Gala Dinner: Who Needs Humans? The Talent Paradox

Thank you, Andrew. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. We are your dinner and a show for the evening. It's been a long day packed full of invigorating discussions and sharp insights. I'm hoping this evening, my distinguished panel, as well as sharing some insights, we can hopefully inject a bit of levity into our final session of the day. Now everyone has had a chance to connect and have a glass of wine as well. On that note, to set the To get the tone, I want to start with a quick fire round. To break the ice, to get, so our audience can get to know you a little bit. That is if you're game. We're game. You're game? But where's the wine? I'm gonna ask. Where's the wine? If someone could please bring Weiwei a glass of wine, that would be much appreciated, and maybe help with some of the answers. I'm going to ask each of you several quickfire questions, one or two words, the first thing that enters your head, as quick as you can. Okay, start the clock. Are you an AI optimist or a P-doomer, Stella? Oh, optimist. Optimist? Optimist. Optimist. Okay, this is going to be an interesting session. We're going to talk a lot about entry-level jobs. What was your first ever part-time job at school or university? Dog walker, and I have allergies to dogs. Thanks. Scooping ice cream at Baskin Robbins. Actually, Vietnam Airlines maintenance worker. Vietnam Airlines maintenance worker. Can you help me pull this one? Yeah, he's the professional one. And just for a bit of reciprocity, I worked in a supermarket. So I'm also willing to give up some stuff. and a fish and chip shop as well, which is the most English thing imaginable. It's understandable. What is one job that people assume AI will replace, but you believe will still remain fundamentally human? PA, some personal assistance. Everyone says that gently. CEO. No. Good one. I'm with her. Consultants. Consult's house. Consult's house. Consult's house. The consultant thinks the consultant is AI-proof. Consult's house. Okay, very good. Complete this sentence. In the age of AI, the most valuable human skill will be? Empathy. Staying human. Empathy. Relationship building. Relationship building. What's one part of your job that you would happily hand over to AI before dessert tonight? Stella? I don't know, everything and nothing. Wait, wait. Only one? Yeah. Oh, my emails. Emails, yeah, I'm with you there, Anna. We're following up with people after so many business cards. Yeah, following up with business cards. What's one skill that you spent years and years mastering that AI can now do annoyingly well? Setting individual KPIs to match with the company objectives. Mm-hmm, okay. Oh, my God. Such a profound answer. I don't know. I'm just going to keep it like maybe analysis. Analysis, yeah. I don't know. See, holiday planning. I used to spend weekends doing this. Last weekend, my father-in-law did it in a couple of hours. You should be happy with that, right? I thought it used to be a skill, you know. I developed speaking the right way. You enjoyed the labour of it. What's a telltale sign that someone is using AI at work, but they're not using it very well? Tone of voice. The way they write my speeches. You can tell. Format. The Claude format. The Claude format. The em dashes are the giveaway, right? At least two of those questions that I've just asked were written by AI. Can you guess one of the AI-written questions? No, wait, what? Can you repeat again? That's funny. I asked about eight or so questions. Two of them were written by AI. Can you guess which two? This one? I'm That was all human, baby. Thank you, baby. starting Which one would you give up? Yeah. Oh, which one would I give up? Okay, you think so too, Weiwei? Yeah, correct. Yeah, Anna? The skill you use to develop yourself. Actually they were all written by AI. We are truly in trouble. to speak I'm just kidding. The last two were written by AI, the last two. Okay so I think that deserves a round of applause ladies and gentlemen. They were all very very game. now. No but Lee we have to ask you, how about you? Which are your skills that AI can replace? Which skill can AI replace? As a moderator. Pretty much what I'm doing right now. Yeah. With a lot more charm, no doubt. Let's start with the big question. AI promises unprecedented efficiency. Of that, there is no doubt at all. The one open question that does remain is who benefits from that efficiency? Is it businesses? Is it employees? Is it shareholders? Can AI's productivity gains translate into better jobs? Or will it inevitably just lead to fewer jobs? I know I'll start with you, then I'll ask all three. I think it's a big question, but to answer this, I think AI will change jobs, will fundamentally change many jobs we have, will create new jobs, you know we have now even BCG's AI forward engineers, but will also exit some jobs. Then to your question, what is the net-net effect? All of this combined, I think the answer is very region-based and sector-based. But what I know is, what I believe is, in Vietnam, in a 10% or 8% to 10% GDP growth, actually we lack talent. And there is not enough people to push the growth of the country. So I would really see more AI as a lever to accelerate the talents and upskilling rather than a risk in this context. Weiwei, what's your take? Better jobs or fewer jobs? Four and a half years as CEO of the bank, I always ask myself how can I make my people more valuable with AI. So, so far I have not used automation to reduce headcount as yet, thank god, but this means as I invest in technology, I also have to invest in people which means Upskilling, redeploying resources, that is important, and also redesigning jobs, perhaps the more repetitive tasks, I can let AI do it, and that frees up my people to take on more complex roles, problem solving, exercise more judgment, I think these are things whereby it's distinctly human. We need AI to help us to be smarter, make faster decisions. But really not quite to replace us, so I'll just stop there. Stella, you're in the IT sector. Last week we learned that Microsoft is offering buyouts to 60,000 employees, nearly a