Vision is committed to developing a new conference focused on AI and its impact on our world. The first Conference on the “Skills for the AI world” will take place in Dubai, and will support its ambition to grow as a hub where innovators can gather and shape the “prototypes” that will change the world.
More information will come soon. Stay tuned!
THE IDEA
What should we study to prepare ourselves for a world that Artificial Intelligence (AI) will dominate? This is the question that students and colleagues ask many of us - as professors, parents, and managers. Indeed, Evidence suggests that most of us do not have a clear answer or roadmap for dealing with a technological disruption that is radically transforming everything. They are mutating the nature of many industries (including entertainment, pharmaceutical and insurance) and public service areas (healthcare and education). There is a change in the very notion of what a “career” is and in the possibility itself to govern “globalisation” for governments and international organisations. More importantly, the way human beings transform information into knowledge is being radically transformed. It is a “brave new world” that opens up unprecedented opportunities and risks. Therefore, the Conference on the "Skills for the AI World” wants to find answers to the above question and to other connected concerns.
What kind of skills and attitudes do companies need to make sense of disruptions that are even making boundaries between industries blur? What can governments do to enable citizens to thrive in such a context, minimising the costs of adaptation to change and maximising the quantum leap that AI can produce in the quality of life? How should universities reorganise themselves to turn the challenge that AI poses to the way they teach, make examinations and conduct research into an opportunity? The endeavour on AI is the base of the third conference that Vision think tank is pursuing with its academic and scientific partners (including Bocconi University in Milan, European University Institute in Fiesole, Said Business School in Oxford), media partners (including The Conversation, The Guardian and The Economist), and corporate partners (including AXA Group, Intesa San Paolo, Monte Paschi di Siena). The objective is to become a global platform for problem-solving where complexity is not just something to admire, but also something to manage. This will be a platform for fresh ideas and proposals that will be relevant for business, governments, media, and research. The method is, indeed, to:
Have groups of students and professors prepare the various sessions and the so called “problem setting/ problem solving groups” of the conference
Bring together participants at the meeting representing all major regions of the world and the four professional sectors (companies, policymaking, communication, and universities) that must be engaged to translate ideas into actions
Follow up the conference with more specific presentations of the proposals to relevant stakeholders (including international organizations like Vision has been doing with the UN and the European Union Institutions).
Concerning Vision's method, the project will answer strategic questions by focusing on three industries as cases of a wider evolution
Movies, Media and Entertainment;
Healthcare and Pharma
Universities and Education
THE BACKGROUND
AI is accelerating profound social, industrial and political changes that began with the Internet. While the Internet aimed to enhance human productivity, it has not fully delivered on that promise, creating both progress and disruption. AI now represents a new leap: machines can replicate human thinking processes and use natural language to interact with us. This shift makes it essential for humans to guide and collaborate with AI effectively.
To thrive in this evolving landscape, organizations need to prioritize human skills that technology cannot replace, among which critical thinking, creative problem-solving, communication, emotional intelligence, adaptability and intellectual humility. These capabilities will shape the future of work and determine how AI will be used to solve real-world problems.
The conference aims to equip participants (business representatives, policymakers, academics and journalists) with a methodology to identify, develop and safeguard these skills. It will focus on the ACEIT toolkit (Adaptability, Cultural Competency, Empathy, Intellectual Curiosity, 360-degree Thinking), developed by USC’s Center for Third Space Thinking, and explore how institutions can restructure recruitment and training to strenghten these competencies.
Considering that media, healthcare/pharma and education are already being transformed by AI, they will serve as case studies. The conference will also address the complementary roles of Generative AI and AI Agents, both of which will shape how humans and machines interact.
The overarching purpose is to conduct a collective, and global problem-solving exercise: determining how to keep humans meaningfully “in the loop,” without losing control of technology, and ensure that AI enhances rather than diminishes our capacity to innovate, collaborate and make ethical decisions.
THE OBJECTIVES OF THE CONFERENCE
The Conference’s objective is to engage, provoke and equip executives, civil servants, policymakers, academics and journalists to join the problem-solving exercise with a concrete blueprint for equipping their organizations with the skills required by the AI revolution. Partecipants themselves will elaborate these recommendations through a process that will use the ACEIT Skills to achieve competencies that, when successfully combined, can complement and extend the two dominant and more traditional strategic approaches offered by engineering and business thinking. More specifically, we will try to answer three critical questions:
How can we reorganize the recruiting processes to recognize in individuals and teams the skills needed to manage AI?
How can we restructure careers, organizations and training paths to foster those skills?
How can we ensure that “soft skills” complement “hard ones” when designing strategies in contexts made complex by rapid technological development?
These answers will be helpful for all industries, for public services operations and for policies and regulations development.
