Ryan Roslansky: Former LinkedIn CEO on Building an Irreplaceable Career in the Age of AI | Career | E396

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Every day I feel like I wake up and you look at the headlines and there's something new that's happening. Let's go over the net-like last few months. ChashmT was super hot. It was all that matter. Now it's like clawing. Then it's like clawed co-work. Now it's this open claw thing. And all you're just like, "Oh my gosh, like every day I wake up and it's like there's some new thing in the world of time."

My goodness, it's like the craziest thing I've seen in my entire career. Ryan Roslanzky is the CEO of LinkedIn. Leading one of the world's largest professional platforms, he's navigating how AI is shifting careers and the structure of work itself. So, tell me, you are sitting on the data of a billion people right now with LinkedIn.

“If somebody is ignoring AI, what happens to their career in the next three years?”

The average set of skills to do a job is changed by 25% over the last few years. We expect to change by 70% by 23%. So, if you're not accepting the fact that like this labor market is changing, your role is changing. It's not okay to like stand the sidelines for this one. You have to get into the mix somehow. You believe that the whole hierarchy of careers is about to shift.

Can you tell us more about that? Everybody's job is a set of tasks. The large percentage of these tasks are the types of things that can be automated away. If your job is just a set of automated tasks, you have to start thinking about finding a new job. Open to work, LinkedIn, sometimes have a negative connotation like your desperate or a job. Talk to us about what it means to actually be open to work.

If you have that green banner on, you are 27% more likely to get higher. Open to work more than anything is a mindset shift. Help us understand how the future is shaping in terms of how people will actually get hired based on their skills, not necessarily their titles, and what LinkedIn is doing to help support that.

“I think, you know, first and foremost, you have to.”

Yeah, Pam LinkedIn data shows up by 2030 70% of the skills required to do your job will have changed, and that shift is already happening. Which is exactly why today's episode matters, because we're breaking down how AI is reshaping the way that we work, and what you need to do right now to stay ahead. And boy, do we have the perfect guest for the topic?

Ryan Roslandski is the CEO of LinkedIn, sitting on career data of over a billion professionals worldwide.

So when he talks about where work is heading, it's worth listening out. His new book "Open to Work" is a survival guide for this exact moment. And today, he breaks down how to identify what AI will automate, how to build your ownliness, and why human skills are now the hottest commodity on the market. If you want to future-proof your career, make sure you follow this podcast if you haven't yet,

because the future of work isn't coming. It's already here. Ryan, welcome to Young and profiting podcast. So excited to be with you. Thank you. I am so honored to be speaking with you today,

and I can't wait to talk all about careers and how AI is reshaping careers.

So tell me, you are sitting on the data of a billion people right now with LinkedIn.

“If somebody is ignoring AI, what happens to their career in the next three years?”

Yeah, well again, it's such a pleasure to be with you. Huge fan of the show, and you're right. The virtue of the activity that's happening all day long on LinkedIn, the companies that are posting jobs, that people who are applying for jobs, are preparing to profile.

I'm just trying to mend this amount of really unique data that we see flowing through the ecosystem. What skills are hot right now? You know, what are companies hiring for? How is the labor market changing? And to your point, there's some real unique signals right now that we're seeing.

And it's not all doom and gloom quite frankly. And on one hand, I will say that the average job right now, which if you take a job as being a set of skills to do a job, you go to a set of skills, by a set of skills. The average set of skills to do a job is changed by 25% over the last few years.

We expect it to change by like 70% by 23%. So if you're not changing your job, it's changing on you. So there's like this change going on in one hand. And the other hand, we're actually seeing AI create a lot of net new jobs. I mean, there's a, you know, across the platform, we actually see 1.3 million new AI jobs being.

So a lot of data center jobs, you know, data AI data annotator jobs for deployed engineers.

All these roles that are actually being created because of AI.

“I think the most important point to where you started is like, hey, look, if you're not accepting the fact that like this labor market is changing.”

Your role is changing, new roles being created, like there's a whole new economy being created around AI. Like you're missing out, it's not okay to like stand the sidelines for this one. You have to get into the mix somehow. Now, I know with AI, if you're missing the boat on learning right now, everything is changing so fast that you can end up really far behind. Can you help us understand why it's so important to actually start learning now and why, you know, you'll miss the boat if you don't start now.