quarter of its staff, Meta, Amazon and IBM. They've also made significant staff cuts over the last couple of years, while all pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into AI. Is this just the beginning? Should we expect further waves of layoffs? What is your take? Is it fewer jobs or is it better jobs? I think it's more jobs and better results, I think, as a BPO provider to industries such as banks. and insurance companies. It's all about the business case as I mentioned earlier today and the deliverables and what we put together. So for us, AI is a part of our toolbox and it's just It's just... making our deliverables to our clients and their pain points even better. So from my perspective, it's a win-win. Let's talk about the future of outsourcing, Arno. For decades, Vietnam and other Southeast Asian economies have competed partly on the availability ...of skills, cost-competitive labor, what happens when AI can perform much of that work? I think it doesn't change, in my opinion, it doesn't change the end state. If you want to be a middle-income or high-income country, ultimately, you need to have higher-skilled jobs, climb up the value chain, and these outsourcing jobs will disappear. I think the end state for Vietnam is the same, but I think it will massively accelerate the trajectory or the time you have to be, what you say, being rich before being old. So I think that's the challenge, I think, for countries like Vietnam or Southeast Asia. How do we speed up the development before, you know, AI or technology catch up and the fundamental factors of labor costs and land become marginally important? I think that's the challenge. And sometimes we say 10% ambition growth in Vietnam is high. Actually, if you flip it, it's probably a requirement, 10% very high GDP growth to make it before technology catch up. Stella, you operate in the region. What is your take? Please repeat. I was listening to Arnaud. Your company does quite a lot of outsourcing for companies based in the West, in Europe, I believe in the US as well. Well, I've been doing this for a long time. I wonder what you think the future of outsourcing is in the region when AI can perform a lot of that work. So for us, it's not so much about that changing because it's just how we deliver things. So our clients outsource their processes to us and we take them in and our job is to deliver it as efficiently, with high quality, the productivity that we can. And so for me, the client is the winner and we just need to set our frameworks, our processes in order to fit that internally as well. Well, so in reality, I think. We're just changing with it, not changing much from it. Weiwei, one of the conversations around agentic AI is the disappearing entry-level job. If AI increasingly handles the work of junior analysts as well as customer service, data processing, administrative tasks... The question remains where the next generation can gain experience. Thank you very much for your experience. And if more entry-level jobs disappear, as many believe that will be the case, how should CHROs reconfigure the talent pipeline? Okay, let's see how to answer. First thing I would say, AI is definitely redefining the way we operate, the way we compete, the way we serve our customers, the way we value add. So I think there is merit there. But at the same time, I think there's also danger that we outsource so much to AI that the junior employees who would be the future leaders of the organization, they may lose the opportunity to acquire the experience, the knowledge that is needed for them to be future leaders. So that is something that really... plays in my mind. I mean, I have a young son. He's doing M&A in Australia and every time I catch up with Ryan, I ask him, Ryan, how much of your work is enabled by AI? Are you using AI? Are you improving your critical thinking? You need AI to do your job well and he's just graduated, yeah? But you've got to make sure you're out there understanding customer, building relationship. These things, AI can help you be better at your job if you nail it right, they can't replace you. So coming back to your question, I think this is something whereby to my earlier point, we've got to invest in technology. We also have to invest in people, they're not competing priorities. I feel, especially for me to run the bank, I need both. So the last four years, we have spent so much time to upskill our people so I still stand by the point in UOB Malaysia I have not used technology to displace my workforce and I'm working very hard to make sure of course I have to deliver cost income ratio I have to deliver profit but I owe it to my people to make sure you've got to upskill and you're willing to upskill we've got to bring the people along in that journey so I just feel as leaders We should use AI to help us perform better as an organization but we should never use it as an excuse to stop being human. I mean that's what I believe in. It's what I believe. It is our responsibility. Yeah. Arno, conversely, could AI make hiring someone inexperienced maybe a better investment? Is there a world in which it's good news for people like Weiwei's son and many other people are entering or just in the early stages of the labor market, it could help people get up to speed quicker. It can support the tasks that mean that they can be out there more building relationships. If so... How would that change how we hire, how we train, how we manage entry-level employees? Yeah, I think, firstly, I do believe some of the jobs will kind of somehow disappear. Just, you know, because, you know, for example, 20 years ago, as a consultant, I used to design by hand, you know, complex chart with 100 points. I don't think, I don't do it today, or young consultant don't do it, and I don't think they need to now to do it. But I think the point is what we actually mentioned is about redesigning the job. I think that's, and we see on some recent numbers, you know, actually companies are investing into AI training. Putting a lot of money into hiring, putting a lot of money in giving chat GPT, free license for Claude, but very few are redesigning the job. What