Your Lived Experience Is Valuable: Preparing Young People for an AI-Enabled World of Work

Mar 1

2 min read

This week I had the privilege of speaking to a group of 14 and 15-year-olds about the world of work during a brilliant We Job Box online “Meet the Employer” session.

Many of the 100 young people we spoke with have experienced disruption, uncertainty and challenge, some are refugees, others have struggled with confidence or with school, but what they all share is potential.

One message I wanted them to leave with was this: your lived experience is not just relevant, it’s valuable.

Resilience, adaptability and curiosity aren’t abstract qualities; they’re workplace skills, and in sectors like tech, cybersecurity and AI they’re in real demand.

I also addressed the elephant in the room, because it’s the question young people are hearing more and more.

A lot of adults are telling them that AI is going to take all the jobs, which is well meaning but often shaped by fear and a lack of firsthand experience of how these technologies actually play out inside organisations.

The truth is more nuanced.

AI will change jobs and automate many mundane tasks; at the same time, it is creating entirely new roles and new specialisms. It’s increasing demand for people who can design, secure, govern, question and improve these systems, and it’s opening up work we can’t fully define yet.

By the time these young people enter the workplace, many of them will be doing jobs that don’t even exist today, and that shouldn’t be frightening, it should be empowering.

If the future is still being built, they get to help build it.

That’s one of the reasons I’m proud to sit on the Advisory Board of We Job Box, an AI-driven platform reimagining work experience at scale and giving young people access to real employer challenges, mentoring and insight into emerging industries.

This isn’t about replacing human connection with technology; it’s about using technology to widen access to it.

The future of work isn’t only about the tools, it’s about the people who use them with judgement, empathy and purpose, and when a young person starts to see themselves in that future something shifts, confidence grows and possibility expands.

Thank you to ramsac, Deloitte, Chelsea Football Club, LSEG and Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) for supporting this week’s session and helping open that door a little wider.

If you’re an employer, educator or leader, I’d encourage you to consider how you can help young people see that future more clearly, because the next generation won’t just inherit the AI-enabled world, they’ll shape it.

Rob May