Every day, professionals across industries are confronted with headlines about artificial intelligence’s growing impact. Many people are understandably concerned that their work will be taken over or rendered obsolete by the ever-growing and ever-evolving plethora of AI tools and systems.
While it’s essential for organizations and their team members to come to grips with how AI will impact them, it’s also essential to remember that there are certain invaluable abilities and traits AI can’t replicate, as well as a host of new opportunities the technology is opening up. Below, members of Forbes Technology Council discuss high-demand, wholly human skills that are in more demand than ever in the age of AI, as well as essential traits and expertise that industries need as the use of AI spreads.
1. Motivation And Drive
The most sought-after soft skills will be motivation and drive. AI can already outperform humans at writing, coding, driving and generating ideas. However, AI remains a tool, performing tasks as instructed. In contrast, a motivated and driven individual grasps the scope of tasks and proactively exceeds expectations without additional guidance. This quality will be crucial. – Dmitry Sokolowski, VOLT AI
2. Critical Thinking
Effective use of AI requires someone with the experience and critical thinking skills to understand the model’s insights in the context of a wider industry. For example, when using generative AI to draft documents, such as regulatory submissions for the pharmaceutical industry, one must be able to contextualize the information to ensure the output’s consistency, accuracy and compliance. – Patrick Smith, Certara
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3. Reasoning And Scientific Thinking
Some of the most interesting insights are not in the data—in the sense that Kepler’s laws of planetary motion are not encoded in the measurements of planets’ positions. AI trained on astronomical observations will not deduce them. My guess is that the following will be more, not less, important: reasoning from first principles, assessing causality, and scientific and experimental thinking. – Eric Novik, Generable Inc.
4. Curiosity
Building a culture of curiosity is critical as we enter the age of AI. Any job that consists of rote, repetitive work is likely to be automated out of existence. Even the act of writing code is getting easier and more automatable. But figuring out what code needs to be written, what questions need to be asked, connecting the dots — this is creative, curious work that is unlikely to ever go away. – Charity Majors, Honeycomb.io
5. Data Literacy
Data literacy will be in high demand. As AI continues to be integrated into various sectors, the ability to interpret, manage and analyze data becomes crucial. This skill enables professionals to make informed decisions based on AI-generated insights and ensures that AI applications are used effectively and ethically across industries. – Sivanagaraju Gadiparthi, ADP
6. Communication
It may feel counterintuitive, but excellent communication skills, both verbal and written, will still be in high demand. Tools such as ChatGPT can generate any text you want, but the problem is that they’re trained on millions of pieces of writing. You end up with text with the quality of “one of a million.” However, to win, you need to be “one in a million”—that’s where great communication skills are needed. – Eugene Klishevich, Moodmate Inc.
7. ‘Outside The Box’ Thinking
While AI excels at data processing and pattern recognition, human creativity—the ability to imagine novel ideas and think outside the box—cannot yet be replicated by machines. Businesses will prize individuals who can bring fresh perspectives and produce original work that complements AI’s capabilities. True creativity remains a uniquely human trait, making it an invaluable asset. – Juta Gurinaviciute, NordLayer
8. Collaboration
In our “age of AI,” an important soft skill will be communication. Teams that are able to effectively communicate and problem-solve in a collaborative way, with equal input from all relevant personnel, will be more critical than ever. While AI can make a job faster, team cohesion is an increasingly critical factor in a faster-paced economy. – Jozef Gherman, StealthGPT
9. Proficiency In Programming Languages
One top hard skill that will be in high demand is proficiency in various programming languages—particularly in languages such as Python, Java and Julia. On the soft skill side, critical thinking and data literacy will remain in high demand. – Sumit Bhatnagar, JP Morgan Chase
10. Deep Domain Understanding
A critical need is experience in and deep vertical understanding of a domain—the ability to see the full picture and evaluate data in context. AI technology excels at the tactical productivity level: for example, at summarizing a balance sheet. But it will be key to be able to strategically leverage this information—to be able to advise teams on what to do. Soft skills such as public speaking, presenting and negotiating will also be essential. – Michael Grupp, BRYTER
11. AI Oversight And Data-Driven Decision-Making
Security and ethical, data-driven decision-making are top priorities. The data must be correct for AI algorithms to work accurately, but what if the data is not correct or is incomplete? Decisions will be made by AI based on false or incomplete information, which could impact people’s lives. Responsible AI use with human intervention will be key, as well as securing and monitoring our networks. – Amina Elgouacem, NEOSTEK
12. Persuasiveness
The ability to influence without authority will be an important skill. All professionals will have endless access to data and AI-prepared arguments at their fingertips. Those who can persuade their peers to follow their reasoning will have an edge and progress more quickly in their careers. – Itai Sadan, Duda Inc.
