The Real AI Edge Is Intelligence If you're just automating, you're already behind

There's a growing narrative at present – turbocharged by headlines and venture capital in the US in particular – that AI is about to replace vast swathes of professional jobs. And it's not entirely wrong. In areas like recruitment and law, AI has already taken hold in powerful, visible ways. You don't have to look far – a recent article in Entrepreneur quoted Benchmark Capital warning that AI is already replacing workers in these sectors – but to focus purely on 'jobs under threat' is to miss the point. What we're really seeing is a deep reconfiguration of work, and it's more about realignment than replacement.

After two decades working in innovation – first inside global consultancies, and now as founder of Label Sessions, where I work with more than 500 C-suite level experts from around the world – I've seen how technology has always reshaped jobs. But also how the early predictions for how its going to work are often wrong. AI today is not just developing quickly, it's blurring the boundaries between human and machine. That's a fundamental shift but also a clue as to where the change to jobs will come (and where it won't). For me, the right use of AI is to make the automatic thing the intelligent thing. That's the best way I can describe where we are now.

Automation isn't new. Long before ChatGPT, we were already technically able to automate lots of what people do in their jobs – from tax returns to travel agents, from estate agents to HR administration - but that did not mean that those jobs disappeared. They just changed. The difference now is that AI is able to automate what more senior people do. If everyone has access to the same tools, then your competitive edge doesn't come from what AI can do, it comes from what you do with it.

That's where I see smart businesses and expert advisors now placing their energy – on refining and amplifying what they do enabled by automation. The best organisations we work with at Label Sessions aren't just asking 'how do we remove people?', they're asking, 'how do we create a better service at a better price point?' None of that takes away from the sheer pace of change that the experts in our network are witnessing.

Jonny Wood, formerly an innovation leader at Dell and one of the transformation specialists in our network, sees the same shift. "AI eats the low-level, repetitive stuff first," he says. "It's already changing the first five years of a legal career. It's already filtering CVs before a recruiter sees them. But that doesn't mean you lose the whole job – it means you redesign the role." Wood likens this to the Jevons Paradox – when something becomes more efficient, demand often increases. If AI makes legal services or recruitment cheaper and faster, it could expand access to expertise rather than contract it. Many people worldwide can't afford a doctor, lawyer, business coach, or therapist – or they can't access one when they actually need them. Intelligent use of AI could change that. The winners will be those who reinvest that efficiency into better service, deeper insight, and stronger relationships.

The risk is assuming that just because something can be automated, it should be. Jez Goldstone, director of our Cyber Security Accelerator program and a former leader at Barclays as well as across the public sector, has seen what happens when we confuse automation with improvement. "Large language models can generate content, but they can also hallucinate legal precedents. They replicate bias at scale unless you intervene," he says. "I've seen recruitment systems that confidently exclude the very candidates you're trying to reach."

Goldstone is right to warn that these tools are not neutral. They reflect our inputs, our incentives, and our blind spots like all new tech. That's why some of the most important new roles in business today aren't technical – they're ethical and strategic. AI auditors, responsible innovation leaders, strategic editors – people who can keep machines accountable and make systems intelligible. Because AI actually makes certain human attributes even more important – taste, judgement, storytelling, and negotiation. The fundamental shift we're seeing is that while AI gets everyone to the starting line faster, your edge lies in what you build from there.

Will you be the founder who uses AI to reduce costs and increase profit, or be the one who creates a previously impossible product or service? AI right now is remarkable, but it's also being used by every competitor in your market. The technology isn't replacing your job, it's reconfiguring it, and in doing so, it's asking every professional one powerful question – now you can do almost anything, what will you do that your competitor can't?