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Vlad Fu started his career as a software engineer and eventually founded his own software agency, but over the past year his big job opportunity has been as a freelance artificial intelligence expert. Hu is not alone. The rise of generative AI is rapidly reshaping the freelance tech job market, with more AI-related job postings from employers and searches among job seekers on career sites like LinkedIn, Upwork, and Fiverr. and is surging across freelance recruitment platforms.
Three years ago, becoming an AI expert required “deep knowledge of machine learning algorithms, deep learning AI in general, and a lot of technical things,” said Hu, who works on chatbot implementation projects through Fiverr. .
According to Indeed data, generated AI-related job postings on Indeed’s platform increased by nearly 250% from July 2021 to July 2023.
According to Microsoft-owned LinkedIn, OpenAI’s main investment backer, LinkedIn member searches for Gen AI terms have continued to increase since the large-scale language model was first made publicly available in November 2022. Since the beginning of April, the number of posts by his LinkedIn members in the US mentioning Gen AI keywords has increased 25% month over month. By June, AI keywords like “ChatGPT,” “prompt engineering,” and “prompt crafting” were being added to profiles 15 times more frequently than at the beginning of the year.
“Many companies are looking for ways to integrate AI into their business platforms and collaborate with skilled freelance developers,” a Fiverr spokesperson said.
Hu said companies interested in implementing ChatGPT or similar AI bots into their apps often contact him to understand the technology. Fiverr has seen an explosion of interest in AI-related video creation over the past six months and is hiring companies looking for AI app development experts, a spokesperson said.
Demand for AI freelance professionals is set to continue to grow, according to LinkedIn, which found in a June survey of business executives that 44% of Americans intend to expand their use of AI technology over the next year. I found out something. 47% say they expect to see an increase in productivity.
“AI is already driving changes in the workforce,” Dr. Karin Kimbrough, chief economist at LinkedIn, wrote in a recent paper. report They found that just under half of executives say AI will improve their productivity. “Over the past year, we have seen professionals around the world rapidly adopt AI skills. It’s happening in tandem with the fact that we’re increasingly looking for people with knowledge of how to do things.”
Freelancers who are experts in AI have an opportunity to take advantage of the lack of AI skills among existing industry professionals across economic sectors. For example, in the US job market, the sector that LinkedIn categorizes as the Technology, Information, and Media sector has the highest number of AI-proficient members, at just 2.2%. Other industries, such as retail and financial services, are rapidly adopting AI core competencies, but the percentage of current skilled employees is very low.
Freelance recruitment platform Upwork, which recently signed a deal with OpenAI to connect companies with experts in its large-scale language models, brings the total number of AI skills sold by professionals to more than 250. It states that there is. According to Margaret Lilani, Upwork’s vice president of talent, there are multiple paths to AI consulting, which require a strong foundation in computer science, knowledge of machine learning algorithms, and a programming language such as Python. proficiency or experience in data management and analysis is often required across the job.
Many AI professionals also have relevant college degrees and experience, such as bachelor’s or master’s degrees in fields such as computer science or engineering. Still, “ultimately to land a job in AI, he needs to demonstrate that he has the skills, ability and expertise to tackle a particular project,” Lilani said.
Online learning company Udacity has seen a 33% increase in interest in AI-based courses such as Deep Learning, AI Programming with Python, AI for Trading, Machine Learning DevOps Engineers, Computer Vision, and Natural Language Processing over the past year . One of the popular courses. “To meet this demand, approximately 20% of our current content development roadmap includes generative AI and generative AI-related content,” said Victoria Paparian, General Manager of Consumer at Udacity. states.
For those who are not yet on the job market and are interested in the AI field, Lilani suggests taking a computer science class to get an early start. She says the foundation of programming languages needed for AI expertise will be built, especially for high school students who want to become familiar with many of the components of her AI field. He added that unique educational methods such as YouTube videos and blogs focused on AI skills are increasingly sought after among the workforce. As professionals of all kinds in the industry advance in their careers, it’s important to learn new concepts and tools like ChatGPT.
Hu said they will start with the basics, including using OpenAI tools such as ChatGPT, ChatGPT API, Dall-E, and davinci. But he added that becoming proficient in these areas of AI is just the beginning. It’s important to spend time deciding how you will use these tools in your business. The value of AI is limited by the user’s application of the technology, so knowledge must be supplemented with the intent to use it. “What’s really important is how to bridge the gap with real-world problems,” Hu said.