Less than half of American companies take steps to train their employees in the operation generative artificial intelligence– according to a recent report, it has been hailed as the most groundbreaking technology since the advent of the Internet.
LinkedIn’s 2024 “Top Companies” list, released Tuesday, ranked the top 10 companies that are “leading the way in AI adoption and workforce education, offering tools and reskilling opportunities to enhance the generative AI capabilities of their employees.” Companies including Moderna, Verizon and Bank of America made the list for their efforts to develop artificial intelligence skills, and some have expanded those efforts to employees generally.
Perhaps the most striking such initiative is Amazon’s program Ready for Amazon AI. While JPMorgan topped the list for establishing an internal AI effort and a student AI training facility at Carnegie Mellon University, Amazon’s AI Ready solution has a broader scale and has committed to training 2 million people worldwide to better understand generative artificial intelligence by 2025.
Of course, Amazon has its own motives for this training: the tech giant competes with rivals Google, Meta, Microsoft, Apple and others to develop leading generative AI technologies in the environment AI talent shortage.
When it comes to their own employees, Verizon and Moderna are providing employees with on-the-job AI training. Northrop Grumman, an aerospace and defense technology company, provides artificial intelligence training to every employee.
“Providing skills and career opportunities is not just a ‘bonus’ – it is a business need, an effective retention strategy and the key to ensuring that employees have the right skills for their jobs.” LinkedIn stated in a previous report.
Economists AND academic experts in various institutions warn that workers who do not adapt to changing technology may lose their jobs due to automation. Others, however, say these fears are exaggerated AI is in the hype phasewhich means the technology will take much longer to implement than pop culture expects.
Aaron Benanov, a sociologist and economic historian who teaches at Syracuse University, told Indeed in a separate report published Tuesday that he is “very skeptical of boosterism in Silicon Valley – it’s really challenging for robots to do a lot of this work.” In other words, the hype surrounding Massive Tech companies is overblown.
But he argued that “this technology will change work—in some ways for the better, and in some ways for the worse.”