I mean, I have to tell you, even it's like every day, I feel like I wake up and you look at the headlines and there's something new that's happening. And if you just take, I mean, just go over the net like last few months and, you know, you and I both spend a lot of time thinking through this, but, you know, Cheshire BT was like super hot, you know, like six weeks ago. It was all that matter. Then all of a sudden, everyone's like, oh, wait, now it's like clock.

Yeah, that's all that matters and everyone's like, you know, learning to pay attention. Then it's like, cloud co-work is like, you know, that's the thing, that's all that matters. And then all of a sudden it's like, oh, now it's this open clock thing. And all, you're just like, oh my gosh, like every day I wake up and it's like, there's some new thing that will be hot. And, you know, I mean, it's, you know, it's my job is part of your job.

There really be on top of these things in order to survive and thrive and, you know, kind of understand where the world is moving. I can only imagine what it's like for any professional in the world trying to like keep up with it as well. And, you know, it's, it's unique.

“It's unique time. It's a different time. It's, you know, it's not status quo, but the point is you have to like try and keep up with it.”

And you have to pay attention and it's difficult and sometimes confusing, but in order to, you know, anything from run a company to, you know, start your career. These are things you have to know and pay attention to. But yeah, my goodness, it's like the craziest thing I've seen in my entire career. I've been really, you know, getting super interested in AI and one of the things I'm noticing is like you've got to spend a lot of time building it, right?

Putting in the memories that I want it to have getting skills and processes and like dumping my brain so that it becomes my second brain.

So I think the other part of it, too, is expanding the time to actually develop your AI because if somebody's been working in AI for two years, and it's ingested all their emails and all their slack messages and butterflies, and it's, you've trained them on all your skills. That person's going to be so much more ahead than the person who just is starting to create their AI. So actually, by the way, I mean, this idea and I think so many people out there, you were like, yeah, you know, I've used AI or I dabble in it and maybe it's not that great or maybe it can't do it.

It's quite fancy because you haven't put the time and effort to, you know, really set the context or train it or put in the time and effort to make it understand what you're actually trying to accomplish. I think you're spot what am I like best hacks is actually I'll just, you know, like open up copilot on my phone and just, you know, talk to it. And like I'll just talk for like 20 minutes writing the ton of context like you're just going on and I'm like this, this, but it's all it means to an end like the next question I have to ask to get, you know, an answer out of it has all that context built into it.

“So continuously building it up, I think, is a really important thing.”

Yeah, so talk to us about how AI is so much different from other tech shifts that we've seen from smartphones to electricity. You guys, you and Nisha co-author, you're calling it a workshop. Why is it so shocking? I think in my career, I've probably been through like three or four massive, you know, transformations in technology. You know, like you said, from, you know, mobile, social AI and this one just feels like it's moving at a much faster pace. There's also such uniqueness in the technology, which is, it's very kind of, it's almost like purposely built to be a little bit difficult to understand, like I don't care who you are, how smart you are, what you've studied.

You know, these models operate in ways that, you know, none of us, you know, truly understand and they're evolving in ways that aren't like technology of the past. It's a lot of uncertainty in it, and it's moving faster than anything that we've ever seen. So, you know, people don't like uncertainty in their lives. Companies don't like uncertainty when they're trying to navigate a company. Markers don't like uncertainty when they're trying to predict where the future is going to go.

So it is this shock right now amongst this, like, really uncertain, you know, new technology, which I'm a goodness, feels so unique and so powerful.

And you really give us a view what you wanted to do, it's like, wow, this is a game changer, but a lack of clarity on actually, you know, how it works, and then the fact that like we said before, every day you wake up and it's like, oh, wow, something new exists out there that I didn't even think could be, you know, existing in this world. So it's a crazy time.

So from what I read in your book, you believe that the whole hierarchy of careers is about to shift. So for example, knowledge work, a lot of it, a lot of our tasks can now be automated by AI and pink color and blue color work is becoming more valuable. Can you tell us more about that? I mean, I think the general framing is, again, everybody's job is a set of tasks. And I've been doing this thing recently where I all tell someone, hey, just imagine that you're not allowed to use your job title anymore, not that your job's gone. You're not getting fired, but you can't talk about yourself in this job title.

