Humans Are Already Servants of Computers

We spend a lot of time worrying that AI is going to take people’s jobs. But the truth is, technology has already taken the human soul out of many jobs a long time ago. The person is still employed, but increasingly they are there to serve the computer rather than the customer.

I was reminded of this recently at my bank. I had what should have been a relatively simple problem involving account access and user rights. My business manager AND the bank director spent most of an afternoon with me trying to solve it. Neither could figure it out. After hours of work and supposedly finding a solution. I find out the next day that they have mostly locked me out of my own account.

This isn’t a technology problem. It is a problem that the people who should know their jobs dont. It is incompetence created because everyone has moved all the decision-making to computers. Humans are merely there to click and type.

I think we have the same problem in hotels.

A few weeks ago I posted about hotel ontology and Tom Goodwin made a simple observation: before worrying about sophisticated AI, many hotels still struggle with basic operational competence. I think he has a point.

Understand the guest when they arrive. Recognize the regulars. Know what they booked. Getting a guest request arranged (not, I will relay the message). Know the hotel. Recommend a restaurant because you have an opinion. Remember things. Take responsibility, actually care about the results of the job, not just the financial reward.

None of this is particularly advanced hospitality. It’s kind of the basics of the job. Yet it is quite rare today.

Over the years we have designed jobs around systems and processes. Select the dropdown. Escalate the exception. Don’t make a decision because the system doesn’t allow it. We say we are protecting jobs, but what exactly we are protecting? Human robots?

Ironically, this is where I think AI could actually help. It may be replacing all the stupid technological work we have forced people to do. Searching through systems, entering information three times, remembering codes, finding policies and navigating processes. If AI can take that away, perhaps we can give people something much more important back: responsibility.

But that requires us to invest in humans again: Teach people good manners. How to maintain a conversation. Reading the customer. When to have an opinion (and, when not to have one). How to decide, and how to own the consequences. Expecting people to solve problems rather than operate software. Being responsible and proud of their jobs. The list was a lot longer but I had to cut some out for brevity.

Unfortunately, it is quite probable that many people will turn over all their opinions and thoughts to AI. But in hotels and business we should be up-skilling people on the responsibilities of being a human.

When I arrived in the hotel industry I was amazed by how easy it is to make people happier, that’s what makes this industry so amazing. Not so many industries have that ability. We should use it more.