PwC’s UK Chief Urges Young Employees to Increase Office Hours Due to AI Impact on Jobs
The UK boss of accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers has suggested that junior staff should increase their office hours in order to secure faster promotions. This recommendation comes as artificial intelligence is expected to assume routine responsibilities that were typically assigned to younger employees.
Generative AI will eliminate “tasks that our junior staff used to train and cut,” Kevin Ellis, chairman of PwC UK, said in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Without those roles, “you have to somehow get people through the career path faster,” he added.
“It’s a lot more face-to-face meaning and a lot more development,” Ellis said. “So you have to get people in the office to work more together.”
Companies have been trying to get staff to spend more time in the office, and surveys last year showed that managers would like less remote work, while workers want to maintain habits formed during the pandemic. Ellis was adamant that younger staff in particular should avoid the temptation to work from home.
“If you’re asking me for my opinion on how you’re going to be successful in your career,” he said. “I would be in the office four to five days a week.”
His comments came as PwC published a report showing that UK businesses are adopting AI faster than their international counterparts. The survey of more than 4,600 global CEOs found that 42 per cent of UK bosses said they had adopted technology in the past year, compared to 32 per cent globally.
Ellis said that in the audit sector, AI would likely mean that clients are billed by the hour. “Performance-based payments and efficient licensing and charging for technology and technology assets will become more important,” he said.
The PwC study also showed that British CEOs are much more positive about the global economy than about domestic growth. Six in 10 expect the global economy to improve, while fewer than four in 10 said the same about UK output.
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