Generative AI is increasingly able to perform entry-level work in white-collar jobs, which will impact workforces far into the future.
Across the white-collar economy, entry-level jobs are suddenly vulnerable to automation because they involve low-stakes assignments of the sort that generative AI is best at. AI could therefore sever the career ladder of industries like finance and law, forcing many would-be bankers and lawyers to look elsewhere for work.
Having used some of the more recent AI meeting tools as a meeting scribe, I can attest to the fact that they are increasingly able to perform routine tasks with a good degree of accuracy. Compared to the early days when we’d have a good laugh at the software’s attempts to summarise, it’s now a useful tool for taking notes and extracting action items.
Consider the legal field. Law is among the industries most exposed to generative AI’s capabilities because of its orientation toward language. Traditionally, the first few years of a newly accredited lawyer’s career is spent working under the tutelage of more senior lawyers and engaged in routine tasks—missives like “document review,” basic research, drafting client communications, taking notes, and preparing briefs and other legal documents. Advances in AI-powered legal software have the potential to create vast efficiencies in these tasks, enabling their completion in a fraction of the time—and a fraction of the billable hours—that it has historically taken junior lawyers and paralegals to complete them.
If we don’t need to train up junior lawyers, how do we grow the legal workforce? Or do we need to rethink the role of a lawyer?