White-collar workers who survive in the AI era are 'strategists who create and manage systems'

My name is Yanagawa, and I am a business manager and executive officer for the financial business at BASE, Inc.
My career path has been Engineer → PdM → Business Manager.
Throughout that journey, I have argued that PdM and BizDev are also planning roles.

In this article, I would like to share my thoughts after reflecting on the recent talk about how 'AI will kill white-collar jobs'.
Conclusion:'Strategists who create and manage systems', please let me share my personal theory that if you become one, white-collar workers will not die out.

Generative AI does not streamline coordination; it makes coordination unnecessary.

I have a strong interest in how AI will change white-collar work, especially product development and planning roles in startups.

Common discussions often focus on productivity improvements, such as 'AI streamlining coordination tasks' or 'making document creation easier'.
However, the starting point of my inquiry is a bit different.
My hypothesis is that generative AI does not streamline coordination, but rather makes coordination unnecessary in the first place. The reason I think this is because, with generative AI, the number of people involved will decrease itself.

Until now, planning and development work has been premised on involving many functions and stakeholders.
In that context, 'coordinators' such as PdMs, managers, and BizDevs functioned as essential entities.

However, if AI can handle planning support, requirement organization, prototyping, verification, documentation, and actual product output, we can see a world where one person can produce output at a certain level.
As a result, the necessity of coordination itself will decrease.

Does this mean we are heading toward a world where only 'builders' like engineers and designers survive?
If it's just about making something quickly and finishing, I think it can be completed by a builder with a vision. However, from the perspective of continuing a business sustainably, other characters are necessary. I have named this role 'Strategist'. I believe that the white-collar workers who survive will belong to this role, and that this role is close to what current PdMs and BizDevs do.

I will be writing about this at length, so please read on if you are interested.

Primary target job categories for this article

• Business Manager

• BizDev

• PdM

• Manager

Secondary target job categories for this article

• Engineer

• Designer

What do you think will happen to organizations with generative AI?

I have thought a little about what organizations will look like in the future.

Fewer people

As the use of AI advances, most of the work previously performed by humans will be replaced, and in the first place, there will be fewer situations requiring human labor.
I believe there will no longer be a need to gather people on the scale we have seen until now.

The discussion about the reduction in people is a bit long, so I have separated it into a different article.

Less coordination work

As the number of people decreases, the actual work of coordination, such as aligning communication between stakeholders and the premises for decision-making, will decrease.
Coordination work is a fruitless flower born from having too many people. If you don't have to coordinate, it's better not to, so it will naturally disappear.

Fewer managers

I believe that management is a job like a fruitless flower born because there are many people. Managers are the systems and roles that solve problems that arise when many people are present. If that is the case, I think the number of managers, especially middle managers, will decrease.

Fewer organizational layers

This is almost synonymous with having fewer managers; since the number of people decreases, the layers in the organization will decrease.
The reason organizational layers increase is because one wants to manage more people.
Since there is a limit to the number of people one manager can manage, the organization grows.
Then, the organizational layers to manage the organization increase.

Fewer bullshit jobs

Precisely because the number of people is limited, it will become impossible to hold onto jobs that exist for no particular reason.
So-called bullshit jobs are jobs that only arise because there are many people, and they serve as a hiding place.

More short-term work

As the speed of organizational decision-making and execution increases, short-term teams and projects organized by objective will increase rather than long-term stable structures.
Unit-based work styles, where people gather when needed and disband after achieving results, may become mainstream.

Are visionary builders the strongest?

Considering the future predictions above, many people might think that we are entering an era where anyone who wants to do something can do it all by themselves.
And I think that is basically correct.
The hurdle for visionaries to acquire builder skills will definitely be lowered. There will be no need to ask others to build things.
I think we are entering an era where visionary builders will blow everything away and thrive.

Also, people like the following will start to thrive.

・People who were told they were 'a bit like a psychopath' because they were too good at their jobs
・People who were evaluated as 'talented, but you can't put anyone under them'

I think there were many situations where these people were hard to evaluate within teams or organizations because they 'could not involve others.' But now, AI is beginning to offset that weakness of 'not being able to use people.'
The premise that one person has limits is gradually crumbling.

I am certain that evaluation criteria will change, and the types of people who have been valued in organizations until now, those who 'accurately carry out instructions' and 'can move obediently' will likely be easily replaced by AI.

