As AI takes hold in the workplace, business leaders say employees are wondering where they fit in

At the top of the list for many professionals: Where do their skills and expertise fit into an AI-enabled workplace?

According to some business leaders, the advent of AI means workers need to identify the skills that make them valuable in their particular field — and lean into them. 

“Everybody is going to have to start thinking about how they fit in and elevate themselves and their skill sets to be relevant,” Robin Gordon, the former MetLife chief data and analytics officer, said Tuesday at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women conference in Laguna Niguel, Calif.

Gordon was speaking on a panel about how AI is transforming work, alongside Shideh Sedgh Bina, founding partner at management consulting firm Insigniam, Rashmi Badwe, the COO of TIAA Wealth Management, and Aashna Kircher, a group general manager at Workday.

The business leaders agreed that AI won’t be wiping out their human workforces anytime soon, but they said soft skills like leadership and compassion will become even more valuable in employees. “If we do AI right,” said Insigniam’s Bina, the tools will help professionals perform at the top of their game.

For many professionals, AI is still something of an unknown though. Anxiety and uncertainty about the concrete ways in which AI will alter an individual’s hard-earned expertise in their role is natural. 

“They need to tangibly see where they fit in with AI,” said Badwe, of TIAA Wealth Management. One way TIAA did so was through a story series with financial news site The Street, in which human experts fact-checked chatbot responses to specific personal finance questions, like how to take tax-efficient withdrawals from retirement accounts. 

The exercise helped TIAA’s advisors see their value amid the AI hype, Badwe said. They were able to see chatbots as a useful starting point, but their expertise helped fill in omissions and catch hallucinations. It’s also a useful exercise for training new employees, Badwe added.

“Humans that use AI will likely replace humans that don’t,” Badwe predicts. 

Still, a large-scale technological shift isn’t happening overnight. An internal survey at Workday found that young professionals are three times as likely to use AI tools than their Boomer-generation colleagues, Kircher said. It takes a combination of carrot and stick incentives to get the whole staff on board, she added.

“It’s still the same incentives you have to build in for any change,” Kircher said.