Written by Andrew Borland – Chief Innovation Officer – VEC
AI is affecting the job market.
AI and automation will disrupt and displace jobs. It has been estimated that up to 3 million UK jobs will be displaced by AI before 2025. Annual job losses between 60,000 and 275,000 are possible each year. The sectors most at risk are in finance, administration, and retail. The pain will be felt most by those without a degree and will be a particular challenge for young people entering the workforce for the first time. The Liverpool City Region and the Northwest economy in general are vulnerable because a significant portion of our economy comprises businesses and roles that are most at risk from AI.
Our children and young people want to have a positive future, and our government, businesses and civic leaders have a responsibility to make decisions today that will safeguard that future. The consensus is that AI and Innovation more broadly will create more new jobs than they displace. Embracing innovation is our best opportunity to grow the economy.
AI might be our best vehicle to restoring prosperity.
Real wages in the UK have remained unchanged since 2008. Economic productivity has collapsed, and despite government spending, there was a 47% drop in UK companies in the Global list of top 2,000 investing R&D between 2013 and 2023. Getting AI and education right is our best chance of restoring the UK economy.
Our schools and teachers face a daunting task. Breaking from the traditional model of schooling that evolved from the Victorian classrooms, rooted in teaching uniformity and compliance for factory workers and clerks, to the modern obsession with exam results and outcomes. In the age of AI, skills, behaviours, and personal qualities will be the best hedge. The current generation of teachers will be the pioneers of a generational shift in what education means. They will also be fund managers; their choices and investments today will determine our future standard of living and the value of our pensions in 2050.
Change is inevitable.
AI could displace three million jobs, but up to 8 million UK jobs could be transformed by AI and automation. Transformation doesn’t mean elimination; it means change. Today’s wave of AI has been estimated to replace 11% of workplace tasks, primarily routine administrative work. Freeing humans for more fulfilling, meaningful and value-adding tasks. If AI could handle 59% of routine tasks, it would provide us with the potential to supercharge productivity and realise new levels of service by freeing people up to focus on uniquely human contributions.
Young people entering the job market face an exciting challenge: they can be the first generation to grow up truly literate in human-AI collaboration. The challenge is teaching the skills needed for new roles that leverage human strengths. This transformation is entirely within our control. The future of work depends on the proactive choices we make today, particularly in our schools and educational systems.
Change is inevitable.
AI could displace three million jobs, but up to 8 million UK jobs could be transformed by AI and automation. Transformation doesn’t mean elimination; it means change. Today’s wave of AI has been estimated to replace 11% of workplace tasks, primarily routine administrative work. Freeing humans for more fulfilling, meaningful and value-adding tasks. If AI could handle 59% of routine tasks, it would provide us with the potential to supercharge productivity and realise new levels of service by freeing people up to focus on uniquely human contributions.
Young people entering the job market face an exciting challenge: they can be the first generation to grow up truly literate in human-AI collaboration. The challenge is teaching the skills needed for new roles that leverage human strengths. This transformation is entirely within our control. The future of work depends on the proactive choices we make today, particularly in our schools and educational systems.
Focus on what machines are bad at.
Teaching everyone to code is not the answer. AI is already having a significant impact on the software development marketplace, just like everything else. While I will always be a cheerleader for STEM subjects, equally critical importance is a refocus on skills, not qualifications. We need to encourage young people to focus on the things humans are innately better at than machines. Collaboration, Communication, Critical thinking and Creativity. These fundamentally human capabilities are where AI still struggles, making them our competitive advantage. These are the four foundations that we can build on to develop our core skills.
- Analytical thinking remains the top priority for employers, with 70% considering it core to their workforce. This isn’t about competing with AI’s computational power; it’s about asking better questions than AI can answer and understanding how to interpret data with human insights.
- Resilience, flexibility, and agility, having the resilience to persevere in an uncertain world, students will need to adapt continuously throughout their careers. The days of learning one set of skills and having a job for life are over.
- Technological literacy has become as fundamental as traditional literacy. Workers need to understand how to effectively collaborate with AI tools, rather than simply using them passively. AI and technology are ubiquitous; don’t compartmentalise it as “IT.” Encourage students to understand how systems work the way they do and why.
- Curiosity
10 Things Schools Must Teach to Future-Proof Our Workforce:
Critical Thinking and Question Formation: Teach students to ask questions that AI cannot answer. Focus on developing human reasoning skills that complement rather than compete with AI’s analytical capabilities.
Creativity & Problem Solving: Encourage unconventional thinking and innovative approaches to challenges. Be weird, creativity remains uniquely human.
Effective Communication and Storytelling: Develop both written and verbal communication skills, including public speaking, cross-cultural & inter-generational communication, and the ability to present complex ideas and persuasively.
Collaboration and Teamwork: Foster genuine collaborative skills, teaching students how to work effectively with both humans and AI systems.
Emotional Intelligence and Empathy: Develop skills in active listening, empathy, and understanding human emotions. These are areas where AI remains fundamentally limited.
Systems Thinking: Help students understand how problems interconnect and how to see the bigger picture in complex situations. Why do things work the way they work ? If we have new tools, can we deliver better solutions?
Technological Literacy: Teach students not just to use technology, but to understand how to work alongside AI tools effectively and ethically. Don’t relegate it to being a topic for “IT”.
Entrepreneurship: The most important shift is recognising the move away from the traditional model of workers or employees. People sell their time and labour for money to an employer. The job market of the future will be less static and rigid. Values, skills and behaviours of individual entrepreneurship will be increasingly important. Learn how money works, how to finance, market, sell and support products and services.
Continuous Learning Skills: Instil curiosity and teach students how to learn independently, as the specific knowledge they need will continue evolving throughout their careers. Impress that school sets people up for a lifetime of continuous learning, change and growth. Education is a process, and skills are not something that will be left behind when they leave school.
Leadership & Civic Community: We need leaders, people with vision, who inspire, empower others, have integrity and commitment. We should develop confidence and ambition, balanced with humility, and the ability to lead and influence others. We also need to create a strong sense of community and belonging in real life. In an age when AI is a tool for deep fakes, social media misinformation and political polarisation, helping students understand the value of their local communities, the structures and organs of government and engender a sense of civic responsibility, community, tolerance, understanding and democratic participation will be critical to keeping in check some of AI and big-tech’s less positive aspects.
A brighter future:
Schools are evolving to embrace this exciting challenge, moving beyond traditional subject-based learning to dynamic, skills-focused curricula that prepare students for roles that don’t yet exist. This means embracing project-based learning, interdisciplinary approaches, and real-world problem-solving.
The AI revolution isn’t something happening to us; it’s something we have an active say in creating. The most promising future lies not in humans versus AI, but in humans with AI. Today’s teachers are the pioneers of preparing children and young people for this reality. Our students don’t just need to be prepared for the AI revolution; they need to be equipped to lead it. This starts in our classroom. Let’s build a future where technology amplifies the best of human potential, where every person can contribute meaningfully to their community, and where the AI revolution goes down in the history books as the greatest tool for human empowerment, wealth generation, prosperity and happiness.
