Are you ready to navigate the AI transformation with confidence? As your guide, Todd Rhoades from chemistrystaffing.com, I'm here to illuminate the path through the burgeoning world of AI, as it makes waves in the labor market and ministry. In this enlightening episode, we confront the staggering predictions: a $4.1 trillion economic impact and 44% of labor influenced by AI. But don’t fret; I'm armed with insights on why human skills, particularly in pastoral and church leadership, remain irreplaceable, regardless of AI's advancements. Together, we'll explore how AI may alter tasks, but it's the human heart that truly defines the essence of ministry.
Embark on a journey with me, as I share actionable strategies for church leaders to adapt to the AI era without losing the soul of their mission. I stress the importance of staying informed and selectively harnessing AI to enhance the efficiency of church operations. We discuss the vital role of upskilling and reskilling, ensuring your team is equipped with AI-relevant knowledge to thrive. This episode is not just a wake-up call, but a playbook on balancing technical acumen with the timeless human touch that is fundamental in leading a community through change. Join us as we embrace the technical revolution, safeguarding the core of what makes ministry work so unique and invaluable.
Are you ready to navigate the AI transformation with confidence? As your guide, Todd Rhoades from chemistrystaffing.com, I'm here to illuminate the path through the burgeoning world of AI, as it makes waves in the labor market and ministry. In this enlightening episode, we confront the staggering predictions: a $4.1 trillion economic impact and 44% of labor influenced by AI. But don’t fret; I'm armed with insights on why human skills, particularly in pastoral and church leadership, remain irreplaceable, regardless of AI's advancements. Together, we'll explore how AI may alter tasks, but it's the human heart that truly defines the essence of ministry.
Embark on a journey with me, as I share actionable strategies for church leaders to adapt to the AI era without losing the soul of their mission. I stress the importance of staying informed and selectively harnessing AI to enhance the efficiency of church operations. We discuss the vital role of upskilling and reskilling, ensuring your team is equipped with AI-relevant knowledge to thrive. This episode is not just a wake-up call, but a playbook on balancing technical acumen with the timeless human touch that is fundamental in leading a community through change. Join us as we embrace the technical revolution, safeguarding the core of what makes ministry work so unique and invaluable.
AI is all the rage and I can't believe. I've never seen a technology and I'm into technology I've never seen a technology take off so quickly. It's just been a little over a year since anyone had even heard of something like ChatGPT, so let's talk about it. This topic is AI Can't Do this, but you can. My name is Todd Rhodes, I'm one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffingcom and I'm your host here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Okay, ai can't do this, but you can. We have seen just exponential growth, and I've been following this pretty closely for the past year, going on a year and a half the rise of AI and its potential impact. You've heard stories on the news about how many people think that AI and artificial intelligence is going to affect the labor market. It already has. We did a podcast a while back about how Google was laying off, I believe, 30,000 workers because they're switching their whole game plan based on how they're using AI, and AI changes the game. But here's my encouragement for you today, human skills still rule. Let me give you the scope of a little bit, though. Ai technology is expected to have just a significant impact on the labor market Estimates of about $4.1 trillion of economic effect. That's $4.1 trillion of economic effect, and analysts are saying that up to 44% of all labor is going to be affected in some way. If we have our heads in the sand and think that this won't affect how we do ministry, we're really fooling ourselves. I think AI is a significant effect on particularly low skilled jobs. I'm not saying that you have a low skilled job, but low skilled jobs, that they're going to be the most affected.
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Here's what I want to bring out to you today how to respond. I'll cut to the chase. Ai cannot replace you pastor. Ai cannot replace you church leader, so can significantly contribute to efficiency and functionality, and I think we in the church world would be wise to try and figure out exactly how it does contribute, or how it could contribute, to our efficiency and our functionality. But listen, in our work, we have to maintain human skills, emotional agility and empathy and vulnerability. And I'm telling you, ai can replace tasks. It's really good at replacing tasks, but it can't replicate hard. And as long as we are emphasizing human skills and growth, mindset, adaptability, like I said that, emotional, emotional agility and empathy and vulnerability, your job is going to be just fine.
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Okay, what are the lessons here? What should we be doing? We're going to be picking this up tomorrow and talking a little bit about how AI how I think AI will change the church, but here are some thoughts that I have today as we introduce this topic, and the first is that we are in an AI era. There is no doubt about it. This technology is moving, and it's moving fast. It's got some people freaked out. It's got other people excited. It's both a threat and an opportunity, and it could be a threat or an opportunity depending on our preparedness as well, and leaders who, during this time, balance their technical proficiency with human skills are going to be able to navigate these changes much, much easier.
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What should you be doing as you think about AI and as you think about the role of AI in your church and in your ministry? First thing I think that's really important is that, first of all, you just stay informed about AI and advancements and think about how to effectively apply them in both your life and your work, and specifically for churches. Here are some ideas, and we're still early in this process. So if you've not done any of this, if you still have our shunning anything AI, maybe some of these tips will help you so that you don't get left in the dust. First of all, train staff with skills that are relevant for the AI area through upskilling and reskilling initiatives. Okay, so what we're saying there is that maybe you don't know about AI much, but younger people do, and they're already implementing it into the work and if, as you hire people in the future, they're going to be coming with these skills. So it's important that you at least try to reach out and train staff so that they know what's available and what's possible and what the what.
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The cautions are as well and this just goes to whether it's AI or anything else cultivating a culture of learning and development, and there may be some ways that you can integrate, integrate some of the artificial intelligence into some tasks and enhance efficiency. That can help you focus more on that human aspect. Now, I'm not asking you to tell him you, hey, we should have chat, gpt or AI or sermons, or do our spiritual care. That's no, that's not it at all, but there are some ways that. Can it write social media posts? Can it? Can it enhance your time through other areas? Absolutely. Here's something that I think is really important as well, and it's just a philosophy, as this is changing so fast, but as as you think of how AI is going to shape the future, let's ensure that we shape AI in the church and in our work.
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If we don't aggressively see how to use this and how not to use that, if we just let it take over, it will. So we need to figure out what ways are there even today that we can leverage AI to improve our productivity with our staff and ourselves and improve our performance across operations. And I know I've been toying around with different ways to use AI in my work at chemistry staffing and it does not, I'm telling you. It does not replace one-on-one interaction with churches. It doesn't replace one-on-one interaction with candidates. It doesn't show that empathy and that agility. It doesn't show emotion and vulnerability. It doesn't do any of that. But it can help with some of the productivity and some of the tasks and some of the writing that I find that I have to do on a daily basis. It's been actually a great help to me in some of those areas, but there's other areas that absolutely not know that it's not going to make a difference and those are the really important people skills that AI will not be able to replace. So we're going to talk more about this tomorrow.
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But just remember, ai is really it's. It's not something I don't think to be feared. Some people may disagree with me on that but it's also not something that should be ignored, and a lot of times in the church we tend to ignore things until it's too late. We can't ignore them any longer. Lean in, find out what you can, and there's all kinds of resources on the Internet. If you haven't even just played around with chat, gbt or, my goodness, google has. Google has an AI option, I think it's called Gemini. Microsoft has one called co-pilot, and a lot of these are free that you can go and just play around with and get to use a little bit to see what exactly and how exactly it might be able to help you in your ministry.
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Today is not the day to have your head in the sand with technology, but the church likes to do that. But don't be one of those people. Don't worry, it's not going to replace you. All right, we'll be back here tomorrow. We'll talk about how I think AI will change the church, whether you like it or not. Any comments on today's episode or any episodes you would like to hear in the future. Reach out to me anytime at podcastandchemistrystaffingcom. Until tomorrow, have a great day.