“If you have to go into work, get to explain to someone what you do all day and you have to sit down at your desk wherever you work and actually do the job.”

As it means to an end to understand, what am I actually doing every day and you realize a couple of things. Number one, I'm probably doing a lot more than my title actually suggested I'm doing quite frankly. Number two, it gives you a framework to say, okay, here are the things that really matter inside of my day to day work. When you're able to understand that and maybe for a typical job, there's 10 to 20 tasks that matter.

You can then start to take control and understand whether or not the large percentage of these tasks are the types of things that can be automated away.

“In the book, talk about it in three buckets, like bucket one, highly automated tasks bucket two, the types of tasks that AI can really help you more productive by using them bucket three, not super likely to be automated through AI.”

When you take a look at your job, if your job is just a set of automated tasks, you have to start thinking about finding a new job, quite frankly, most jobs are not that, but that's the framework that we start with to understand kind of how this pulls together. Then looking at a set of jobs is just as task, you start to realize, wow, like these bucket two tasks, things that AI can really help you do, you know, uniquely better and automated and maybe, you know, maybe I was historically a, you know, a product designer or a product manager and didn't really have a lot of great, you know, coding skills.

But now all of a sudden I have this AI that gives me that super power of all these coding skills, then the actual market completely starts to change and flatten. So one of the things we've tried to do it linked in is to be a little bit ahead of that curve.

“We used to hire for, you know, four or five roles separately inside of the software development process, you know, graphic designer, product manager, product marketer, for an engineer, back in engineering.”

What we've learned is that, you know, we can equip people with a set of AI tools that can actually allow you to be really good and a lot of those tasks.

So we've started a new role at LinkedIn, it's just called builder and we're doing it kind of for as an entry level role into the company, you know, a associate product builder. It's a combination of all those things that used to be these horizontal earth, you know, vertical skills in the company into one role in order to apply for that. I don't really care if you've gone to college, if you studied anything, I want to see what you actually know how to build using these tools.

So the application process is like show us what you built using AI and it's a way to really start to evolve what roles look like.

Giving people a lot more ability and autonomy to, you know, take agency in their role in their career, but also to really play ahead, because now you can move as a kind of move a lot faster when instead of having to like go through five different steps to get something done. Yeah, someone has that ability to move much quicker is like, you know, one person with all these tools for product like LinkedIn. There is no shortage of features that customers want us to be building. And so by empowering people to do much more, it's like, oh my gosh, all of a sudden we can start to build many more things get things done quicker.

Respond to a customer, you know, request much quicker. So it's really exciting, but it requires to rethink the entire way that like jobs exist in the company. Yeah, I imagine that hiring is going to be so much different because what you're going to concentrate on are the skills that AI actually can't automate the bucket three that you were talking about. So you actually have these five seas, five capabilities in your book, which are all the things that AI can't automate and the types of human skills that we should really be concentrating on. Can you break that down for us? So the thesis there is, you know.

If a lot of people have an AI tool that they have access to, they can do a lot of what we've historically maybe called hard skills creating Excel spreadsheet or some sort of coding or etc. Then that becomes a little bit more democratized and what becomes more valuable and important are the actual unique human skills on top of it. We've historically talked about that as soft skills and when we call them soft skills it kind of feels like they're not that important or, you know, no need to pay attention to them. I run out of the probably the most important in my view.

To go above and beyond to stand out to really be effective in your job. Not only do you need to know how to use AI or the tools, but it's to be able to get things done communicate with people.

You know galvanized people to actually go and do something collaborate when things aren't easier people aren't getting along. There are these things that I think are really going to make people stand out the more we can focus on them and it's funny because I just think so much

“That everyone's talking about the AI tools and the AI skills, but those are going to become much more commoditized and democratized. So trying to figure out how to be great at these human skills. I think it's going to be the key.”

