We can’t all be AI specialists…there’s other work to be done as well.

If my career had been an investment strategy, it would be what they call “diversified.” I’ve dipped in and out of different industries and gone back and forth between business owner and employee, or usually both at once. Calling this a strategy would be generous. I mostly accepted opportunities that seemed like the right next step. I don’t mean to minimize the work I put into it, but a lot of chance and timing helped me end up where I am. 

I know peers who went all in on one profession. Some were far more successful than I am, and some are feeling like they painted themselves into a corner.

The New York Times recently published an article about the generation of kids who were promised huge paychecks if they studied computer science, and unfortunately, no one predicted AI would swoop in and make most of those jobs obsolete. As someone who chose a specific major because I was certain it was my life's passion and then immediately went in a different direction, my gut tells me that these college grads are going to be just fine. They’ll do some navel gazing and with any luck will find a calling that will bring them far more fulfillment than what they expected.

I think a better conversation to have is the cultural and societal pressure that gave us a plethora of unemployed coders in the first place. How many of these graduates chose computer science because they felt a real passion for it? How many bought into the guarantee of a well-paying job?

I acknowledge that industries and jobs come and go and evolve over time. Gratefully, there are not a lot of barbers offering surgical services anymore. But it’s unfair and demoralizing to hold up one profession as the Holy Grail. Like in a play, we all have a part to play and something to contribute. It’s easy to dismiss the freshman kid that has just one line in the big school musical, but if they miss it, we suddenly appreciate the void created.

Right now there is an increased demand for specialists in AI, but those specialists need civil engineers to build the roads they drive on, accountants to manage their books, builders to construct and repair their homes, and shipping professionals to deliver all those pairs of fancy pants that they put on one leg at a time like the rest of us. 

Yes, there are the fortunate few, who know what they want to be when they grow up, and they follow a fulfilling path to retirement. Most of us just figure it out as we go along. So how do we avoid another crop of great minds from all investing years and thousands of dollars into the same path because they were told it was the best thing to do only to learn later they were sold a bill of goods?