Lessons from “STAGE”, a Political Ad Against Romney, And AI on Jobs

It was an unmistakable political advertisement. As the Chairman of the Institute of Electrical & Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Boston Gold, I had just completed a program where we represented the Institute in MIT, in a program organized by the German government. All the leadership decided to have dinner together in Waltham in Cheesecake Factory.

As I sat down, I saw a political ad: a factory man explained how Mitt Romney (competing against Obama for US presidency) had asked them to build a stage, and how Romney later came, and fired all of them while standing on that stage. That was my first time of watching the “Stage”, the ad that destroyed Romney’s any chance of winning the presidency. How do you ask people to build a stage so that you can be visible as you fire them? The message was politically lethal. (The advert below)

That takes me to the news that Goldman Sachs software developers are now using ChatGPT to get their codes going: “Reports reveal that software developers at leading global investment banking, securities, and investment management firm, Goldman Sachs, are internally using generative AI tools to assist in writing and testing codes.”  

Across all domains of business, as AI systems evolve, many will train machines which will prepare stages to displace them. The key is having awareness of what to do to stop being a victim. 

Learn something beyond coding because basic coding will go like Isaac Pitman shorthand in 3 years.

“Developers are already using some of the assisted coding technology to write codes. It is currently in a proof of concept stage and not yet ready for production. It is still very early, you wouldn’t put immediately all your most important workloads there, but the imperative is to really try to understand the potential”.

“In some cases, developers have been able to write as much as 40% of their code automatically using generative AI. They are using the software to both test code and generate new ones. If you actually have a GPT-like technology that tests the code, or you generate the tests for the GPT code, you are creating this dualism where you test the machine and you get the machine to test your work”.

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Comment 1: I read this then put it away. I returned to it and read it again. I reread it thrice and came to the conclusion that sometimes we don’t know if we really wanted something until we actually got it: Once Pandora opened the box what escaped could not be put back in.

As the story of Pandora’s box goes the only thing that remained in the box was hope. While the invention of AI is certainly amazing what will be created by its use will tower above what exists today. With all good things comes evil so maybe we need Pandora to open that box once more to release the trapped hope so that more good will come of AI than bad.

Let’s learn to us it for good and create jobs and opportunities to enrich life for many, instead of the opposite.

My Response: “Let’s learn to us it for good and create jobs and opportunities to enrich life for many, instead of the opposite.” – it will of course. The only challenge is that it will not carry many people along!

Comment 2: Interesting piece! People skills and building managerial competencies will always be needed. So building that will be an added advantage. In the words of Rockefeller “The ability to deal with people is as purchasable a commodity as sugar or coffee. And I will pay more for that ability than for any other under the sun.”

Comment 3: Industrial revolution = Farms to Factories

Technological revolution = Offices to Farms

We are about to go full circle, then we rinse and repeat again.

The process is basically the same, different terminologies for each dispensation.

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