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For your $1 per month trial today at Shopify dot com slash profiting go to Shopify dot com slash profiting that Shopify dot com slash profiting. I'm wondering how you imagine companies will level up their employees in these skills and also like higher for these specific skills.

The the education system which you know to a large extent has been built for a different era and is probably passed as prime.

Has never really valued this ability to be teaching these you know softer skills.

“And if those are going to become the hot commodity, I think that is a society is going to be coming upon us to figure out how to ensure people have these skills and it's not a lot of focus for people right now.”

I think you get them by practicing them like you would anything else and there's a type of skills unfortunately you can't do alone like you can't learn to be a great communicator like by yourself you sit down and talk to someone and be able to look them in the eye and like have a great conversation. I think that you know one is a mindset shift at a society level and at a company level to figure out how to like really focus on this. And then you know I think upon that will start to see these ways where you know hiring against those skills will be much more you know common place in terms of how it works.

My favorite question right now for what it's worth any time I hire somebody for LinkedIn. I have two favorite questions like number one.

If if a friend or colleague of yours had never heard of LinkedIn before and asked you what it wasn't but it's for what would you say and sometimes you get like really really smart people.

You have all these amazing like you know technical skills who are like oh. I'd say it's like Facebook but for professionals it's like okay that's one way to say it. But you know then you get people are like oh well you know it's a great place you know to create academic opportunity and build your brand is like okay wow like some that it can actually like craft a story and communicate. Those me inability to leverage and use some of these softer skills EQ communication etc. and the second question I love to ask people that are viewing.

Everyone's going to know these questions by the way it's okay.

Tell me about something that you created in the world that never existed.

You know maybe a school club like I mean like I mean not not a company or an app like anything that you built and I'll usually get one or two answers one is the like oh what do you mean. What do you mean like what do you mean creative that didn't exist and I think that that's you know that shows a lack of creativity or courage or the thinking that oh the world just exists and I become part of it versus I can actually have agency to create something. Or you love people who are like oh my gosh let me tell you the list of like the 30 things I created you know I started this club at school and then I did this other thing when I was in college and it's like and here's the app that I created to help my like parents do their thing and it's like okay like that's the mentality that you're looking for.

“So you can kind of sus out some of these you know more human skills in the process but I think it's going to become much more commonplace moving forward.”

Yeah, by the way I love those questions I'm definitely stealing them. I know LinkedIn has a coaching program and I know for middle managers especially their role is going to shift a lot from you know just doing meetings and managing the team to actually coaching the team. Can you talk to us about that? So the first thing we try and we've been trying you know for a couple years now and it's like really successful is and people thought we were crazy when we did it is we said every employee has access to a career coach and not any accurate coach like a real human being career coach.

With the idea that you know going through a process like this our company can only be successful the people are able to adapt to the transformation. In order to adapt you need someone to help you figure this out you need a coach a mentor someone you can go to with questions that's not your manager to help you figure out like am I doing this right. Wait a second where are my skills lacking and my communicating correctly, et cetera, et cetera.

“It's been wildly successful I think it's a really important thing that most companies you know should try and adapt as well.”

But I guess your second point which is that this is all adapting and you know. If your manager is just someone who thinks that their job all day long is to ensure you're doing your tasks that job is going to become a lot less necessary moving forward. What's going to need to be there and be replaced is you know similarly someone that can coach you do your job better that can coach you to handle conflict that can coach you to ensure that the system set up correctly and know how to make. Heart rate of decisions you'll be able to do many more things with these tools and you ever thought was possible.

And that's a good thing on one hand and a bad thing on the other hand because all of a sudden if you think about you know you building a product and you have 10 people that can now do you know all these you know amazing things left and right that they didn't think or possible. And then there's going to become conflict at a certain point really quickly. So you know that manager's job now becomes ensuring how to get this people to work together correctly and sure they're you know they understand the lanes that they're swimming in and then handle conflict which is.

And it's probably going to become much more commonplace when people have much more agency to be building things so you know people have to really understand that. To succeed or the next you know a couple of years. You can't be operating the way you operate it historically in your career and I think that goes for middle managers as well as quite frankly almost every role that exists.

