What AI cannot replace #1

I am going to start writing a series of posts about the topic “What AI cannot replace”. Artificial Intelligence is certainly disrupting our lives and the work we do, not to mention the anxiety of job loss of many white-collar workers. As the saying goes “Know yourself and know your enemy, and you will never be defeated.”, knowing what AI excels in and what it cannot replace will allow us to leverage the unique benefits as a human being. I am going to share, from my observation and experience as a learning consultant, what skills AI cannot replace. This is going to be a series of posts. Here you go!

The first thing that AI cannot replace is our communication skill. AI excels in providing lots of information and ideas in no time, but it doesn’t communicate for us. Yes, chatbots may answer emails and reply basic inquiries, but anything more complicated than that will require human intervention. Would you rely on your AI agent to discuss with your boss about the challenges you face on a project, or assign a chatbot to make a sales pitch to a major client? Would you talk to your wife/husband and your kids using an AI agent at home?

No, you don’t. You see, human communication still accounts for most of our communication on a daily basis. AI can help us prepare the ingredients of the message, such as brainstorming the arguments or product benefits of the pitch, but it cannot communicate for us, for the most part.

Therefore, the ability to listen, ask questions, and express in a precise and concise manner, in real time, is a valuable skill that AI cannot replace. In my career experience I have communicated with tons of different people, and those who really master the art of communication is a rarity. A person’s education level is not positively correlated to their communication skill. For example, I have dealt with university professors and PhD holders who were extremely difficult to communicate.

Communication training, in my opinion, becomes even more important in the age of AI. Unfortunately, it is not getting the level of attention it deserves. Some people found communication skills “too basic” to learn. I can understand why people have this feeling. When everyone’s minimum education level is a college degree, why need to learn this “basic skill”? Corporate L&D team may have a hard time justifying why they need to allocate budget to train their managers “basic” communication skills, not the “next big thing” and hot topic such as AI.

Do you think communication skill is something that AI cannot replace? Let me know in the comments.

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