The story of Mark Quinn generally begins with an end: a technological framework experienced by companies like Apple and Amazon which, in the ultimate technological irony, was laid down because of the AI. But the title lacks the real story. The layoff was not the end. This is the moment when the world has changed for him, and the beginning of a trip that saw him transform the very technology that made his work obsolete into his most intimate collaborator, career advisor and even parental coach.
It is not only a story on technological disturbances; It is a deeply human story of adaptation in the face of obsolescence. It is a roadmap for what happens after the initial shock, when fear disappears and only one terrifying question remains: now what?
For Quinn, the answer started with a revelation. Before his departure in May 2023, he had an experience that rocked him. An operational challenge that brought him and his team, four months of intense work to be resolved was presented to GPT-4 as an experience.
“In 30 seconds, he spits not only the answer, but the complete methodology, which we thought was the intelligent adaptations we understood,” recalls Quinn. “When I saw this, I realized that the world had changed. This is the moment I said that we should be completely.”
He was immediately, but soon he came out. The very efficiency that he helped implement a human workforce from 3,000 people with AI finally eliminated his own role. He was a ghost in the machine he had helped to build.
But instead of succumbing to the fear that seizes so much, Quinn made a conscious choice. He decided to learn the language of the ghost.
“For me, it was a moment of awakening to realize what is really going on,” he says. “The world had been overthrown. The world is no longer round. Now it’s a triangle, and I have to sail in this new world order. ”
His first step was to reject the common perception of AI. He implores people to do the same. “Do not consider AI as a tool. Do not consider it as a search engine,” he insists. “These companies have made themselves huge by making them look like chatbots. They are not. The more you can think of AI as a collaborator, as the best expert in the world in everything you need to sit down next to you, the more you remove it. ”
By putting this theory to the test, Quinn started what he calls the process of “Ai-Iterived Me”. He built a personalized GPT, a personal AI agent, to guide him. He nourished her CV, his skills and fears, and asked him a simple question: what should I do?
The result was a 120 -day detailed AI application plan. He told her what to learn, who to talk to and what tools to master to sail in his new “triangular world”. It was a survival program, prescribed by the very force that had threatened it.
This new collaboration gave its most surprising result when Quinn was hunting for work. He came across a publication for a role at Pearl.com, but he first succeeded. “He has not read at all like the kind of work I have done in my past,” he says.
A week later, he saw her again. This time, he traveled it in his “career boyfriend” GPT. The machine’s response was a revelation. “He came back and said,” Mark, I understand that it doesn’t really look like a surface match, but you have to be deeper. “And that explained to me the connections that I did not see. The AI rewritten his CV and his cover letter for the role. He obtained the post.
The contrast between his past and his present is a bright snapshot of the future of the work of knowledge.
“Previously, I directed hundreds of thousands of humans in large operational and complex groups,” explains Quinn. “And now I lead a team of zero. It’s me and my army of agents. I am here at my office with four different computer screens, probably six different agents at any time. And that’s my team.”
His new job is to reclaim the whole business to take advantage of AI, transforming work and its inhabitants, a role that his AI collaborator found for him, a role that did not exist in his old round world.
But perhaps the deepest transformation occurred not in his office, but at home. The ghost was domesticated. Quinn, a divorced father of two children, brought his AI collaborator into the most intimate corners of his life. He built a GPT “Kid Coach”, was categorical with his own parental philosophies, to help him navigate, to set up allowances to help his children through difficult social situations.
The most powerful example came from his 13 -year -old daughter, who has learning challenges. His manual of social studies was a nocturnal source of conflict. The vocal text software was robotic and creaky. Thus, Quinn began to deposit the chapters in an AI tool and transform them into engaging podcasts.
“It came from me having to chat every night with my child to have it read, she impatiently awaits him and having to put him in a box because she appreciated so much,” he said, the pride of her palpable voice.
However, this proximity to AI also surfaced the deeper anxieties. History pivots a question from her eldest daughter, the one that echoes a global fear. “She expressed that she was afraid,” shares Quinn. “She asked me,” Will IA take all our jobs? ” And “will the AI manage the world?” She didn’t think it as a disposable question.
It’s a moment that founds the whole story. For all his optimism, Quinn understands fear because he lives with it. His answer to her daughter is the same as her message to the world: the concern is valid, but the only way to follow is by commitment, not on avoidance. We have to build the railings to make sure that AI is good.
This leads to questions that even Mark Quinn, a scout sent to this new strange territory, cannot answer. When conversations turn to the future, to a world where AI performs all entry -level work, it is asked where the next generation of leaders comes from. How to gain experience when the entry points have been automated?
His answer is refreshing and honest. “I don’t know,” he admits. “I think that over time, what we will see is my theory, but it is loose, is that we will see something like enlarged learning programs where companies mainly hire workers who do not really do a lot of work for years to develop them.”
It is an amorphous conclusion for a amorphous period. Mark Quinn does not have a crystal ball. What he has is a story, a will that the same force that can look like a destructive ghost can also become a creative partner. He was caught off guard once. Now the work of his life is to make sure that others do not have to be. His message is clear: stop being afraid. Go down the stands.
The game has already started.
