The future of work is Remote. The future of remote is AI
The traditional question, “Do we need to have physical proximity to work?” has evolved into a deeper inquiry: “What exactly drives the perceived need for being colocated to work? With the rise of generative AI, we stand at the brink of unlocking the full potential of remote and hybrid work models, potentially reducing — or perhaps eliminating — the in-office paradigm.
We have a nationwide network of remote-first companies, and in recent months, our conversations with them have largely centered on how generative AI can help us replace the in-office dependencies and unbridle the full power of remote and hybrid workforces.
Information Sharing: JD.com, China’s answer to Amazon, envisions a future where the company runs on 100% automation. Founder Richard Liu champions AI for resource allocation, slashing time spent on document searches and waiting for remote colleagues’ responses. Their fully automated warehouses get as futuristic as ever with drone deliveries. Charming!
Automation: Alibaba, the global e-commerce behemoth, sees AI as indispensable to its operations. Leveraging natural language processing, Alibaba automates product description generation, a task one can perform from anywhere in the world, thereby making more sales than Amazon and eBay combined.
Skill Development: The landscape of remote work is constantly evolving and talent needs to keep pace. Microsoft, in a strategic pivot, integrates AI into its employee training. The company’s workforce is trained to get hands-on with using AI for all product-related development, including their flagship products such as Cortana, Skype, Bing, and Office 365. Microsoft is en route to becoming one of the world’s biggest AI as a Service (AIaaS) vendors. Even the company’s vision statement mentions Artificial Intelligence.
Community Building: Facebook’s business model has always been centered around community. The company has now integrated AI and DeepText, a text understanding engine, into its backend to automatically interpret the emotional sentiment of the millions of posts that their users publish every second, in multiple languages. The company even goes an extra mile to have a proactive stance against revenge porn using AI to automatically identify and eliminate bullying images (it’s allegedly better at facial recognition than humans). Community building at its best.
Employee Mental Health: Corporate giants worldwide have started prioritising AI-driven initiatives to support remote workers’ well-being. This goes as far as giving personalised recommendations to slow down, exercise, maintain a healthy diet, sleep, take breaks, and practice stress-reducing techniques. The new-age way of dealing with burnout.
One can say, AI and remote go with each other like bread and butter
As AI continues to permeate every aspect of remote operations, employers now have a million less worries. So we say, the future of work is remote and the future of remote is AI. We shall leave you to introspect.
