Nurturing emerging talent in an AI world

While AI is set to transform industries across the board, it will have a significant impact on some more than others, and the media and entertainment industry is likely to be one of those that is profoundly affected.

We’re currently in the AI gold rush, and while it’s still unclear which applications are going to be the most valuable, we can see that AI is already having a significant impact. In the video industry, technology vendors and service providers are working to leverage AI to bring improvements across the value chain, from producing and managing content more efficiently, improving user experience, enhancing personalisation, and enabling smarter monitoring, through to gaining deeper industry and service insights, unlocking new monetisation opportunities, and delivering video more efficiently. This shift is going to quickly reshape skills requirements across the video industry, and indeed across the wider M&E industry.

Furthermore, the technology is advancing at such a rate that soon traditional career pathways won’t be able to keep pace, and as a result, the demand for skilled AI professionals is going to quickly outpace supply. If we’re to avoid having a huge skills gap and getting left behind in the AI revolution, then we need to support and nurture new talent to help them develop skills in this critical area. As such, there’s a growing need for hands-on, industry embedded AI learning and skills development for students and graduates alike.

Skills requirements are changing

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Kantar Media’s Global Media Leader’s survey found that almost three quarters (72%) of global media industry leaders say they’re having to significantly reshape their organisations in terms of the skills and talent needed to adapt to the impact of AI and a changing media environment. The report also found that most respondents (74%) felt that in the near future, AI skills will be essential, ranking it as the third most important skill after communication skills and storytelling, and data analysis and interpretation.

In light of these shifting skillset requirements, it’s vital that M&E companies support their existing workforce to develop AI skills by adopting a range of measures such as training, mentoring and professional qualifications. But that alone is not enough to address the looming AI skills gap. It’s also critically important to support and nurture young talent only just embarking on a career in the industry. Traditionally, career pathways would have ensured that the young people joining the media industry had the skills that the industry needed. The issue we’re facing now is that AI technology is accelerating at such a pace, that these traditional pathways are struggling to keep up.

We know that young people thrive when given the tools to expand and develop their skills, so the question is, how can we as an industry make sure this happens so that the next generation are equipped with the skills needed to drive AI-led transformation?

Industry-led learning

One approach is for technology companies to offer AI focused internships to students and graduates. Bitmovin trialed this type of scheme earlier this year with its AI & Beyond Internship Incubator. The initiative is designed to give students hands-on experience with AI-powered solutions, along with mentorship from experts, and the opportunity to see their innovations developed into real-life products.

Under the initiative, participants are not limited by traditional workplace experience, instead they get to work with experts on meaningful real-world AI video streaming projects. Stand out innovations are then incorporated into existing products, further developed as independent spin-offs, or presented by the incubator participants at international tradeshows. Offering this program to students and graduates gives them access to top talent and tools to share fresh ideas helping to accelerate AI developments and giving the skillset of future talent a much needed boost.

Schemes like this give young talent an opportunity to work with experts and develop real-world practical solutions that can influence how the industry harnesses AI. These types of industry-led initiatives play an important role in supporting emerging talent to gain AI experience, develop their skillset around AI and become more confident in developing their own innovative ideas to solve industry challenges.

There’s no time to be complacent. It’s important that we lay the groundwork now to ensure that the next wave of talent has the skills needed to drive AI-led transformation, in whatever shape that may take.

Thomas Pearson is global director of people at Bitmovin