Three Career Questions for the AI Era

Part one of our four-week series “AI and Human Potential”, a practical guide to managing change with clarity, empathy and confidence

AI is no longer somewhere out there. It sits in our inboxes, our meeting notes and our daily workflows. That can feel exciting and unsettling at the same time. When clients ask how to future-proof their careers, I start with three simple questions. They help you stay human, add more value and feel more confident as tools get smarter. Most importantly, they turn AI from a vague worry into a change you can lead well. This post answers three career questions for the AI era so you can manage change with confidence.

Choose the path that elevates your strengths.

1) How might AI change my role, not my worth

The first trap is to ask if a job will disappear. A better question is which tasks will be reshaped and which parts of your value will grow. A large real-world study in customer service found that a generative AI assistant improved productivity on average and helped less experienced agents the most. That is encouraging if you are learning fast or moving into a new specialism [1]. Use that as a prompt to review your own work. In Your Emotional Growth Journey: A Practical Guide we outline a simple way to spot your current stage and choose one stabilising practice each week. It is a helpful starting point before you decide what to automate and what to keep on your desk [2].

To make this practical, try to list your five most common tasks and mark each one as automate, augment or human.

• Automate when quality is easy to check.

• Augment when a first draft helps but your judgement finishes it.

• Human when nuance, ethics or relationship are central.

  
  

2) Which strengths will matter more for me this year

The more routine work machines can do, the more valuable it becomes to ask better questions, listen well and connect dots. Recent reviews suggest that human and AI pairs do not always win on decision-heavy tasks, yet hybrid approaches show promise in content creation and early drafting [3][4]. Treat that as an invitation to sharpen your judgement, not to outsource it. Integrating Emotional Growth into Daily Life: Building Lasting Habits offers tiny, trackable habits that strengthen presence, curiosity and courageous conversations. Those are exactly the strengths AI cannot replicate [5].

Try a four-week upgrade.

• Choose just one meeting each week to frame with a clear question.

• Use an AI tool for a first draft or analysis, then highlight what needed your judgement.

• Capture one lesson about your unique value and share it with a colleague.

There is also a bigger structural shift under way. As the Wall Street Journal has reported recently, AI is nudging companies to flatten their org charts, widen spans of control at the top and build more skill based, cross-functional teams. Middle layers are getting leaner, while individual contributors are being asked to take more ownership across projects. In that world, the people who thrive are the ones who can ask better questions, collaborate across disciplines and pair tools with judgement [6].

3) What does success look like now

Old metrics can trap you in old behaviour. If your worth has been tied to speed or volume, you may overuse tools and underuse your judgement. Set goals that fit the world you are in. For many professionals that means fewer hours spent drafting and more time with clients, stakeholders or deeper thinking. Research from the St Louis Fed suggests users who adopt generative AI save on average about two hours a week. It is not dramatic, and it is real [7]. Decide, in advance, where those two hours will go. If resilience is thin, top up your reserves. Building Emotional Resilience: Thriving Through Life’s Ups and Downs is a helpful companion if you want practices that sustain performance without burning out [8].

You may also be wondering about the market as a whole. Recent analyses from Yale’s Budget Lab and Brookings suggest the labour market has not been seriously disrupted since late 2022, with adoption uneven by sector and firm. That reduces the noise and makes room for capability building [9][10]. It is a window worth using.

A final thought. One of my favourite films, Wall-E, gives us a picture of a world where people become passengers while machines steer. That is not the future we are building. Use the tools to reduce toil and raise the quality of your thinking, relationships and contribution. That balance keeps your career alive and well.

Have a think about this. Which single behaviour will you upgrade this month, and what small daily action will make it stick.

Next week in this series: How Leaders Can Build Trust During AI Change. We will look at simple routines that build clarity, care and credibility during adoption.

Book a Free Discovery Session to map your next 90 days with AI, including a simple "Automate-Augment-Human" plan tailored to your role.

FAQ

How do I decide what to automate, what to augment and what to keep human. Use a simple test. If quality is easy to check and risk is low, automate. If a first draft helps but judgement finishes it, augment. If nuance, ethics or relationship are central, keep it human. This aligns with evidence that AI lifts drafting and summarising, while human judgement remains decisive [1].

I am worried about being replaced. Is there any data that calms this. Recent analyses suggest the labour market has not been seriously disrupted so far. Adoption looks uneven and gradual, which gives you time to build capability and reshape your role [9][10].

What is one action I can take this week. Pick two recurring tasks. Try an AI first draft on one, then mark what needed your judgement. Decide in advance where the time saved will go. Many users report saving about two hours a week on average when they adopt tools intentionally [7].

References

[1] Brynjolfsson E, Li D, Raymond L. Generative AI at Work. The Quarterly Journal of Economics. 2025. Oxford University Press.

[2] CO Coaching. Your Emotional Growth Journey: A Practical Guide. 23 Dec 2024.

[3] MIT Sloan Management Review. Humans and AI: Do they work better together or alone. 28 Oct 2024.

[4] Vaccaro M, Almaatouq A, Malone T. When combinations of humans and AI are useful. Nature Human Behaviour. 2024.

[5] CO Coaching. Integrating Emotional Growth into Daily Life: Building Lasting Habits. 16 Dec 2024.

[6] The Wall Street Journal. AI Is Turning Traditional Corporate Org Charts Upside Down. Sep 16, 2025. Accessed Sep 2025.

[7] Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis. The Impact of Generative AI on Work Productivity. 27 Feb 2025.

[8] CO Coaching. Building Emotional Resilience: Thriving Through Life’s Ups and Downs. 5 Dec 2024.

[9] Yale Budget Lab. Evaluating the Impact of AI on the Labour Market. 2025.

[10] Brookings. New data show no AI jobs apocalypse for now. 2025.