The impact of AI on leverage, work and employment
The implications of recent advancements in artificial intelligence are being widely under-estimated.
We're seeing artificial intelligence being applied to certain common tasks like the creation of blog posts, and the generation of images. These use cases on their own are significant jumps in productivity, which allow what would have formerly been hours of work to be compressed into minutes or less, as well as not requiring specific resources like a camera and specific photography knowledge.
But I believe that the real, compounding benefits of artificial intelligence are currently hard to predict, and we will start to see them when tasks are chained together and performed sequentially by artificial intelligence - some are calling these agents - autonomous workers that are able to complete complex tasks without (or with minimal) human interaction.
I've written about the topic of leverage in the past, but this will completely change the nature of leverage that a small group of people will be able to have on a problem. It's clear that people are already starting to think about the implications of this:
In the near future we will see sub 10 person teams doing what previously companies hundreds of people could not.
— Alex MacCaw (@maccaw) May 3, 2023
Founders will manage dozens of AI agents that will be in charge of various job functions.
Essentially Zapier on steroids.
Revenue per FTE might be the most interesting metric to look for SaaS companies going forward.
— Krishna (@ntkris) May 3, 2023
Smaller teams are going to do things at a scale that we simply cannot imagine.
AI radically drops the number of people needed to building something amazing.
— Mckay Wrigley (@mckaywrigley) May 12, 2023
Smaller and smaller teams will be able to make truly incredible products & innovations.
Great ideas will become increasingly less constrained by resources.
Curiosity + hard work will get you far.
I think we’re going to see many $25M/yr+ revenue, 1 person businesses over the next 5 years
— GREG ISENBERG (@gregisenberg) May 7, 2023
If software can make you 100x more productive, how much more productive will AI make you?
The thread on how it goes down for solopreneurs:
For the consumer, this is an incredibly positive thing. It means smaller, more agile teams will be able to solve larger problems with fewer resources, and from that we will see an increase in innovation and development.
It is up to governments and large companies to contend with the shift that will inevitably follow from these technological breakthroughs in the job market, and the demand for various roles over the coming years and decades.