Killing with Kindness
I had lunch today with a VC from a major Tier 1 platform.
He spoke about some of the conversations they are able to convene with senior policymakers and corporate enterprises across Europe.
Something he said really struck me: that corporates across Europe are unclear on how they will manage the employee displacement as a function of AI. Unlike the US where hiring and firing is easy, in Europe, labour laws can be extremely worker-friendly. In Germany in particular, representatives of workers often have a seat on the board of the company and therefore have a direct influence on corporate decision-making.
That means adopting AI isn't the no-brainer that it would be on a purely rational basis. The people that have to be on board with that course of action are the same people that would suffer from it. Turkeys don't vote for Christmas.
The second order consequences of that are obviously fairly dire. Without the ability to adopt the latest technology, it is inevitable that European firms will fall behind in competitiveness on the international stage. We may preserve a few jobs in the here and now, but the slow death of the vitality of our economies and global competitiveness will generate untold forgone opportunities.
I'm all for a compassionate transition but we can't be in a situation where we dig our heels in and simply fight for the status quo. The modern world is too dynamic for that. We can't kill our future with kindness in the present.