How as an entrepreneur your stack of skills really is your superpower so me for example it's like I started my career in radio. Then I went to marketing and I had Twitter and I had a blog with a hundred girls and like you had a galvanized and recruit and lead and I turned like all those skills to become a top 100 potcaster and. Grow network and all those things right and you've got a similar concept in your book called only and I thought that was really interesting and it's it's interesting how that's not only important for entrepreneurs now.

It's important for everybody to be more employable so talk to us about this concept of onlyness and how somebody can ensure that they've got a unique set of skills that's going to make them employ us. So I mean millions of people would probably love to have built what you have built or to have the success that you have had why do you think that you have been able to do it.

“I honestly think it's those five seas that you're talking about I think I've really great communication I have really great curiosity and courage and just do stuff without really thinking about it too much I just I just do.”

And so that's the point that that is what is unique to you and I imagine that you know having known you for like a few days now there's a couple other like really important things there as well that you are uniquely good at. But it's that understanding like again in a sea of where you know skills become more commoditized like what makes you stand out. If everyone at the push for a button can create a website or you know create a mobile app or you know do a lot of these things like what's going to make yours be unique and stand out what's going to allow you to go and you know when the next customer.

So understanding that about yourself is the place to start like what am I good at and how can I use that to my advantage my guess is most entrepreneurs actually. And we're just to survive you have to know what makes you unique I think most people who are not entrepreneurs don't think like that often and I think the world you know the labor market's going to be shifting a lot you're going to have to be thinking more entrepreneur really about your career no matter who you are.

“And so you know finding inside of yourself what makes you unique and really honing that evangelizing it is going to be the the key to success and you know that's why you can't just be like the same as everyone you can't just be.”

You know you know the the same is everyone trying to apply the job for the job and think you're going to get it you have to find a way to stand out right now and the people that do that are going to be the ones that succeed.

So I read a story about you that you had a manager once that told you that you would never succeed without him.

And Barbara Quarker and who I think went on your podcast told you something very similar. So talk to us about your onlyness and also the experiences that you've had that you think gave you the drive to become the CEO of one of the biggest companies in the world. I go drives me or probably a few fundamental things some are unique and some are you know pretty commonplace right wrangly like number one. What matters most to me is that. That I'm working on something that has a positive impact on the world.

Many people are out there building awesome technology companies you know awesome social networks. But the core of LinkedIn is that we built LinkedIn as a platform to create economic opportunity for every member of a global workforce and every single one of those words is chosen very intentionally.

When we build good products at LinkedIn people get jobs they you know create you know connections with people that they you know maybe never knew they start companies they learn new skills.

You know not a you know non for profit companies so like there's also a business model type all of that but we build it in a way that you know when we do you know well as a company you know people hopefully you know great get good outcomes from it. You know I always talk about. You know I try and find opportunities that are where we sit at the intersection of doing good and doing well and every single company in the world. I want to do well in business but when it you talk about doing good it's often an afterthought it's you know it's the last line in the PowerPoint presentation or it's the creation of a you know dot org website on the side but when you can seamlessly combine doing good and doing well.

“In what you're building I think there's real competitive advantage and that like really resonates and matters to me.”

I think I have a couple of you know human skills that are really important for me are communication and storytelling the amazing you know large employee based at LinkedIn.

Being able to talk about LinkedIn is one holistic thing instead of a bunch of five sidewalk things. How people understand how they connect to the mission, how they're work connect to the mission, however one is moving forward together. Create LinkedIn is one consistent coherent thing instead of like a you know just a massive mess for everyone's tripping over each other and can't get anything done and I think finally that's a storytelling challenge is communication challenge which is you know how do you.

You know set the right framework to also inspire someone to be like hey you know you are this part of this thing that ladders up to helping people find a job and wow you know you know get it every morning excited to do that one thing you know that makes you part of this bigger system but we're all moving together.

“So again, I think for me like you know you know very vision driven and then communication storytelling to probably bend the most important skills that I better work on.”

I want to touch on something that you are just a looting to which is that AI is really leveling the playing field and one of the things that you talk about in your book is how you're really big proponent of hiring for skills and not necessarily titles. I understand how the future is shaping in terms of how people will actually get hired based on their skills not necessarily their titles and what LinkedIn is doing to help support that. You know product that we sell commercially at LinkedIn is a product called LinkedIn recruiter it's used by millions of recruiters all day long to search LinkedIn database to find candidates to come join their company.

