Gartner’s crystal ball foresees an emerging ‘super class’ of technologies Credit: Thinkstock ORLANDO – Gartner sees things like robots and drones replacing a third of all workers by 2025, and whether you want to believe it or not, is entirely your business. This is Gartner being provocative, as it typically is, at the start of its major U.S. conference, the Symposium/ITxpo. Take drones, for instance. “One day, a drone may be your eyes and ears,” said Peter Sondergaard, Gartner’s research director. In five years, drones will be a standard part of operations in many industries, used in agriculture, geographical surveys and oil and gas pipeline inspections. “Drones are just one of many kinds of emerging technologies that extend well beyond the traditional information technology world — these are smart machines,” said Sondergaard. Smart machines are an emerging “super class” of technologies that perform a wide variety of work, both the physical and the intellectual kind, said Sondergaard. Machines, for instance, have been grading multiple choice for years, but now they are grading essays and unstructured text. This cognitive capability in software will extend to other areas, including financial analysis, medical diagnostics and data analytic jobs of all sorts, says Gartner. “Knowledge work will be automated,” said Sondergaard, as will physical jobs with the arrival of smart robots. “Gartner predicts one in three jobs will be converted to software, robots and smart machines by 2025,” said Sondergaard. “New digital businesses require less labor; machines will be make sense of data faster than humans can.” Among those listening in this audience was Lawrence Strohmaier, the CIO of Nuverra Environmental Solutions, who said Gartner’s prediction is similar to what happened in other eras of technological advance. “The shift is from doing to implementing, so the doers go away but someone still has to implement,” said Strohmaier. IT is a shift, although a slow one, to new types of jobs, no different than what happened in the machine age, he said. The forecast of the impact of technology on jobs was also a warning to the CIOs and IT managers at this conference to consider how they will adapt. “The door is open for the CIO and the IT organization to be a major player in digital leadership,” said David Aron, a Gartner analyst. CIOs have been steadily gaining authority, and 41% of CIOs now report to the CEO, a record level, said Aron. That’s based on data from 2,810 CIOs globally. To be effective leaders, Gartner argues that CIOs have shifted from being focused on measuring things like cost to being able to lead with vision and describe what their business or government agency must do to take advantage of smarter technologies. Related content news Businesses lack AI strategy despite employee interest — Microsoft survey Microsoft’s fourth annual Work Trend Index survey shows that workers are coming to grips with generative AI tools, but leaders aren’t convinced they have a proper deployment strategy in place. By Matthew Finnegan May 08, 2024 6 mins Microsoft Generative AI IT Skills news analysis Apple Silicon sets scene for a new AI ecosystem With its new iPads, Apple presses home the message that Apple Silicon is built for AI. By Jonny Evans May 08, 2024 12 mins Apple Generative AI iPad news The CHIPS Act money: A timeline of grants to chipmakers The Department of Commerce is divvying up $52 billion in the hopes of spurring on-shore chip manufacturing in the US. Here's what's been allocated and where the money is going. By Lucas Mearian May 08, 2024 5 mins CPUs and Processors Government Manufacturing Industry reviews Arc browser for Windows — better than Chrome? This might just be the best web browser for power users. But you’ll have to rewire your brain. By Chris Hoffman May 08, 2024 13 mins Windows Browsers Productivity Software Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe