I’ve lost count of how many “Will AI take my job?” conversations I’ve had in the past two years. The question comes up in every workshop, every leadership meeting, every coffee chat with worried team members.

My answer has evolved. It used to be reassuring platitudes about how technology always creates more jobs than it destroys. That’s historically true, but it’s cold comfort to someone worried about their mortgage.

Now I tell people something more honest: AI probably won’t take your job directly. But someone who knows how to use AI effectively might take your opportunities.

The Real Competition

Last month, I watched two marketing coordinators respond to the same brief. Both had similar experience and education. Both were smart and hardworking.

The first spent four days researching, drafting, and refining a campaign proposal. The result was solid professional work.

The second used AI tools to accelerate her research, generate initial drafts, and iterate through multiple concepts in hours instead of days. She spent her saved time on strategic thinking and stakeholder consultation. Her proposal was significantly better.

This isn’t about one person being smarter or working harder. They both worked hard. One just had an advantage the other didn’t.

Now multiply this across every role in your organisation. The gap between AI-fluent workers and AI-hesitant workers is growing every day. And it’s not about age—some of the most effective AI users I know are in their fifties.

What AI Fluency Actually Looks Like

Let me be clear about what I mean by “using AI effectively.” It’s not just knowing how to open ChatGPT.

AI fluency includes:

Knowing what to ask. The quality of AI output depends heavily on input quality. Someone who can break down complex problems, provide appropriate context, and iterate on prompts will get dramatically better results than someone who types “write me a report.”

Knowing when not to use it. AI-fluent workers understand limitations. They know when the task requires human judgment, when data confidentiality is a concern, and when AI outputs need verification.

Integrating AI into workflows. It’s not about using AI for everything. It’s about identifying the specific points where AI assistance adds value and creating smooth handoffs between human and machine work.

Maintaining quality standards. Using AI shouldn’t mean accepting mediocre output. The best AI users have higher standards, not lower ones, because they can iterate more quickly.

The Skills That Still Matter

Here’s where it gets interesting. AI fluency doesn’t replace other professional skills—it amplifies them.

The marketing coordinator who produced the better proposal didn’t succeed just because she used AI. She succeeded because she had strong strategic thinking skills that the AI helped her express. Without that foundation, the AI would have produced generic, unfocused work.

The skills that AI amplifies:

• Critical thinking and judgment
• Strategic analysis
• Relationship building
• Creative problem-solving
• Domain expertise
• Communication and influence

If you’re strong in these areas, AI makes you more effective. If you’re weak in these areas, AI doesn’t compensate.

The Uncomfortable Implications for Hiring

This creates real challenges for how we hire and develop talent.

Traditional hiring focuses heavily on credentials and past experience. But the correlation between those factors and AI fluency is weak. I’ve interviewed candidates with perfect résumés who struggled to adapt to AI-augmented workflows, and candidates with unconventional backgrounds who took to it immediately.

What predicts AI fluency:

• Learning agility and curiosity
• Comfort with ambiguity
• Willingness to experiment
• Ability to think in systems
• Self-directed learning habits

Deloitte’s workforce research supports this, showing that adaptability traits predict AI adoption success far better than technical background or age.

What doesn’t reliably predict it:

• Age or generation
• Technical background
• Seniority level
• Formal qualifications

What This Means for You

If you’re an individual contributor, the message is straightforward: develop AI fluency now. Not because your employer demands it, but because it’s a competitive advantage you can’t afford to ignore.

Start with the tools relevant to your role. Experiment daily. Join communities of practice. Accept that you’ll feel incompetent for a while. That’s the price of learning anything new.

If you’re a manager, your responsibility is broader. You need to:

• Create safe spaces for your team to experiment
• Model AI usage in your own work
• Identify team members who are falling behind
• Provide resources and time for development
• Adjust expectations to account for AI-augmented productivity

If you’re in L&D or HR, you’re facing a workforce bifurcation that will only accelerate. Some employees will embrace these tools and thrive. Others will resist and struggle. Your job is to maximise the first group and minimise the second.

The Timeline Is Shorter Than You Think

When I started in L&D, technology changes happened over years. There was time to watch and wait, to see which trends were real and which were passing fads.

AI is different. The capabilities are improving faster than most organisations can respond. The workers who are building AI fluency today will have a significant head start on those who wait.

I’m not saying panic. I’m saying that “wait and see” is itself a decision with consequences.

A Note on Equity

I want to acknowledge something uncomfortable: not everyone has equal access to AI learning opportunities.

Some organisations are investing heavily in AI training. Others aren’t investing at all. Some workers have jobs that expose them to AI daily. Others work in contexts where these tools aren’t available.

This creates a risk of widening existing inequalities. Workers in well-resourced organisations will develop AI fluency faster than workers in under-resourced ones. Knowledge workers will adapt faster than other workers.

If you have access to these tools and the time to learn them, you have an obligation to take that seriously. And if you’re in a position to expand access for others—through formal training, informal mentoring, or advocating for investment—please do.

The Bottom Line

AI probably won’t take your job through some dramatic automation event. That’s not how this technology works for most roles.

What’s more likely is a gradual shift. The workers who integrate AI effectively will become more productive, take on more interesting work, and advance faster. The workers who don’t will find themselves increasingly left behind.

You get to choose which category you’re in. But the window for that choice is narrower than it used to be.

The technology isn’t the threat. Falling behind is.