Algorithms, artificial intelligence and code oh my!

Article originally published on LinkedIN

Nearly all of you have taken an UBER in the last week or two…

Corporations have begun to change in ways that would be unthinkable a few years ago, technology has transformed businesses in ways that are both uncomfortable and remarkable. The idea of Skynet takes on a whole new meaning; I think James Cameron had it half right with the Terminator movie franchise. We won’t be at war with Robots and AI, the reality is that robots, AI and code are entities with which we as humans will need to coexist with across a variety of situations and sectors…the truth is we already do it that we haven’t thought of it in this particular way…

Let’s look at a couple of recent pieces of news; Apple’s manufacturing partner Foxconn replaced laborers with 60,000 robots, the Philippines is using code to replace call center jobs while investing to re-train their workforce to provide higher end services and believe it or not the European Union is in talks to create a robo-bill of rights and companies are required to pay social security taxes on the electronic people they employ in the future.

Everyday professionals like you and me are following schedules and instructions given by software whether sent from a desktop, mobile phone or tablet device. And Uber’s automated management system is evaluating performance and compensation for over 200,000 workers. Could software serve as a CEO? Why not, a great CEO needs to be credible, competent and objective. These traits could be programmable.

According to a Gartner analyst, in 2018 3 million people will be supervised by robo-bosses, these smart machines will assess performance in dispassionate ways that could effectively manage the workplace.

So, could we be seeing a reality where a line of business or organization is headed up by a piece of code or managed by robot?