Number two where did this person used to work so basically it's like oh you know she went to Princeton she must be good or someone that used to work at Google is probably smart.

And when you filter down the LinkedIn member base by those two categories you quickly go from a billion people down to a very tiny group of people then it's a very tiny group of people that everyone is trying to go and recruit and. That's not good for anyone it's not good for these same people that are getting you know all the job you know requests it's not good for all the members that you know are super qualified or never getting reached out to. And these companies actually aren't hiring anyone because they're going after a tiny pool and competing after the same time.

So it's not a very efficient nor equitable you know use of the labor market on LinkedIn. Recently we've switched it to in the recruiter tool the first thing we ask you to do is to actually short or search by these skills necessary to do the job. And that's it not where did someone go to school etc. When you do that all of a sudden you learn two things number one there's a vastly repool of talent that actually exists on LinkedIn. Not everyone is going after those people and oftentimes those people are the most valuable people that you never knew existed.

So it's it's a much better, more efficient, more equitable way for the labor market to be running.

The problem is like we can build those tools a lot along but human nature always goes back to.

Oh well that's cool but like where does she go to school you know or where did he used to work. So it's as much of a mindset shift as it is a tool shift but I think we're making a lot of progress on it and ultimately you know.

“Being able to get hired for what you're good at not who you know or where you want to school I think it's going to be a really important thing for labor market moving forward.”

And it's not just like the skills you put on your LinkedIn profile but it's also. The knowledge that you share on LinkedIn the things that you share and the feed the insights that you share. I can't tell you the number of times people get new jobs you know part time gigs speaking give gigs or get invited to like you know come to a conference because of something they have shared on LinkedIn. And so you know your your reputation your profile is more than you know the things you type in statically on LinkedIn.

It's actually the act of conversations that you're continuously having as well it's showing your work. If you're done I think even now with AI you see these people who like frequently are like oh like look at this like cool app a bit with AI or. Wow like top copiles to do this crazy thing or today I use like cloud co work and I've like done this thing and you're like okay like why are you sharing that but. These are the people that are actually you know getting reached out to for jobs because they're showcasing their ability to be.

You know innovative in using these AI tools I think it's really really smart. I think that's the main your book your calling signaling right can you talk us through the three levers that can help you get noticed.

“I think you know first and foremost you have to ensure that you actually you know is is weird or you know crazy sounds like you have to establish your identity like online and put time and effort into it.”

You can't just like throw profile up there never think about it and expect great things to happen.

So that's number one you have to invest in time and effort in your personal brand.

I think networking has a bad rap sometimes it feels like you know like it's an old school way of doing things or I don't want to have to go and like focus on this but.

The way that you know people find opportunities get things done is often through people it's through who you know who can I reach out to to get help or who can I reach out to when they need help.

“I think one of the greatest things we see on LinkedIn is some Alaska question sometimes it's really vulnerable to ask a question on LinkedIn but like.”

Then you'll see this community pile on with ways to help them and I think it's really unique and then last you know the evolution of. I've kind of like showcasing who you are in your identity isn't just this like static resume anymore it has to be through unique knowledge and insights that you're sharing in the platform.

I'm not going to you don't have to be some crazy like LinkedIn thought leader or amazing you know creator like you you can just be someone who's like oh like.

I saw a post in my feed and like someone had a question and I answered in the comment and like I you know I'm trying to help them out like just participating in the community is one of the most important ways to get yourself out there and you know kind of signal the market it. You know not only who you are but you know how to do so. You know these are things that quite frankly someone like you or maybe the people listening to this podcast like no inherently but you know.

“There's millions of people don't you know understand these things and how important is to be intentional about you know yourself in your career so I think it's really important things to work on.”

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For a long time we've heard that LinkedIn is focusing on video but the impressions didn't show that now suddenly my videos are getting a lot more impressions.

“Also I am a part of this new monetization program which is really exciting where brands can basically find my profile and ask me to do sponsorships with them which I love.”

