The book on AI, as stated by Bill Gates, is "one of the most important" and it foresees a "hugely destabilizing" effect on jobs.

Bill Gates recommends reading his "favorite book on AI," which predicts that AI will transform most jobs across industries within the next five years.

The book "The Coming Wave: Technology, Power, and the Twenty-first Century's Greatest Dilemma" was published in 2023 and was written by AI pioneer Mustafa Suleyman, who co-founded the research lab DeepMind. He sold it to Google in 2014 and now serves as CEO of Microsoft AI.

In a blog post last month, Gates recommended the book on AI more than any other, stating that it provides a unique perspective on the opportunities and risks ahead, making it suitable for heads of state, business leaders, and anyone else who seeks advice.

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Suleyman predicted that AI development will revolutionize nearly every industry by 2030, as estimated in a 2023 study by McKinsey, which forecasts that about half of all work activities will be automated.

According to McKinsey, more than 400 million global workers could need to transition to new jobs or roles due to the potential destabilizing effects of AI.

As Suleyman wrote, AI can help employees be more efficient initially, but its effectiveness may diminish over time.

"He wrote that these tools will temporarily enhance human intelligence, making us smarter and more productive, but ultimately they will replace labor and lead to economic growth."

How to prepare for AI's impact on the workforce

The AI revolution will impact almost every industry, including physical manufacturing and cognitive labor, according to Suleyman.

Suleyman predicts that AI will soon surpass human workers in office tasks such as administration, customer service, and content creation, leaving only a few areas where humans can excel.

The creation of millions of new jobs due to economic growth will not necessarily result in all work going to humans, as employers will continue to choose "abundance of ultra-low-cost equivalents" whenever possible, according to Suleyman.

Skilled trades like plumbers and electricians, as well as white collar roles that heavily rely on social skills, critical thinking, and creativity, will be more challenging for AI to replicate.

As AI technology becomes more widespread in every industry, nearly everyone will need to enhance their skills and learn how to integrate it into their current jobs. However, many individuals will also need to shift into new career paths, according to Suleyman.

The trend of implementing AI training plans among U.S. companies is already underway, as a 2023 EY survey revealed that 41% of companies polled were taking such steps.

Nearly 70% of employers consider basic AI skills, including prompt engineering, machine learning, and data literacy, to be a crucial factor in the hiring process, according to a March 2024 survey of over 10,000 professionals conducted by the Slack Workforce Lab.

The monumental challenge AI poses to jobs

Some experts predict that the economic advantages of AI will result in the creation of enough new jobs to offset the ones lost.

The World Economic Forum's Future of Jobs Report 2025 predicted earlier this month that artificial intelligence will create 78 million more positions than it eliminates by 2030, and the future of work will revolve around collaboration between humans and machines.

According to Suleyman, even AI optimists acknowledge that significant shifts in the way people work will lead to a period of intense transformation. Despite the emergence of new jobs facilitated by AI, it may not be enough to save a substantial portion of the global workforce, he predicted in his book.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman stated in a May 2024 conversation with MIT President Sally Kornbluth that AI will "eliminate a lot of current jobs, and there will be classes of jobs that totally go away."

'Breakthrough treatments,' 'innovative solutions' and other benefits

Both Suleyman and Gates believe that AI has the potential to improve people's lives positively.

Last month, Gates wrote that if workers and leaders prepare for massive changes, everyone should be able to benefit from "breakthrough treatments for deadly diseases, innovative solutions for climate change, and high-quality education for everyone."

Suleyman argued that to achieve the best-case scenario, humans must learn to work with new AI technologies as they are implemented in their daily lives and careers.

Discovering advanced AI services, such as ChatGPT or other language models, and enrolling in online courses to acquire AI skills, like prompt engineering, are some of the ways to explore AI.

Suleyman wrote that this challenge is monumental and will determine the quality and nature of life in the century and beyond.

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