This event will be taking place in at the University of Westminster, Baker Street Campus, 35 Marylebone Road, London NW1 5LS
Every previous wave of automation had a next rung. Factory workers became service workers, service workers became knowledge workers, and the ladder held. This time the layer being automated is the one project professionals stand on: coordination, reporting, status-chasing, the orchestration work that sits between systems and people. And the rung above it is being automated at the same time.
Chris Simmance builds AI tools for a living and has written a book about what they do to careers, including his own clients’. In this session he sets out which project management tasks are exposed and which are durable, why the standard retraining advice fails this time, and a practical self-audit method for working out where you actually stand. Expect numbers rather than hype, and a fair amount of discomfort. Copies of The Next Rung will be available on the night.
Speaker
Chris Simmance is the author of The Next Rung: Why AI is Breaking the Career Ladder, and How to Build a New One (Practical Inspiration Publishing, 19th January 2027). He builds AI systems for a living: Orca, his managed AI executive assistant platform, is live with paying clients, and through The OMG Center he advises professional services firms on AI adoption. This means he spends his working week building the tools that remove orchestration work from businesses, and the book is his honest account of what that does to the people who do it. He also owns Windmill Garage, a 40-year-old family garage business, which AI has shown no interest in so far. Chris is a Liveryman and Court Assistant of the Worshipful Company of Entrepreneurs, and a Freeman of the City of London. Endorsers of the book include Sir Rod Aldridge and Peter Cheese, Chief Executive of the CIPD.
