The Potential Impacts of Artificial Intelligence on the Workforce

We live in a fast-paced world, and AI continuously impacts today’s workforce.  The good news is that AI will enhance jobs requiring problem-solving and data analysis create new opportunities like never before, and its impact on accessibility and equity in the workforce will be profound.  However, some consulting firms have reckoned that, depending upon various scenarios, automation may displace 100’s of millions of jobs by 2030 and require as many as 375 million people to switch job categories entirely.  Such a potential shift causes significant fears and concerns in employees.  In addition, this displacement of employees is likely to apply to college graduates and professionals as much as it has to plant workers in the past.  However, when such fears or concerns have been raised in the past, they have been proven to be unfounded.  In the 1980s, the advent of personal computers caused many employees to fear that computers would replace them.  Instead, the creation of computers modified the job duties of existing employees and provided us with a sense of progress and efficiency in businesses.

This presentation will discuss the potential impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on the workforce.  Artificial intelligence has made significant progress in the last few years, with public access to chatbots such as ChatGPT, and this progress has the potential to impact the next generation of workers positively and negatively.  This discussion will explore these impacts on the workplace, along with concerns on the part of employers, unions, and employees. Topics for the presentation will touch upon hiring practices, diversity and inclusion, employee fears, and how employers should work to allay those fears.

Speakers: Rick Bales and Lindsay Wagner

Professor Bales is a faculty member at Ohio Northern University Law School.  He teaches various labor/employment and alternative dispute resolution (ADR) courses, Torts, and Civil Procedure.  He has published over 100 scholarly articles and authored or co-authored ten books on various topics related to labor/employment/ADR. Professor Bales is also a labor arbitrator.  He is a member of the National Academy of Arbitrators (NAA) and the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers. He serves on panels for the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS), American Arbitration Association (AAA), State Employee Relations Board (SERB Ohio), Michigan Employee Relations Commission, Minnesota Bureau of Mediation Services, Houston Police Department, City of Columbus & Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), Lockheed Martin/IAM, and PERG-U.S. Virgin Islands.

In 2010, Professor Bales served as a Fulbright Specialist, providing dispute resolution training to labor judges in Malaysia.  Three years later, he again served as a Fulbright Specialist in Indonesia.  His time in Malaysia led to his becoming familiar with the Cambodian Arbitration Council – a model for labor-arbitration design throughout Southeast Asia.  That, in turn, led to several opportunities to work with the Solidarity Center to provide dispute-resolution training to garment workers in Myanmar.  Since disrupted by the 2021 military coup, the goal was to provide tripartite (labor, management, neutrals) training in labor dispute resolution.

Lindsey Wagner – Ms. Wagner is licensed to practice law in California, Florida, New York, and Ohio.  She is the Founder and Managing Partner of Moxie Mediation, an employment mediation, workplace training, and workplace investigation firm, and Wagner Legal, an employment law firm.  She also employs Of Counsel with Ramo Law, P.C., a Beverly Hills, California entertainment law firm.

Before opening her practice, Ms. Wagner worked with the Florida-based employment litigation law firm Scott Wagner and Associates, P.A. for over 13 years with a practice that included assisting employers and employees in employment litigation (state and federal), arbitration matters and employment-related counseling and compliance, including workplace training and workplace investigations.

Ms. Wagner serves on the Executive Council for the Florida Bar Association Labor and Employment Section and the Los Angeles County Bar Association Labor and Employment Section, among other leadership roles.  She is a Florida Circuit Civil Certified Mediator, an Association of Workplace Investigators (AWI) Certificate Holder, and an Employment Mediator and Employment Arbitrator with the American Arbitration Association (AAA).

Most importantly, Ms. Wagner is passionate about developments in the intersectionality between artificial intelligence and employment law and provides employment law-artificial intelligence compliance consulting through Wagner Legal.  Her articles on artificial intelligence in the workplace have been published in the American Bar Association (ABA) Labor and Employment Journal and LA Lawyer Magazine.

Moderator

Christina E. Haselberger, COLERA President

CLE’s

One hour of CLE pending approval.

Pricing and Logistics

COLERA is offering the webinar free of charge. Please register to reserve your spot and receive the Zoom link to attend.