Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

The middle manager has been replaced by the entry-level employee. What?

Ah, the bane of 20th century civilization—the middleman. The middleman was the person in the middle who did nothing but pass a product along from the producer to the consumer. The middleman did nothing of value, but took a good 10% or more cut and passed that to poor me, i.e., the consumer.

Closer to home and daily life was the middle manager. This person did nothing but pass instructions from the big boss down to me. What? The big boss could have sent a memo directly to me or something. Why was the middle manager there? Even the big boss knew the middle manager was a waste of money and should be eliminated.

Along came computing hardware and software. Aha! That would replace the middle manager. The word processor, email, desktop publishing, network, inter-network of computers—one of these things would replace the middle manager.

Along came AI, which is merely yet another thing in the above list of things that were supposed to replace the middle manager. Today’s incarnation of AI, there have been many incarnations since the 1950s, is here and doing fundamental tasks in business and commerce.

But wait. Today’s AI is replacing the entry-level employee. That is who would do the fundamental tasks in business and commerce.

But wait. The middle manager is still here. AI saved the middle manager. Instead, AI clobbered the entry-level employee.

Someone made a mistake.