Published on November 15th, 2017 | by Guest

Five Industries That Are Threatened By Automation Software

Some jobs, more than others, will be affected by automation and the growth of artificial intelligence.

Some automation promises higher efficiency for businesses, and it won’t matter how highly-trained some employees are when it comes to choosing who should stay and who should go. If their jobs can be replaced by software, they will be.

It doesn’t matter where you work, there is a chance that some aspect of your job will be automated. Here are some of the jobs that will be replaced due to automation.

Banking Tellers and Branch Workers

The banking industry has been driven by decision making and human judgement, but it will soon be replaced by the work of robots. These machines will not only perform cash transactions, they will be able to process loans, and other tasks more quickly than humans.

It’s likely that banks could have machines do research and analysis, along with customer service tasks.

Traditional banks still utilize human labor as their main source of labor. However, as more branchless banks form, who don’t have the huge overhead expenses associated with running a bank branch, these traditional banks will start to head the warnings their competitors have been sending out.

That message is that there really isn’t a need for branches anymore. Most of the issues can be handled via the company’s website, mobile applications, and phone representatives. There is no need for the overhead expenses branches incur. They work to raise the operating costs and since there are so many individuals operating with branchless banks, the need for branch locations is becoming obsolete.

Customer Service Representatives

There has been a growing controversy regarding this industry and its future in the workplace.

Some customer service reps will likely stick around if they must deal with unpredictable circumstances or deal with issues that go beyond information presentation. When there are some queries that take ingenuity to solve, it is possible that they won’t be handled by machines.

Regardless, there will be fewer needs for these workers in the future. One individual may be needed to man a telephone center that handles queries past what the machines can answer, but the days of “can I speak to your manager” will be over soon. There are more and more ways to develop automated customer service systems without losing the personal touch.

As there are more things that automated systems can do for ecommerce and general sales, there will be less need for customer service representatives. It’s as plain and simple as that.

Clerks and Mid-Tier Finance Professionals

With businesses automating their services, there will be decreased need for checks and cash payments to be processed. Companies will begin to receive payments in other forms, such as PayPal, e-invoicing and credit cards. Therefore, the money can go directly into the bank and there won’t be a need for paper checks anymore.

A lot of people work in these industries, and not all of them will be able to withstand automation. Some will be able to stick around and focus high-level tasks while software handles the administrivia, but it’s hard to imagine a world where clerks and admins are as prominent as they are now.

Assistants and Project Managers

This goes the same way as many of the others—these jobs will likely never be completely replaced, but a lot of people will be automated out of them.

Scheduling assistants, for example, will still exist for companies and executives with extremely busy schedules, but that’s only to manage the scheduling software. There won’t be a such thing as a physical calendar, and assistants can automate calendar reminders to an exec’s phone or computer easily.

Project managers are in a similar pickle. People still need to manage the project management software, but it doesn’t require the sophistication it once did. You learn it, and it makes your life easier. This will either free up project managers to take on multiple projects, which would eliminate the need for so many of them, or they’d be freed up to assist in execution.

IT Professionals

It’s a classic joke that nobody likes dealing with IT, but the truth is that they are valuable pieces of the digital infrastructure at any workplace. Especially with the growth of cybercrime and identity theft, it’s important to have a network that’s protected and backed up.

The problem is that many of these tasks take a long time to be completed manually. Instead of having a large IT staff, a lot of companies are moving over to software for data backup and recovery. This is true for a lot of general IT tasks as well.

It’s only a matter of time before more companies catch on and use automation software instead of people to cut down on resource spending.

We Can’t Stop Automation

Automation actually makes most jobs simpler, even if it diminishes the employment pool. The best thing to do is grow employee skills as businesses automate, and have them focus on higher-level tasks.