Talk to any software developer today, and within minutes, he or she will bring Artificial Intelligence or Machine Learning into the conversation.
The world is quickly adapting to automation, however, there’s still a sector that remains untouched by automation: leadership. Why is it important for leaders to learn about and embrace automation? Let’s take a look.
Spread of Automation
Deep learning is rising at an exponential pace, and its impact can be seen in our daily routine. From facial recognition to home automation, it is gradually becoming an integral part of our life. The main aim of automation is to create an efficient work system.
Automation at Work 
Large scale industries have already used automation in assembly lines for a long time. The move toward automation has drastically reduced the manpower required for bulk production.
In the office, we have AI-based service robots to reduce our manual work. Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is replacing the high-volume repeated tasks to cut down the laborious work like calculation and record maintenance.
Impact on the Workplace
Since automation is replacing the tasks we’re used to doing ourselves, what are the workers going to do now? Even though the need for workers to complete repetitive tasks has been reduced in every sector due to automation, there’s still plenty of work to be done. Now, your team can pivot their focus to tasks that machines cannot complete, those that require creativity, people skills, and collaboration.
The Leader’s Role
Leadership plays a significant role in determining what is most important in a working environment, and it’s their responsibility to decide how to incorporate automation into the day to day work of their company and team. Leadership teams will have the opportunity to re-evaluate how to allocate the extra time that becomes available when repetitive administrative tasks can be automated.
Leadership should focus on creating a culture of development and learning, where staff can be fluid and flexible with the introduction of automation. Team members can be assigned to supervise automated tasks for accuracy or analyze them for efficiency. Additionally, this is a great opportunity for your team to work together to determine how automation fits into their day to day work and how they want to spend their extra time. Leaders can prioritize motivation, empathy, and collaboration during this time.
Leadership needs to embrace the creative side of their team to keep work fulfilling. Creativity is something that’s uniquely a human skill and can never be automated.
Failure to Adapt
Failing to accommodate the incoming advancements in technology can directly impact productivity. The team may lose enthusiasm with continuous monotonous work, and sticking to old methods and processes will never cut down the operational costs. New technology aims at increasing efficiency and reducing spending, so leaders who don’t embrace it are missing out on an opportunity for savings.
Automation will change things in your business and it takes human work to figure out where it fits into your team. Leaders should take these changes as an opportunity to not only improve efficiency but also to find out what else their team can add to their business when automation is taking care of the busywork.