13. Emotional Intelligence
As we move further into the age of AI, emotional intelligence is becoming increasingly important. AI is really good at such things as analyzing data, recognizing patterns and doing tasks automatically. But it’s not so great at understanding and reacting to human emotions. So, as AI becomes more common, being emotionally intelligent will be a valuable skill to have. – Nikhil Jathar, AvanSaber Technologies
14. Prompt Writing
It’s interesting how prompt writing is both underrated and overhyped. You could leverage ChatGPT-3.5 and, with skilled prompting, make it outperform ChatGPT-4. You can achieve top results with strategies including reflection, step-description, multi-AI roleplay and injection. This will not only garner you more accurate outputs from AI tools, but also help you get more out of them. – M. Nash, Integry
15. Problem-Solving
In the age of AI, problem-solving is critical. With AI becoming more prevalent, the ability to analyze complex situations, identify problems and develop innovative solutions is crucial. Tech differentiation is no longer as important. To stand out, businesses will need to know how to apply AI to uncover and capitalize on opportunities, meet market needs and overcome challenges. – Haresh Bhungalia, Casepoint
16. Willingness To Learn
In the age of AI, be flexible and ready to learn. Now is the time to study prompt engineering, data literacy and machine learning. AI offers the ability to compute data as never before, but AI is only as good as the person using it. And while AI handles the heavy lifting when it comes to data, our most human traits—creativity, empathy and the ability to discern ethics—are more important than ever. – Vikas Khorana, Ntooitive Digital
17. Empathy
I believe that empathy will be a top, high-demand soft skill. As AI advances, it can automate tasks, but it cannot replicate the genuine human connection. Empathy enables leaders to understand and relate to others, fostering a supportive environment that AI simply cannot create. And in the world of leadership, nothing is more important. Human skills such as empathy are nonnegotiable. – Prashant Ketkar, Parallels (part of Alludo)
18. Cognitive Science
An understanding of cognitive science will be important as AI developers try to emulate the reasoning and common sense elements of the human mind, the underlying rules of inference, and how people identify logical fallacies. There are still gaps in AI that make it data-dependent and rigid. There will be a need to go deeper into related principles of psychology, neuroscience, philosophy, linguistics, anthropology and education. – AJ Abdallat, Beyond Limits
19. Interpersonal Skills
As AI advances, interpersonal skills will become more important than ever. AI is changing the way people work and replacing the role of humans in many capacities. The ability to navigate challenging situations with grace, show empathy, demonstrate leadership, communicate effectively and relate to diverse groups of people will help you thrive as AI’s changes manifest in the workplace. – Avital Pardo, Pagaya
20. Project Management
The art of project management, including estimations, remains eternal. Determining how long a project will take, assessing the reliability of that assumption, understanding how an individual player could affect the overall team performance—these kinds of problems often lack context. Humans are notoriously bad at probabilities, but so are algorithms when they don’t have enough data. Even if AI does it better, inputting all the data will often take more time than we have to make a call. – Narinder Singh, LookDeep Health
