AI Disruption: The Workplace Reboot

Arham: Since all three of you are using AI in your companies, I’m wondering what kind of transformation you’re seeing within your organization, especially as it becomes such a central part of your processes. What are the opportunities you’re seeing for the coming years?

Yann: On the software side, we’re basically equipping all our engineers to use AI, and also to put AI at the heart of every project we have. It’s not only a code assistant; we use IDX integrated with CodeG code assist from Gemini on the backend. We also use GitLab Enterprise to check the pipeline, security, and quality of the code, and to summarize what’s been done for all our developers.

So there’s definitely a leap in productivity that you extract from these engineers, and you also make them better engineers. What we’re noticing is the best are getting even better. The barrier to entry for junior roles is a little harder, but you really get tons of productivity extracted from your top performers, which is truly great to see.

Bharat: I’d say one of the big changes in 2024 is that people are now embracing AI more in their everyday lives. Forget workplace stuff for a moment; they’re using ChatGPT, Gemini, or other AI tools like Alexa on a daily basis. Now, if I go to a cafe, I probably see someone with their laptop open, an AI bot like ChatGPT or Gemini right next to them, doing research or writing an email.

So, in general, people are getting used to using AI. It’s almost like when mobile phones or iPhones came out – people got used to using smartphones and then started expecting them in the workplace. They didn’t want Blackberries anymore; they needed iPhones. I see a similar transition happening now, but even faster. Since people are already accustomed to AI, starting with an AI assistant at work or including it is becoming common. We used to have trouble with change, but now we don’t. When we include AI in workflows, it’s embraced. Now, it’s up to us how quickly or elegantly we transition from not using AI at all to having AI as part of everyone’s work environment.

Ambika: There are a lot of fascinating areas we can delve into. I’d like to look at it from an industry-specific lens.

Working with healthcare companies, I’ve seen AI play a significant role in automation, augmentation, skill shifts, and the creation of new roles. AI has automated the analysis of medical images like X-rays and large volumes of files. With speech-to-text and text-to-speech technology, radiologists can now read reports and transcribe them using AI, making them much more productive and able to read more files.

For augmentation, patient reports are immediately available to doctors. Doctors can now connect to different AI tools and provide real-time insights during patient consultations, rather than waiting for reports to come back, reading them, summarizing, and then going back to the patient. Doctors and hospitals are at the forefront of embracing AI for early research studies, clinical trials, and more. It’s super fascinating to see how the medical landscape is evolving.

Now, let’s look at a different industry, like retail. The role of AI-powered robots to automate warehouse operations excites me. Companies with large manufacturing divisions or shipment carriers are seeing AI play a significant role in automating supply chain processes, streamlining picking, packaging, shipment, and delivery, thereby reducing customer delivery times. AI-driven personalization systems provide customers tailored product recommendations for shopping experiences. When you buy a product online and see similar recommendations, that’s all AI working in the background.

Retail employers are shifting from traditional sales associate jobs to seeking a workforce ready to embrace AI across tablets or mobile devices. This allows them to provide a seamless experience to customers, from Browse online to walking into a store. So, there’s a lot of shift across each of these divisions.

At Google, we use AI in a variety of ways, from using AI Gemini in the pre-sale, sales, and post-sales process. We’re just getting started. I think this is a fascinating space with a lot of growth and evolution.

Bharat: You know, I’d add to that. I have this constant conversation with my teams about embracing AI. I was recently in the Google offices and saw a notice in the restroom about what’s new with Gemini. That was an inspiration for me; I took a picture of it. So I had to put those same kinds of notices about all the new AI developments in the restrooms at my company.

It’s really hard to keep up. So I tell our engineers and content creators that an engineer who is AI-savvy is going to be much more marketable than an engineer who is behind on AI know-how. And that’s real. It used to be that you needed to know different software technologies to be, say, an architect or to keep up with DevOps. Now, one of the core skills is keeping up with how to work alongside AI to enhance your engineering.