A Fortune 500 CEO answers FoxTalk’s question about what students should learn for AI-era jobs
Dave Bozeman, CEO of C.H. Robinson, said students should go deep in their field, understand technology and use it to solve real customer problems.
ASPEN, Colo. — Dave Bozeman, president and CEO of C.H. Robinson, one of the largest logistics companies in the country, spoke at Fortune Brainstorm Tech on June 9 about how AI is already changing supply chain work. The company is not treating AI as a future experiment. Bozeman said C.H. Robinson has already re-engineered parts of the business around it.
On stage, Bozeman described an AI quoting agent that now responds to customer quote requests 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Before that, he said, human workers could reach about 60% of those quote requests, and when they did, it could take 17 to 20 minutes to respond.
Now, he said, the company has an agent responding to all quote requests in about 31 seconds.
If AI is already doing more of the work, what should people entering the workforce learn?
FoxTalk asked Bozeman what advice he had for students who want to enter supply chain work now that AI and automation have changed the field.
Bozeman said students should learn, stay curious and “go deep into the field.” He said students need to understand the scale of supply chain work, not just the tools being used to automate parts of it.
“Don’t be afraid of technology,” Bozeman said. “Technology will always have a partner in a human.”
C.H. Robinson, founded more than 100 years ago, connects shippers and carriers across global supply chains. Bozeman said the company now thinks of itself as a technology company serving logistics.
That shift is not just branding. Bozeman said C.H. Robinson’s AI tools are changing what people do inside the company.
“We’ve shifted our work,” Bozeman said. “We fundamentally re-engineered the company.”
He said the company will still employ people, but not necessarily in the same roles.
“We will have humans go in contact with customers, solving customers’ problems, and going up the value stack.” Bozeman said.
Bozeman’s advice points students toward the work that remains valuable: know the field, understand the technology and use both to solve problems for people.
“Understand the technology, how to use it for solving problems with customers,” Bozeman said. “That’ll make you very valuable.”