However, to continue growing as a business

I think that creating and growing continuously are different skill sets.
If it is just about creating, I think a visionary builder is enough, but when considering running a business, continuous growth is essential.

Creating is a point, and growing continuously is a line.
From my experience, I feel that the work of continuously improving and drawing a line is not a job that many people can do.

The work of ensuring continuous, steady growth, and acting as guardrails for visionaries and builders while consistently telling the story.
Creating the foundation that allows visionaries and builders to fully unleash their potential.
It is the work of having a strategic will, building upon it, and creating and improving the systems to carry it out. I have defined this as a 'Strategist who creates and manages systems'.

• Continuously maintaining the core purpose of why we are doing this in the first place

• Embodying how to continuously improve

• What structure will allow the team to achieve maximum results with the minimum number of people

• How much to leave to AI, and where to retain human judgment and sensibility

• How to redesign from the system side when processes stall

Building, operating, and improving organizations and projects with a strategy.
From the perspective of continuing a business sustainably, I believe this role will not disappear.
And I think this is the power that PdMs and BizDevs have been honing. It is quite a specialized skill, and while AI can help, I believe it will be difficult to completely replace it in the near future. (If AGI arrives, everything will change fundamentally, so I am not considering that far ahead this time.)

Because the number of people will decrease, it is often thought that people who cannot make decisions or have no ideas are unnecessary.

'In an era where the number of people decreases, those who cannot make decisions or generate ideas will become unnecessary'.
Certainly, with the advent of AI, roles that only involve doing assigned tasks or waiting for instructions may shrink.

But if you ask if having people who generate ideas is enough, I don't think that is the case at all.
The ideas that are generated do not automatically take shape.

Of course, there are areas where generative AI will be a great help.
Nevertheless, actually releasing products to the world, incorporating them into systems, and developing them while operating them. I believe that consistently carrying out such a series of processes will remain a specialized skill.
It is still
necessary to strategically create and manage systems. Also, making things into something that truly functions is not that simple.

Haven't we seen time and time again that just because someone can write code doesn't mean they can build a wonderfully functioning system?

Without being pessimistic about not being able to be a visionary or an idea person, and without hiding or lamenting the desire to focus on building, let's hone the skills to perceive things logically and improve operations while having a strategy.

So, let's summarize the roles that have appeared so far.

Visionary (Founder/Business Manager)

Role of creating business ideas and value hypotheses
Will continue in the same form as now and will be further strengthened

Builder (Engineer/Designer)

Role of concretely building products
If it's just about giving it shape, visionaries will be able to do it.
It is necessary to not only give it shape but to make it function.

Coordinator/Promoter -> New! Strategist

Role of strategically organizing direction and connecting resources with progress
Thought to be dead, but necessary.
However, the condition is that it can be done strategically with intent.
Therefore, I name it Strategist.

Each of them should cross over into each other's domains.

To reiterate, please rest assured that it is not just visionaries who will be empowered and survive. While they help bring ideas to life, that is where it ends for them.
The power of other specialized skills is required to structure and perpetuate those ideas, and those skills will remain.

I also believe that the level of individual specialization will naturally decrease. This is because, with the help of AI, it will become easier to cross boundaries between planning, implementation, and operations.
An era is coming where 'full-cycle talent who can see the big picture' will have more value than members who were confined to specific domains. This applies to non-engineers as well.
I believe that boundaries will definitely become blurred, and I predict that the world will become a place where people who actively change those boundaries can thrive.

AI is moving not toward 'helping managers,' but toward 'making managers unnecessary.'

While I acknowledge that the context changes slightly here, I would like to talk about management.
Since this article is essentially a sibling to the one I wrote the other day, I will clarify that connection.

https://note.com/gimupop/n/n4d6b2fce9af5

If the number of people decreases due to the evolution of AI, the need for a 'role to manage people' will inevitably decrease as well.
In other words,I am certain that the importance of the job of 'managing systems, not people' will increase.

When there are many 'people,' one tends to think centered on 'people' and is pulled by the gravity of 'people.' Adjustments, groundwork, and relationship building were all premised on manipulating or adjusting to people.

