With the release of the FE Collective report, Gavin O’Meara CEO of FE News explores how having a re-think on the impact of AI on jobs and skills is not just being re-thought by the FE Sector, but the importance of skills is being reflected on by Prime Ministers to Global tech leaders. Crafting ‘AI for Good,’ re-developing investment in the FE Sector of the future, and restructuring progression routes is important to everyone and the timing is now.The timing of the FE Collective gives us a unique opportunity. The FE Collective, looking at the impact of AI on skills and the jobs of the future, Investing in the sector of the future and exploring Progression was literally 2.5 weeks before the Global AI Safety Summit at Bletchley, where 28 nations including the US and China, signed the ‘Bletchley Declaration’ to collaborate to research safety concerns around the world’s most capable AI models. The Bletchley Declaration explores threats and opportunities, in the same spirit as the FE Collective, through collaboration and cooperation.At the AI Safety Summit, opportunities and challenges were explored and solutions moved to actions. So a very similar model to what was used at the FE Collective! As Rishi Sunak explained, the wisdom of the crowd is necessary to address such large global challenges.The AI Safety Summit had two views on the impact of AI, one which would remove millions of jobs. Before the summit, Goldman Sachs predicted that AI will remove 300 million jobs globally and Elon Musk, in the summing up interview with Rishi Sunak, Elon said that ‘AI was the most disruptive force in history… and that there will come a point when no job is needed. You can have a job if you want a job, but AI will be able to do everything”.So the timing on this is key, particularly when thinking on the potential impact of AI, of the jobs of the future, then investing in the sector of the future and exploring progression.Rishi Sunak had a view that AI will be like a co-pilot, or ‘co-bots’ as Charles McIntyre called them back in July 2018, the jobs of the future will be in collaboration with AI and bots.How can AI be a tool for good?I think we need to differentiate between the different AI tools: AI for automation and bots and generative AI. A lot of people are afraid of the possible impact of generative AI, machine learning and deep learning. During the AI Safety Summit, Rishi Sunak addressed concerns about AI displacing jobs. His response includes building a world-class education system, looking at Maths and English to 18, developing a global leading lifelong learning system and developing AI Chatbots to support learners (which sounds very similar to what Aftab Hussain discussed on FE News back in December 2018).So all of these tools and services are not new… but the processing power and tools to deliver on this are expanding and growing at a rapid rate. The timing and collective intelligence (or wisdom of the crowd) of the FE Collective to develop a skills solution to compliment the AI Safety Summit is literally perfect on timing.Joining the dots…So joining up the dots, FE and Skills is key for the continual professional development of the nation, and the World to embrace new technologies and disruptors to work. As the technology is rapidly expanding, the training needs to be modular led and ‘stackable’ to keep apace, or ideally ahead of the developments in technology.CPD or Lifelong learning (eg Further Education and Skills) will be key to help retain jobs, but also to raise productivity and use the disruptive tools to help accelerate productivity in the world of work.Linking AI to transferable skills, for the jobs of the now and the future, is key. Establishing connections between career advice and guidance is crucial not only for young individuals but also for those in mid-career, returners to the workforce, and career changers. Utilizing AI to consider previous learning and skills, the aim is to suggest tailored training and development oppor...

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