While professionals, managers and executives (PMEs) and knowledge workers may feel the pressure as businesses adopt artificial intelligence (AI), those who can combine their AI know-how with their domain expertise can become more effective, said Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo.
Teo, who is also Minister-in-charge of Cybersecurity and Smart Nation Group, spoke about how the adoption of AI can present an opportunity to uplift the workforce, at the Ministry of Digital Development and Information's (MDDI) Committee of Supply debate in Parliament on Monday (March 2).
"For a start, the Government will support 100,000 workers to become AI 'bilingual'. They will be pathfinders for meaningful AI upskilling, for others to emulate," she said.
What becoming AI 'bilingual' means
Being AI "bilingual" means combining domain expertise and human touch with a PME's AI know-how, explained Teo.
Citing the example of Geraldine Lau, an audit professional with consultancy firm KPMG for 27 years, Teo shared that Lau's work requires her to pore through a significant number of documents to assess risk.
To organise information more quickly, Lau created an AI agent that will automatically consolidate key information from company announcements for audit reviews.
Lau has not become obsolete, instead her domain knowledge is key to ensuring that the agent "looks in the right places".
Teo said that this has led to hours of manual work saved, allowing Lau to focus on deeper risk assessments and applying her human abilities — wisdom, calibration and professional judgement — to complex work.
"Geraldine and many PMEs are showing that AI know-how, domain expertise and human touch are a powerful combination.
"Not all of us can be AI engineers. But we can be 'bilingual' in AI and our own areas of expertise, to solve problems in our domains," the minister explained.
The initiative will begin with the accountancy and legal professions, and later to other fields such as human resources.
"Our initial focus will be on professions that are highly exposed to AI, and serve multiple industries. IMDA will work with relevant agencies and professional bodies to expand its TechSkills Accelerator programme, developing AI 'bilingual' workers in key domains," the minister said.
@asiaone
Speaking at the Parliament, Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo said MDDI is creating the National AI Impact Programme, aiming to support 10,000 local enterprises to integrate AI into their business processes effectively and affordably. They will also be enhancing the Digital Leaders Programme (DLP) and launching a new Digital Leaders Accelerator Bootcamp (DLAB), to build skills and confidence in change management. #sgnews #Singapore #parliament #AI #SME #business
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