze said.
Generative AI could also change the way education is carried out eventually, said MyDigital’s Bigar.
“The schooling experience may be a little bit different, I don’t think it will be about knowledge any more, but rather about asking the right questions,” he added.
Pos Malaysia Bhd ’s group chief executive Charles Brewer said he sees generative AI as an exciting development that’s anticipated to change many different parts of its business. “Generative AI is a huge opportunity and super exciting. We know of 642 use cases where it would add significant value to our employees, customers and business. On the flipside, we have to think of the jobs that would no longer exist, and we would need to reskill these people and create new business units,” Brewer told StarBiz.
Danze said the situation in the job market and the impact of generative AI is still playing out, and is difficult to predict what new jobs or industries would come about.
“Ten years ago, no one would’ve thought that ride hailing would be such a huge job market. As the application of new technologies increases, the opportunities of new jobs will increase at the same pace,” he said.
Melissa Yap, chief of staff for Deloitte’s SEA Consulting Office, was the moderator of the event. The Leaders Council Power Breakfast is a satellite event to kick off the Leaders Council Summit.
