The year 2024 has been one of overwhelming change for workers, as they struggle to get to grips with the rapidly changing workplace under the specter of AI.
To put this change into perspective, consider that more than 10% of workers hired today have job titles that didn’t exist in 2000, according to LinkedIn research.
That change is only likely to accelerate, with roles like “chief AI officer” becoming the hottest new title in the C-suite this year. It’s also filtering down to employees at all levels of an organization.
“Not changing your job, but your job changing on you, is going to be a big theme for 2025,” Daniel Shapero, LinkedIn’s chief operating officer, summarized to Fortune.
The rapid change in the workplace also means employers aren’t quite sure of the talent they need to drive AI uptake in their organizations, and they’re coming up with creative ways to interrogate candidates’ suitability.
LinkedIn’s Shapero says employers are keen to pick prospective new hires’ brains, with one question in particular proving illuminating with regard to workers’ aptitude for AI.
“One of the questions that was increasingly asked this year by employers in interviews was: ‘Tell me a story about how you used AI at the workplace or at home,’ and what that demonstrates is, if you’re comfortable using AI, then you’re more likely to be someone that helps their organization become more AI-centric,” says Shapero.
There isn’t one obvious answer, with Shapero saying his favorite examples from asking the question himself have spanned the personal and professional.
“You hear about people planning family trips, you hear about people summarizing meeting notes. You hear people generating creative ideas for customers. And so there’s a very wide range of things AI can be used for.
“But it’s becoming increasingly clear when you talk to someone, you ask them for examples, how comfortable is this person really? And I think what we’re finding is employers are looking for people that show comfort with AI because they know that they’re going to have to bring AI into their day-to-day.
“So I do think this is becoming a trend, not just at upper levels of leadership, but across the entire organization.”
Workers overwhelmed by AI change
The interview question shows that bosses may be just as unsure as employees about what their roles will look like after the latest technological revolution.
“What they [employers] acknowledge is that the more comfortable and fluent with AI an employee is, the more likely they are to navigate that change, the more agile that they are in terms of their mindset, the more likely they’re going to be successful.”
However, the burden of that uncertainty is skewed negatively toward employees.
According to a LinkedIn survey, nearly two-thirds (64%) of employees are overwhelmed by the pace of change in their workforce amid the proliferation of AI.
“I think we’re going to be living in this place where change is happening at a pace and with a level of magnitude that people are not familiar with,” said Shapero.
What the open-ended job interview question shows, however, is that finding ways you can use AI effectively at home and at work is a cheat code to impressing future hiring managers.