Episode 106 – Edward Hess discusses The New Smart Machine Age and where humans fit in. Will smart machines and robots start taking our jobs? What can we do to prepare for the inevitable transformation to robotics and automation? Ed is a Professor of Business Administration at the Darden Graduate School of Business at the University of Virginia. You've seen and heard him in places like WSJ Radio, CNBC, NPR, and Investor's Business Daily.

The convergence of artificial intelligence (AI) -- machine learning -- increased global mobile connectivity, the Internet of Things, heightened computing power, virtual and augmented reality, and nanotechnology will produce a data tsunami that will require most organizations to transform how they do business. The magnitude of the coming disruption is mindboggling. One major aspect of this disruption will be the impact on employment and the resulting loss of global consumer purchasing power. According to research from the Martin School at Oxford University and Citi published in January 2016, technology has a high probability of automating 57 percent of the jobs in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries, as compared to 47 percent of the jobs in the United States alone. The corresponding high risk of job automation numbers for China is 77 percent, India is 69 percent, South Africa is 67 percent and Ethiopia is 85 percent.

The Smart Machine Age is upon us and is likely to disrupt many different human processes, tasks, and activities over the next 10 years and far longer as the key technologies continue to develop. In the last decade, Data Management personnel solved business problems with data; in the next decade, highly capable machines using Artificial Intelligence Applications will solve problems with available data in a scale unheard before. Some of the by-products of this Smart Machine Age that we need to prepare for are Smart Workspace, Smart Data Discovery, Virtual Personal Assistants, Interactive User Interfaces, Cognitive Expert Advisors, and Smart Robots, to name just a few. Stephen Hawking has warned that the full growth of the "artificial intellect" could spell the doomsday for humanity. On the other end of the spectrum, many optimists believe that with full preparation, human society can look forward to a highly fruitful era of alliance between the human and the machine.

Ed Hess is a professor of business administration at the Darden School of Business at University of Virginia and co-author of the new book "Humility Is the New Smart: Rethinking Human Excellence in the Smart Machine Age." American manufacturing job losses to China and Mexico were a major theme of the presidential campaign, and President Trump has followed up on his promise to pressure manufacturers to keep jobs here rather than send them abroad. Already, he has jawboned automakers Ford, General Motors, Toyota and Fiat Chrysler and heating and cooling manufacturer Carrier into keeping and creating jobs in the United States. What he hasn't yet addressed -- but should -- is the looming technology tsunami that will hit the U.S. job market over the next five to 15 years and likely destroy tens of millions of jobs due to automation by artificial intelligence, 3-D manufacturing, advanced robotics and driverless vehicles -- among other emerging technologies. The best research to date indicates that 47 percent of all U.S. jobs are likely to be replaced by technology over the next 10 to 15 years, more than 80 million in all, according to the Bank of England.

We are on the brink of a technology tsunami that will likely be as challenging and transformative for us as the Industrial Revolution was for our ancestors. This tsunami will be led by artificial intelligence (AI), increased global connectivity, the Internet of Things, major advances in computing power, and virtual and augmented reality. As a result, the Smart Machine Age (SMA) will fundamentally change the availability and nature of human work and make obsolete the dominate Industrial Revolution model of business organization and leadership. The organization of the future will be staffed by a combination of smart robots, AI systems, and human beings. Humans will be needed to do the tasks that technology won't be able to do well: higher-order critical thinking, creativity, imagination, and innovation and tasks involving high emotional engagement with other human beings (SMA Skills).

In the book, Hess and Ludwig argue that workers of the world stand at the brink of an unprecedented transformation, as a coming Smart Machine Age promises to eliminate tens of millions of jobs across the socioeconomic spectrum. The transition to an era of widespread automation will be tumultuous for both companies and employees, and its effects on the fabric of society have not yet been fully considered by workers, government entities or global corporations. Hess and Ludwig offer actionable insights for coping -- and thriving -- in the new era, describing how to excel at the critical skills that machines can't replicate. "We are on the leading edge of a Smart Machine Age led by artificial intelligence that will be as transformative as the Industrial Revolution was for our ancestors," said Hess (pictured below), author of the best-selling Learn or Die. "When it comes to smart machines, we cannot stay relevant using the traditional mindsets, culture and leadership model. To excel, we have to play a different game."

Technology in the so-called Smart Machine Age, which includes AI, virtual reality and robotics, will bring huge changes not just in headcount, but also in how people innovate and collaborate. That will require new approaches to how people think, listen and relate, says Edward D. Hess, a professor of business administration at the University of Virginia. In the "Smart Age" now evolving, ego has no place. Instead, the focus will need to be on the quality of ideas, accuracy, emotional intelligence and mindfulness. Hess writes about these issues in the just-released book he co-authored with Katherine Ludwig, titled Humility is the New Smart: Rethinking Human Excellence in the Smart Machine Age. Hess discussed his ideas on the Knowledge@Wharton show on Wharton Business Radio, SiriusXM channel 111.

A revolution that has been quietly brewing in the sphere of machine learning and predictive analytics is taking flight. For customers, the analytics revolution is putting powerful new analytical tools in the hands of financial planners and business managers in every area of the business, enabling more comprehensive, effective, and reliable planning. While the value of machine learning has been known for some time, the advances needed to make the practice accessible to a mainstream audience have been made only recently. As KDnuggets reports,[1] the convergence of three key trends is breaking down the barriers that have impeded the growth and employment of machine learning:[2] The abundance of data enables more features and better machine learning models to be created. Data scientists no longer are needed to manage the machine learning infrastructure or implement custom code.

The blurring of the physical and digital worlds is creating new business opportunities for companies perceptive enough to embrace options including artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and smart technologies. "Digital business is about more than technologies. It is about creating new business models and new ways to engage with customers, partners and suppliers in your business ecosystem," explained Betsy Burton, co-author of the report. Gartner defines a hype cycle as "a graphical depiction of a common pattern that arises with each new technology or other innovation." Burton estimates nearly 100 hype cycles will be produced over the course of this year, but noted that four major trends are dominating the technology landscape. Nexus Technologies, notably cloud, data, mobile and social, are all passing through or have already exited the Trough of Disillusionment.

Every summer, technologists turn to Gartner's Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies, which has become a barometer of sorts for gauging the state of various hardware and software innovations that are expected to impact business and society over the next decade. This year, Gartner analysts have their eye on all manner of artificial intelligence technologies, including "smart machines" that can learn by themselves. After relieving "big data" from its hype-cycle duties last year–ostensibly due to the all-encompassing pervasiveness of data in this pervasively digital age–Gartner analysts this year are talking up a swath of related "smart machine" technologies. Together, Gartner refers to these technologies as key enablers of "the perceptual smart machine age" that is currently unfolding. "Smart machine technologies," the analyst group says in a press release, "will be the most disruptive class of technologies over the next 10 years due to radical computational power, near-endless amounts of data, and unprecedented advances in deep neural networks that will allow organizations with smart machine technologies to harness data in order to adapt to new situations and solve problems that no one has encountered previously."