The artificial intelligence revolution is here and there’s never been a more crucial moment for everyone, not just techies, to harness this new power and transform what you can do. And while at the onset of the artificial intelligence revolution, most professionals were concerned that AI tools would replace them, the reality is now quite clear: to stay relevant, everyone in every field should research the most prominent and helpful AI tools and learn them, adding them to their tool belt.
In addition to the clear job security of staying up-to-date with the latest market trends, artificial intelligence tools have the power to automate repetitive tasks, increase efficiency, and analyze incredibly large amounts of data, helping businesses make better and data-driven decisions.
What does this mean for today’s professionals? Well, it’s simple: artificial intelligence is the future and brushing up on your AI skills can help set you apart from the competition and make you better at your job. In this article, we’ll explore the importance of artificial intelligence in today’s professional world (even outside of tech!) and cover the top AI skills needed for landing a job in 2024.
The Power of Artificial Intelligence
When you think of artificial intelligence skills, you may just think of robots or flying cars and while these are certainly applications of artificial intelligence that have dominated popular culture, artificial intelligence has infiltrated our lives in much more subtle and influential ways in recent years, making its power that much more pronounced.
Previously, many believed that artificial intelligence skills were needed in just tech roles, but the past year has shown us that artificial intelligence will soon become the norm in every single sector and the more tools that professionals have in their arsenal, the better prepared they’ll be to advance in their field.
The reasons to learn artificial intelligence skills are practically limitless, but here are just a few reasons we think prioritizing AI tools should be at the forefront of your mind this year:
Staying up-to-date with technology: the impact that technology has on our society is clear and the more you know, the better suited you’ll be to keep up with new tools your company wants to introduce or even suggest tools that can help improve your individual performance or that of the company. Both understanding how AI works and how you can apply it to your day-to-day will help your career advance.
Becoming a better candidate for new roles: even if your field seemingly has nothing to do with AI, there are certainly AI tools that can help advance your career and help you stand out from the competition. As artificial intelligence becomes increasingly widespread, employers will be looking for candidates with a proven competence in the area.
Championing efficiency and best practices: the uses of AI are widespread and depend on your specific role, but across all industries, AI is increasing efficiency and improving productivity, meaning you will become better at your job and yield better results with the help of AI tools.
Exploring new fields: with the help of short AI courses that target new skills for your specific sector, you’ll be able to learn more about the tech world and find a new interest that maybe you previously wouldn’t have stumbled across.
With a clear understanding of what learning AI skills can do for you professionally, let’s dive a bit deeper into some applications that will help advance your career, no matter what industry you’re in.
Top AI Skills to Learn in 2024
Although you might be eager to dive headfirst into everything artificial intelligence has to offer, take the time to read through our list of the top artificial intelligence skills to learn in 2024 and choose the ones that best match with your career goals and field. Remember: you can always add on another one later on!
Programming languages
Although you might think programming languages are just for web developers who spend their days writing lines and lines of code, the reality is that the majority of AI tools are backed by common programming languages like Python and R. If you’re concerned about the difficulty, remember you’re not trying to become the world’s next computer programmer–on the contrary, you’re just trying to understand the basis on which many AI tools are built, which can help you customize them to meet your exact needs.
Data analytics
All good decisions are backed by data and thanks to artificial intelligence tools, the quantity of data that can be processed has absolutely skyrocketed, meaning companies are able to gain even more insight into what their users want and need. In addition, artificial intelligence data tools are capable of easily identifying trends or patterns in data, which can be instrumental in identifying the right areas to make changes.
Critical thinking
Not all AI skills are related to tech and in the field of artificial intelligence where advancements are happening practically constantly, it’s essential to prioritize soft skills like critical thinking. As you’re probably well aware, the issue of the ethics surrounding artificial intelligence has been rather rampant in recent years as doubts such as the bias that AI programs have and how fair they are have been raised.
To be a skilled professional and use AI in your daily professional life, you’ll have to put your critical thinking skills to the test when choosing which AI programs are to be used.
Creativity
With AI, the world is your oyster and similarly to the need to possess critical thinking skills to harness the power of AI tools, creativity is an absolutely essential element of maximizing the power of artificial intelligence. Employers will want to see that you’re not only capable of choosing the right artificial intelligence tool for the task at hand, but also creative in its outputs, bringing its power to unforeseen heights.
Cybersecurity
The rise of artificial intelligence has led to lots of benefits, but it’s also led to an entirely new range of threats in terms of the realisticness of cyber attacks and what cyberattackers can do with phishing attacks or malware with artificial intelligence tools themselves. Remember: both the good and bad guys have access to artificial intelligence tools and knowing how to keep yourself, your data, and your company safe while using artificial intelligence is an absolutely essential part of becoming an AI-fluent professional.
Natural language processing
One of the most commonplace applications of artificial intelligence is its ability to comprehend, interpret, and respond to human languages; chatbots and virtual assistants are two examples of natural language processing (NLP) technology that have revolutionized certain industries, allowing automation to relieve some of the duties previously tasked to humans.
Although there’s still a lot of work to be done in this field to take aspects like dialects and accents into consideration, properly understanding NLP technology and how it works can help you better use this technology in your day-to-day responsibilities.
