While some Ukrainians use artificial intelligence for work and study, others are already beginning to compete with algorithms for their own jobs. Automation is gradually entering HR, marketing, customer support, IT, and office work, changing the usual rules of the labor market. Businesses gain a tool to increase productivity, while employees face a new challenge – how not to become "redundant" in a world where a machine performs part of the functions increasingly faster. Which professions will be the first to feel the consequences of technological transformation, whether Ukraine is ready for the new digital reality, and who should protect workers from the risks of automation, was analyzed by UNN.
The rapid development of artificial intelligence is changing the realities of the Ukrainian labor market. What existed only in futuristic films a few years ago is now a daily occurrence. Algorithms are taking on more and more routine tasks, and companies are testing new models of automation and digital control over employee efficiency.
Iryna Prudnikova, Director of the HR agency Smart Solutions Ukraine, explains that artificial intelligence primarily displaces routine processes, but at the same time creates new requirements for employees.
Iryna Prudnikova, Director of the HR agency Smart Solutions Ukraine
Today, proficient AI users have competitive advantages over candidates who ignore mastering available tools
According to her, Ukraine is currently only at the beginning of a large-scale transformation of the labor market under the influence of artificial intelligence. However, changes are already taking place, and they concern not only technological professions. Automation is changing approaches to work in HR, marketing, customer support, IT, and a range of office professions.
AI will not replace a human in responsibility for the result. AI cannot set tasks for itself. It is these circumstances that will determine the list of new professions that will appear in the next 10-15 years
Among such professions, the HR specialist names, for example: Data trust architect, Algorithmic auditor, AI ethics compliance lead, Human-AI interaction designer, ML operations engineer, AI governance officer, and other specialists who will monitor the work of algorithms and be responsible for human interaction with new technologies.
New challenges
However, along with new opportunities, the labor market also faces new risks. One of them is so-called "algorithmic management," where decisions regarding workload, performance evaluation, or even employee layoffs are effectively made by a digital system. This very issue is being discussed in the Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine (FPU). The team of FPU Chairman Serhiy Byzov has for the first time included the topic of artificial intelligence in the Federation's official development strategy as a separate direction – "The Future of Work and AI."
IX Congress of the Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine
The FPU development strategy for 2026-2031, which Byzov presented at the IX Congress, provides for specific mechanisms to respond to these challenges:
- participation in the development of regulatory acts regarding the use of artificial intelligence in workplaces;
- protection of workers from "algorithmic management" through collective agreements;
- creation of a system of trade union career counseling to adapt people to new market requirements;
- training trade union leaders in the use of AI tools;
- monitoring the psychosocial risks of digitalization and professional burnout.
The Federation of Trade Unions is convinced that if work on the topic of artificial intelligence does not begin now, the rules of the new labor market will be written by large technology companies and employers. That is why the FPU insists that digitalization should not narrow the labor rights of workers, and the state must already begin forming rules for the use of new technologies in workplaces.