AI will not replace technicians. It will equip them

Much of the conversation about artificial intelligence is about jobs that will disappear. In technical work, the more useful question is which jobs will change, and who will be ready. The answer, for now, is very few people.

AI is already reaching the trades. Diagnostic tools suggest faults in vehicles. Design software drafts solar layouts. Customer operations teams use AI to answer queries and summarise data. None of this replaces the technician. All of it rewards the technician who knows how to use the tool and when not to trust it.

• Diagnostics that point a technician to the likely fault

• Design tools that speed up solar and building layouts

• AI assistants in customer and data operations

• Automated reporting on site progress and quality

At IDEA, AI is a tool of the trade across every school. Automotive learners use data-driven diagnostics. Digital Business learners use AI tools and learn to check their output. And our School of Applied Computing, Data and AI goes further.

"The technician who can use AI well will outwork the one who cannot. We intend to train the first kind."

IDEA is developing one of the first competency-based AI curricula in Kenya's TVET system. The Applied Artificial Intelligence diploma trains learners to prepare data, build practical automation and deploy AI responsibly, on real problems set by our employer partners.

AI will not replace skilled people. It will widen the gap between people who have the skill to use it and people who do not. Our job is to make sure our learners are on the right side of that gap.