So talk to us about your features what you guys are focused on what you're pushing and then also how creators and people on LinkedIn and general are going to make more money on the platform like what are the ways like how are you thinking about it. Yeah, I'll say you know we are a little bit unique in an in our approach and that uniqueness may sometimes cause us to be a little bit later to the party than some of the other networks you know I mean super transparent. You think about LinkedIn is a platform where people find opportunity and make money you know like I said every minute on the platform you know 50 people in the world will start a new job because of LinkedIn.

It is the you know largest labor market in the world it is where you know nearly every company trying to hire someone is actively doing it and you know on the flip side everyone getting a job is going to the platform so people all day long are getting jobs to LinkedIn.

So historically we focused on again the efficiency of that labor market is typically for you know a lot of you know knowledge and more and more like you know frontline roles but not you know unique.

Like platform based roles like creators you look at the data and right now there are 4 million people whose full time job on LinkedIn is creator I mean they're not making their living on LinkedIn they're making the living somewhere in the world are trying to as a creator.

“And you know I think we've really kind of walking up to be like okay like you know we need to ensure this audience can be successful in creating opportunity on LinkedIn as well and so.”

You know we're trying and like really kind of investing in the tools that can help people you know showcase themselves you know not through what is historically on a professional platform but you know like long form text like that's what people like you know it's like now it's like short form video or any kind of video. And when we put video on LinkedIn we get like two reactions you know number one you know these you know folks that are maybe you know a lot further along in their career or you know senior executives companies are like oh wait a second like you know LinkedIn's not a place for video that's where you go to other platforms like.

No video on LinkedIn right and please and then like the end generation is like thank you finally like my goodness like I can like showcase who I am now that you actually have video and so we kind of see this it's just like the world of work like different generations working together or kind of like manifesting themselves on this platform. I think more and more video is like you know to your point starting to catch on great now someone like you is going to be investing your time and effort in sharing your amazing you know knowledge and insight with the community to help them be more productive.

You know we now have to invest in the platforms and the policies and the programs to help you be more successful on LinkedIn. You know when you do something it's like we use these advertisers like oh my gosh like how do I meet this person how do I work with this person is like okay well we you know. We're the largest like be to be like advertising platform on the internet as well how do we help connect these people so that you can actually you know make a living off it as well.

So we're investing more and actually you know creation of opportunity on the platform which you know creation of opportunity is always been the purpose of LinkedIn on the platform is a new thing.

We see the creators we also see it quite frankly in a role that is just exploding right now on LinkedIn which is around. You know data annotation or you know human AI valuation and the way that a lot of these AM models work. Is the following like if you're if you're an engineer working on one of these large language models like here's your day you maybe pick a topic like I don't know you know. You know you're job is to make sure the model is really good at cardiovascular health so you may be right 100 prompts you feed it to the model you get responses back.

“But you need to know whether or not the model is giving really good responses about cardiovascular health.”

So the next thing you have to do is go and try and find someone who's an expert in that to kind of look at this and be like oh yeah that's right that's wrong. That's been a market that's been moving now for a couple of years and really kind of you know growing and now we have that on LinkedIn which is that oh. Now a cardiovascular surgeon on LinkedIn can you know make money on the side by looking at you know some of these prompts in the model output grade them. Get it back to that engineer at one of the model companies who can then use that to retrain the model and you know a lot of what you know people.

So there's a real marketplace for that as well which has now started to grow on LinkedIn again your point of like how do we create more opportunity on the platform itself. Yeah so cool and I'm just so excited for all the things that LinkedIn is doing I've been such a fan of the platform for like 10 years now. I love it your book is called Open to Work now open to work on LinkedIn sometimes sometimes has a negative connotation like your desk or a firm job. And you've got this like little green badge and everybody knows that you're not employed.

Talk to us about the mindset shift of what it means to actually be open to work.

“First off we create you know it's open to work is a little green circle that exists on your LinkedIn profile that you can turn on if you want to signal to the community and that you open for work.”

