Around the world, companies and their leaders are navigating an accelerated technology landscape that is changing their business models, how they invest, and the people they hire. To understand the workplace that will result from this evolution, the George Washington University is convening industry watchers, researchers, technology experts and business leaders for two days of discussions.
“The Future of Work is Now” is the focus of the GW Business & Policy Forum 2025, which unfolds at the university on Oct. 21 and 22.
“We want the forum to do two things. We want to bring policymakers, practitioners, researchers and students all together to discuss issues that are pertinent in tomorrow’s workplace and to learn from one another,” said Sevin Yeltekin, dean of the GW School of Business, which organizes the conference. “And as educators, as a school in the business of developing the leaders of the future, we want to have a voice in how this industry evolution unfolds.”
The annual GW Business & Policy Forum, now in its third year, showcases leaders from the private and public sectors addressing the most significant emerging issues affecting global business, markets, U.S. competitiveness and regulation.
The first day of the 2025 conference features presentations and hands-on workshops for GW students. On the second day, expert speakers will discuss how to negotiate AI risks while simultaneously harnessing its power to optimize business sectors. Panelists and speakers from McKinsey, Arcadia, Accenture and other companies will discuss how organizations can future-proof by thinking in new ways about their business models, the way they identify and prepare leaders and their relationship with technology, most notably artificial intelligence (AI).
The conference is followed by a networking reception.
“The big challenge for so many businesses is that AI will disrupt them. The question is to what degree it will disrupt them,” said Gallup Chair Jim Clifton, who will take part in a fireside chat with Yeltekin at the conference. “We also all have to change our relationship to technology. You’ll have to tap the power of AI. And I mean everyone. Young people coming out of college will have to upskill themselves with AI. So will construction workers. And managers of restaurants.
“They will all need to know how to use AI.”
As evidence of technology’s dominance in the future, Clifton pointed to the enormity of the technology-related deals currently in the news, among them Nvidia Corp.’s estimated $100 billion investment in OpenAI, Nvidia’s $5 billion investment in Intel on chips for personal computers, and Oracle’s talks with Meta related to a $20 billion cloud computing partnership. This push to elevate U.S. competitiveness, he noted, is countered by the tremendous danger for businesses that do not adapt appropriately.
He said companies like his, as well as law firms, consulting firms and public relations firms are already undergoing widespread layoffs as AI systems take over tasks that once relied on human expertise.
Importance of human input
Although much of the noise around the future of work focuses on technology, global work futurist Diana Wu David, another speaker at the conference, cautioned that human input is still critically important.
“The workplace of tomorrow, to be thriving and adapting, is going to have to celebrate the human element. The people who do that best will win,” said David, who will join a conference panel examining new workplace trends and strategies. Also on the panel are Greater Washington Board of Trade President and CEO Jack McDougle and GW Professor of Management Chris Kayes.
“The outcomes in every single industry are about building the future leaders of the company,” said David, director of futures for ServiceNow Futures, which helps global enterprises with their AI transformation. “If it’s an investment firm, they’re thinking about the disruption from AI and whether the way they manage onboarding … is relevant for their next generation of leaders. You don’t want to onboard young talent into legacy mindsets.”
David said it’s not simply that organizations need to change gears. They must redesign their work for new business models and opportunities. She said workplace talent of the future must be able to “really scan the horizon, understand what is going on in multiple industries and have some divergent thinking to test assumptions and then to converge on an idea.
“The speed of change and the speed of technology make it much easier to start eight things and to test to see which is the one to double-down on. It’s about placing a lot of small bets and seeing which ones will have the most potential in the future,” she added. “It’s about the ability to pivot quickly—and pivot your resources as well.”
The volatility of these workplace changes has led business schools, including GW’s, to a turning point. For the next generation of business leaders to navigate uncertainty and adapt to continuous change, they may need different skillsets.
“At the GW School of Business, we are embracing the technology,” said Yeltekin. “We’re not scared by it, nor do we want to be passive participants in it. We want to be in the business of how to use these technologies in effective ways.”
GW already builds digital tools into its curriculum, and the dean predicted that emerging technology would become more deeply embedded in its degree and certificate programs, especially at the point where AI, data analytics and domain knowledge intersect.
“I want us to think thoughtfully about how to make the best of this, how to feel comfortable with the technology and use it,” she said.
Yeltekin said too often the discussion within higher education concentrates on academic integrity issues in the age of AI.
“While important, that’s not where our sole focus should be. Nor are the doomsday scenarios,” Yeltekin said.
The dean said that the greatest challenge may be the need to rethink how people acquire the experience required for the jobs of the future.
“Imagine a world in which we are farming out a lot of things to AI. We are doing away with the lower-level assistants or analysts or associates. But people gain experience from working at those different levels, so where will the top talent come from? Where will they build the experience they need?”
Gallup’s Clifton said college graduates will need to ask themselves if they have upskilled enough that they bring high value to the companies where they seek jobs. U.S. businesses will be looking for job candidates they see as “stars”—and they will pay a premium to acquire that talent, he predicted.
David said current business leaders may have to work against their natural instincts in thinking about tomorrow’s workplace. For example, they may need to assign their younger workers much harder problems while also pairing them with more experienced mentors to accelerate the way they build their abilities.
Yeltekin said she will be watching the conference presentations for data-driven examples that showcase the productivity gains being made through AI.
“There is a lot of talk about potential. There is a lot of talk about the future and what it will look like. My feeling is that a lot of companies are still trying to figure out how to integrate AI,” said Yeltekin. “As an economist and as a business school dean, I would love to be able to point to actual data that shows the beginning of the transformation already underway.”
For more information on the GW Business & Policy Forum 2025: The Future of Work is Now, see the full conference schedule or contact SBEvents
gwu [dot] edu (SBEvents[at]gwu[dot]edu).
Register here for the Oct. 22 sessions at Jack Morton Auditorium, 805 21st St. NW, Washington, D.C. Tickets are available for purchase by GW alumni and general audience members. Tickets are complimentary for GW students, staff and faculty. The workshops and presentations for students on Oct. 21 have sold out.