As artificial intelligence continues to advance in the workplace, employees have been urged to up the value they bring to the workplace and maintain responsible use of the technology.
Ashley Immanuel, the co-founder and Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Semicolon Africa, a Lagos-based technology talent and venture-building company, made this call in a keynote address at the SHEALS Bootcamp 4.0 in Lagos.
Speaking on the topic; The future is yours: Building relevance, financial independence and opportunities in a changing world” Immanuel noted that the workspace is changing at a faster pace than at any time in history, and career paths are becoming more vague and unpredictable.
“Decades ago, you knew that if you studied accounting, you would get a job as a junior account officer and grow through the ranks to become the Chief Accountant, but now, it is not so certain. Even traditional career paths like medicine, law, engineering are changing every day as technology creeps into the workplace” she explained.
The workers who will remain relevant are those who master soft skills like communication, critical thinking, conflict management, effective listening, problem solving and leadership, while staying abreast with the technological advancement, she said. She also discouraged the mindless use of AI in the workplace, noting that it diminishes critical thinking skills of the individual, introduces workshop where quality of output drops, and also exposes the organisations to several privacy risks.
Immanuel urged the attendees to identify problems around them and work towards developing technology solutions to fix them.
“The technology from outside the country may be good, but only those living her ein Nigeria have a deep understanding of how the market works, and what real problems people will pay to have solved” she said.
To achieve this, she recommended the Japanese concept – IKIGAI – for the women to find a purpose at the intersection of what they love, what they are good at, what the world needs, and what people are willing to pay for.
Earlier in her welcome address, Ayodeji Michael-Oni, SHEALS founder and mental health advocate explained that the SHEALS project was born out of a concern for women that continue to push through their everyday live, investing in everyone around them even when they are broken.
“I am not a gender-centred person, and in fact, I would like to organise programmes like this for everyone. But I realised that everything traces back to the woman. Every broken man or woman out there, every criminal on the street, every violent person out there was raised by a broken women. And so this bootcamp is centred around a healing and transformational experience for the women because when a woman heals, a generation is restored,” she stated.
Michael-Oni thanked the partners – Sycamore and BusinessDay Media Limited, for their support, adding that the bootcamp would help the women further build financial capacity, and confront the economic realities that often keep them trapped in unhealthy situations.
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Ruth is a seasoned journalist and communications strategist with over a decade of experience telling impactful stories across environment, technology, entrepreneurship, business, and political economy.
At BusinessDay, she leads editorial partnerships and content initiatives that deepen public understanding and spark meaningful conversations on issues shaping Nigeria’s socio-economic landscape.
She holds an MSc in Mass Communication from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and a BSc in Mass Communication from Delta State University.
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