Image generated using Chat GPT – for depiction purposes only
By Tom Griffith, MD Midlandjobs.ie
Welcome back to work (ish). We’re not quite out of holiday mode just yet and we still have the fireworks displays over the New Year’s Eve Mullingar skies to look forward to.
But there’s been plenty of musings over sherry trifle during the past week, plenty of idle conversations and no shortage of online articles to get the creative electrons flowing again.
Some of the headlining on AI has been turning negative. Plenty of it indeed, for good reason. But a consideration which tumbled to me (somewhere between the Silent Santa night and Spongebob the Movie over the past few days), is that Agentic AI could also possibly be the only thing that will actually save some long-standing Midlands businesses over the coming decades. Like, “the only thing”!! And potentially lots of businesses.
In my role with Midlandjobs, I get contacted by lots of local businesspeople, perhaps approaching the last third of their career, starting to look to the future and wondering what’s to become of the thriving businesses they’ve built up over decades, whenever they no longer have the same energy levels that they currently have to drive them on.
Many of them are either starting to recruit, or they’ve already tried and failed to source people from their industry sector to match their levels of expertise, leaving them a bit bemused as to where to turn next. The current level of skills shortage was never in the script when they were setting out in business. A well-crafted recruitment campaign can potentially hold some of the solution to such problems. But who would want to be betting their entire retirement fund in the form of the continuation of their family business, on the chances of being able to source and retain a suitable replacement for themselves in the current labour market? Not me anyways.
Step forward agentic AI. Now much is being made of the wonders of generative AI and all that it can create in the time it takes to pull a Christmas cracker. Filling up our social media flows with useless AI slop, wasting our time that we’ll never get back. But far less attention is being drawn to Agentic AI and it’s potential ability to automate work processes. Potentially buying us lots of time. Time that we can use to solve more substantial business problems, like who’s going to take over from us when we do finally hang up our Santa boots.
Yes, there are valid concerns that the introduction of AI will replace some roles which would otherwise be filled by real people. Especially at entry level. But what about the roles for which NO suitable applicants even exist out there whatsoever? What about the many boring roles, tasks and sub-tasks which no-one really wants to do anymore? The roles which have evolved over time and for which the exact right combination of skillsets don’t even exist in the form of one person. Of which there are also potentially a great number.
I know personally of at least 5 successful, viable, profitable Midlands businesses in vastly different industry sectors, for which there is no obvious succession plan. (I also know of one which has already closed for this very same reason). Put together, these companies could be supporting as many as 50 full-time jobs and a further 10 or so part-time or indirect roles. Aggregated over the whole region, and this could represent a serious risk to the local economy.
That is not to say that Agentic AI can immediately solve such problems or that it even should. But with the potential for some of these essential local companies to just permanently shut their doors, not even to sell up, but to actually close down altogether, I think it’s at least worth giving serious consideration in 2026 to how such companies can be supported and possibly saved from extinction through the gradual gearing up and adoption of Agentic AI. Even as a possible fall-back position. This can take some planning, it would take serious commitment to digitalisation and workflow design. And in the end, it might only make up part of the overall solution. But better that than the loss to the region of a whole cohort of companies owned by people of a certain age group, and all for the want of a bit of collaboration, planning and forward thinking.
To be revisited. Happy New Year.