does it mean to be an RM with AI tomorrow? What does it mean to be, you know, a Fortune 500 editor with AI, if you can write your script, you know, in a minute? So I think even as consultants, we are reinventing ourselves, you know. What does it mean to be a consultant with AI? I think that's probably what's coming the next couple of months, couple of years for companies. A bit deeper redesign, you know, and I think to your point is, you know, once we do this, you kind of know who do you need to hire. I think at this point of time, there's a bit of a fluctuation, I think, in this AI edge. Can I jump in here and give some example? For example, I'm challenging my HR team. How do we build the kind of skill set in our more junior employees whereby today AI is really doing that foundational work? Let me give you an example. As a banker, when I started my career, I have to do financial statement analysis, I have to do risk identification, check on financial covenants, and before I see a customer, I have to write a customer brief, do research on businesses. But actually these are all foundational work that you can outsource to AI. But when you go through the grind, these are the kind of experience that will teach you down the line, commercial instinct. Your ability to understand customer therefore build relationship and hopefully over time the experience will help you build good sound judgment. Now if all these are taken away and I think of my son he used AI but he would not have gone through the grind with all this. So so much more I think in the workplace the kind of course we train our graduates have to pivot. Even in university today when I talk to, because we hire graduates, even I'm now also wanting to make sure my team works with university to say, okay, how can we come in? We are practitioners. How can we help you uplift the quality of your... Syllabus, it's got to be private sector and academia coming together. So I think these are the kind of collaboration we've got to see more and more in order to make sure that, you know, to your question, right, the next generation doesn't lose out the best of what all of us in this room actually enjoyed in our early years. I don't know, I haven't cracked that yet. No one has. No one has. And Stella, I want to come to you on this. We were sharing stories about our kids earlier. If a 17-year-old relative came to you and asked what they should study at university next year, what would your advice be? And would you be confident that whatever you did recommend would still be relevant and not redundant four years hence when they've graduated? Well, personally, I think it's more of a mindset and teaching the young generation to understand the market and choosing curriculums or universities that are close to the industries that they are interested in. And I think that's something that you can't really teach from school, but that also gives you a mindset of being flexible. This is a very rapidly changing environment and I think it's going to be like that for the coming five to six years or you know, who knows and so short term, I think the mindset and then it's going to stabilize a little bit more. We're going to understand it a little bit better. So work on yourself is what I would say. But that's a true sweet answer as well. Right. Mindset. I think getting used to volatility and a rapid change of pace is good advice for anyone at any stage in their career or life. Right. Weiwei, let's talk about the skills that AI cannot replace for leaders, for CEOs. As AI destroys the moat that's around technical skills, around knowledge, around experience, that take a career to accumulate, what will become a leader's most fundamentally important quality in the intelligent age? I would say empathy. Actually, I've been reading quite a bit to find out, can AI really have empathy? And then the answer came back is... They can, but it may not be genuine empathy. Okay, so now, personally, I feel leadership today, you've got to have empathy because you're dealing with people. So I think this is one quality whereby AI cannot replace. And so when we make decisions, and to me, investments in AI, all these are business decisions. It's not technology decisions. So when we look at it, when we're dealing with people and we're bringing people on the journey, I feel the ability to connect is so important. So that is one area. And the other one I would say is judgment. I've said that a few times the last 10 minutes. Because to exercise sound judgment, you have to rely on your experience. So AI can never have the kind of experience one has when you're going through the years of... Whatever, wherever you are in your career, right, and definitely also who we are as individuals, our values, our purpose, these things AI cannot replace. So you put them all together, I would say it's a lot of quantitative, so it's experience, it's empathy, your values, your purpose as a leader, because you need these things to lead the organization, so that your people believe in the direction you are steering them. So the more I'm talking to you, I really think the CEO job cannot be replaced by AI. You know what, each of you identified as AI optimists, and this has been a much more upbeat and positive conversation than I was expecting going in. I'm very grateful to all three of you. Thank you very much for the interview. Tell me why we should be optimists in a bumper sticker form, right? Give me the takeaway. Why should we be optimistic about the transformation to the labor force that AI will bring? Give me the bumper sticker, Arnaud, in one line. I mean, AI is a talent. It's a workforce transformation. AI transformation is a people transformation. That's what makes me an optimist for it. Sarah? AI can teach you what you want. Yeah. The humans are still at the center, yeah. Weiwei, the final word. I totally agree there, and AI can help you make faster, better decisions with the right information. Well, I'm tremendously grateful to all three of you for bringing us some entertainment, as well as some really, really sharp insights this evening. Please join me in thanking our three fantastic panelists. Thank you. Thank you.