However, with the advent of generative AI,as much of the actual hands-on work becomes systematized and automated,the number of 'people' will decrease. Therefore, value will concentrate on those who can purelydesign, operate, and continuously update the systems themselves.In other words, I believe the role of the manager I wrote about in my previous article will be further strengthened. (Please do read that previous article.)
As the number of people decreases, I believe we should use our energy not to make AI a 'tool to support the management aspects of a manager's job,' but rather in the direction of

making managers unnecessary along with their roles.When assuming generative AI, I do not believe that creating manager-support products under the premise that existing frameworks will continue is the best approach.
Organizational structures will change due to generative AI, and managers will undoubtedly be the most affected.

The 'anti-strategy' backlash

There is currently a trend that praises 'acting rather than thinking' and 'just trying it out.'
The background to this is likely a reaction to the overabundance of managers and wasteful coordination of the past.
The emergence of generative AI, which has made 'just trying it out' tactics somewhat viable, has also fueled this.

Even so, 'strategy and systems' are necessary

Precisely because we live in a fast-paced era, what is called into question is:

• Where are we heading?

• What should we use our resources for?

• How should we combine people and AI?

Such strategic design capabilities. Beyond builders and visionaries, an entity that can
design and manage the structure of organizations and teamsis indispensable.

The 'manager who manages people' may decrease.
However, I believe that the'manager who organizes systems = strategist'will become even more important in the AI era.

At the end of the day, the skill of getting people to move is still necessary

As I have written so far, from now on,the situations where 'you have to get people to move' will definitely decrease.This is because the power of AI and automation will allow more things to be completed by one person.'The power to get people to move' = the power to gain trust and involve otherswill become harder to cultivate than ever before.
That is precisely why it can be said thatthose who have consciously cultivated such skills have a great opportunity.

In the end, 'people who can work normally' will be empowered

I have talked about many things, but I think that even as AI and organizational changes progress, what remains in the end can be abstracted as 'people who can properly fulfill their roles'.

• Understand their own role

• Can act with the shortest distance

• Have the comprehension to grasp intentions

• Can move their own hands

• Can answer why they are doing it after all

• Have the ability to see things through to the end

• Can move their hands and produce output

• Can have full-cycle thinking rather than sectionalism

If you polish such skills, you will not die, so you will be fine.
AI will actually support you.
Let's survive together as 'strategists who create and manage systems'.

[Appendix] Organization of roles necessary to advance business through product development and considerations after generative AI

As a premise for writing the main text, I will leave as an appendix the organization of roles necessary for product development, which I created by brainstorming with ChatGPT.

1. Visionary (Founder/Business Manager)

Role of creating business ideas and value hypotheses
This role will become increasingly important in the future.
This is because as AI becomes able to handle 'implementation' and 'adjustment',
the power to conceive 'what to do' and 'why to do it'will become relatively more valuable. In the future, it will become common for small teams with conceptual power to speedily shape products from a single vision.

2. Adjustment/Promotion Layer (PdM, BizDev, PM, etc., and in fact, many business managers fall into this pattern)

Role of organizing direction and connecting resources and progress
With AI, 'adjustment as a task' such as schedule management, document organization, and alignment of perceptions will be almost entirely automated.
As a result, the significance of the 'coordinator' role itself will diminish, and the following types of talent will be required:

• Those leaning toward visionary: People who can ask questions, build hypotheses, and translate them into business

• Those leaning toward builder: People who can move their own hands and quickly prototype and verify

• Those who excel as a strategist: People who can design and manage structures and promote organizations and systems

In other words, it is not a role of 'just standing in between', butthe power to create structures and connect them to resultsis required.
'Half-baked management' alone will no longer be sufficient in the future.

3. Builder Layer (Engineers/Designers)

The role of concretely building products

For the builder layer, such as engineers and designers, overwhelming improvements in productivity are expected through co-creation with AI.
Even small teams will be able to build high-quality products at high speed. Consequently, roles that involve 'just implementing' will decrease, and skills that require more interpretation and judgment, such as
design ability, editing ability, and the ability to read intent, will become more important.

4. Support/Operations Layer (CS, Operations, Back Office)

The role of handling daily operations and support

In this area, it is no exaggeration to say that the ability to master AI will determine survival. Simple inquiry responses and administrative tasks will be replaceable by AI. Therefore, the ability to act as an AI manager will become important.

• Utilization and optimization of AI tools

• Designing division of labor with humans (human-in-the-loop)

• Building automation using no-code/low-code

The key will be the ability to 'operate systems' rather than 'doing things by hand'.