We started it during COVID when you know the market was just you know really uncertain going crazy and you know really reshuffling all over the place. What most people turned it on for wasn't just a signal they're open for a job but to you know start a conversation with the community of other people who are. We want to be in a similar position and again like what's so important to LinkedIn or the job searching process is you're not in it alone you know there's a network of people around you that can help you out or when someone turns on that green banner and it's like oh my gosh I actually know this person I didn't know they were looking but they'd be really good for this job over here how can I help connect them to it.

It's a really strong signal to the community just like set the record straight like if you have that you know green banner on. You are 27% more likely to get higher so it's a very very valuable signal to the market what I think is more important than anything at this moment in time is like the green circle alone. This idea that I need to be put myself out there thinking differently leveraging my network leveraging the community adopting learning new skills is all that matters for the future of work and being able to navigate the transition that we're all going to go through no matter what your job is in the world of AI so open to work more than anything is a mindset shift on.

My careers in my own hands I have to put her to my own hands and I have to adapt for the moment around us right now and I know that when it comes to the way that our careers are going to change a lot more people will be entrepreneurs we're going to be holding more jobs than we ever had before and there's no such thing as a five year career plan everything is just really.

“I'm sure I don't know if I want to talk about that I learned you know kind of last night about you know you were no stranger to like having multiple jobs I mean I think that's a lot of the way the market is going right now and it's not about.”

You know it's not about having multiple jobs most of the up six but like the experiences that you get when you know like you can't get experience fast enough right now learning new things so. You know it's not about having a five year plan I think that that's outdated career advice but the best career advice right now is like hey over the next three months. I think that's a lot of the experiences that I want to try and learn and get to help you know kind of put those into my repertoire my profile so that I can go and do new when you need things.

Well Ryan it was such a pleasure to have you on the podcast your new book open to work I read it it is absolutely amazing.

If anybody is interested on how to level up their career in the age of AI I highly recommend the books so Ryan thanks again for being on the podcast. Yeah fam I'm so grateful that Ryan pulled back a curtain on where work is actually heading and gave us a real framework to navigate it. The bottom line from today is this your job or career isn't under threat to stop thinking about it that way your job is really under transformation. And the professionals who understand that shift will be the ones who stay in control and stay writing their own rules.

Here's what I want you to walk away with first stop thinking about your job as a title and start seeing it as a collection of tasks.

“Sit down this week and list your top 10 to 20 tasks and weekly responsibilities and start sorting them honestly into three buckets.”

The first automatable the second AI assisted the task that you can do with AI and the third the ones that are uniquely human only you can do. That one exercise will give you more career clarity than any five year plan ever could. Second, if you're dabbling in AI that all needs to change that is not enough chat GBT is not enough depth is the advantage spend 20 minutes every single day for the next several months.

Giving one AI tool real detailed context about your actual work problems start uploading your documents start creating skills start feeding AI your world so it becomes your second brain.

The people who invest in building out their AI now are going to be the ones operating on a completely different level. I've started doing this and it's totally leveled up my game I feel like I'm as productive as 10 people now thirdly.

Now is the time to start investing in your communication your creativity your courage where you weakest when it comes to human skills start working on that right now.

“These are not soft extras anymore these are your core product this week.”

I want you to focus on your communication we talked about how that's the number one job skill in demand right now.

So I want you to initiate a real conversation give somebody feedback resolve tension pitch an idea practice communication like it's a skill because it literally is.

“The future belongs to people who know what makes them irreplaceable and then go all in that is your work gap fam and if today's episode open your eyes share it with somebody who's career you care about.”

Drop us a five star review on Apple Spotify cast box wherever you listen to the show it genuinely helps us reach more listeners.

You can also watch the full conversation on YouTube and Spotify video and you can connect with me on Instagram @yabathala or LinkedIn by search and my name is Hala Taha and a massive shout out to the entire app team.

“It's been an incredible year and we got nominated for seven different awards this year.”

We got best performing podcast at the indie podcast awards. We got a huge nomination for best business and finance podcast at the I heart podcast awards. We got a bunch of NYC awards nominations and wins. I got a webby award honoree. I didn't quite get an nomination for a best business creator and so many great awards.

So shout out to the team for all your hard work. I couldn't have done this without you. This is your host, Hala Taha aka the podcast princess signing off.