How to survive the AI killing fields

How to safeguard your professional future

All the rules have changed. And none of us were prepared for this.

AI is changing our professional landscape faster than we can keep up. It is changing the very nature of the work we do and the configuration of who (or what) does it, when and how.

How do you ensure you’re not a casualty? How do you pivot when that landscape is shifting under your feet?

In building any career, competitive advantage has typically come from knowing more, through more education and more experience. Not any more.

Because AI is leveling the knowledge playing field. More like bulldozing it, in fact, but you get the idea.

It’s not hard to see that the more deeply AI takes over our professional world, the less that world needs our own piece of the knowledge pie. After all, how much can one brain really compete against a universe of knowledge?

So as you navigate this new world, what's the differentiator going to be that sets you apart from all the other casualties?

When knowledge isn't it any more, what will give you that essential competitive advantage?

Answer: It's the other stuff you must bring to the table, outside of knowledge. The self- and other-management skills you bring (or don't bring) that become more consequential than ever.

Consider how much better you'd perform and the goals you'd achieve if you:

• Controlled your emotions better so you act instead of react

• Understood why you do the things you do so you know how to change the triggers

• Adopted a growth mindset rather than giving up so easily

• 'Got' the people around you and had more influence on them

• Managed stress and ambiguity so they didn't mow you down

Can't compete on the AI plane? Up your game on the human one.

That's what will determine your trajectory. And spoiler alert: it’s what will determine how well you survive the stress, worry and uncertainty that are coming along for the ride.

Subscribe to this Substack and find out how. One teeny tiny step at a time.