Booz Allen Hamilton Collaborates With Workera to Bolster Industry Leading AI Workforce Relationship will provide Booz Allen employees with continuous AI skill development pathways to further empower government and commercial clients with secure and responsible AI Palo Alto, CA – November 16th, 2023 – Workera, the leading workforce transformation platform, and Booz Allen Hamilton (NYSE: BAH), the largest provider of AI services to the federal government, today announced a collaboration to power advanced AI skills development for Booz Allen employees. Booz Allen will deploy Workera’s platform to provide granular skills assessments and hyper-personalized learning plans in essential AI Engineering and AI Consulting skill areas for employees working directly with government and commercial clients. This collaboration is the latest move by Booz Allen designed to enhance the AI-ready posture of its workforce, providing the skills and training required to help its clients adopt secure, responsible, and mission-driven AI solutions, even amidst a constantly evolving technology landscape. The pace of innovation in AI has never been faster, bringing incredible productivity gains to workers and organizations with the skills to take advantage. But despite a federal sector that is increasingly bullish on the idea of a skills-based future, the shortage of technical talent is a critical limiting factor in government adoption of emerging technology. Bringing AI to bear on the federal government’s toughest challenges while maintaining rigorous standards of safety, security, and trustworthiness requires the skill and perspective of a large and diverse workforce. By leveraging Workera’s workforce transformation platform, Booz Allen will be able to continuously nurture highly-skilled talent dedicated to helping federal agencies design, build, and scale responsible AI solutions that support the nation’s most critical and socially impactful work, as well as keep up with a rapidly advancing private sector. “I started Workera with the belief that with the right skills, people can greatly advance progress,” said Kian Katanforoosh, CEO and Founder of Workera. “Finding the optimal pathways to proficiency is especially important for the public sector, which employs a diverse workforce and reaches hundreds of millions in need of AI-related skills. That’s why we’re excited to bring our workforce transformation platform to Booz Allen, helping them equip their teams with the technology skills allowing them to bring AI to their federal partners.” Powered by the most granular skills dataset in the world, Workera uses assessments to measure an individual’s proficiency across more than 10,000 distinct skills — including machine learning, data science, cybersecurity, and more — with incredible accuracy. It then uses the results of those assessments to build hyper-personalized adaptive learning plans using both an organization's own internal content, paid content providers, as well as freely-available content from sources such as publications, blogs, whitepapers, and more. With Workera, organizations also have visibility into employee proficiency, progress, and benchmarking. That means not only do employees get the individualized training they need to improve their skills quickly, but leaders have a birds-eye view to help them effectively staff teams, inform hiring decisions, and stay on the cutting-edge of innovation. “We’re seeing enormous growth in demand for AI services and solutions from our federal government and commercial clients, as emerging capabilities present new opportunities. Booz Allen’s role as the foremost provider of AI services, and mission partner for over a century, to the federal government gives us a unique perspective in bringing the best in innovation to our clients," said Joe Rohner, Vice President of Artificial Intelligence at Booz Allen. "The Workera platform is an important component of the infrastructure we’ve built over the last decade to ensure our 2200+ AI practitioners have the skills and expertise they need to operationalize our latest AI tech stacks for our clients.” Workera’s collaboration with Booz Allen comes following their raise of $23.5 million in Series B financing earlier this year, led by Jump Capital with participation from NEA, Owl Ventures, AI Fund, and Sozo Ventures. About Workera Workera is the leading workforce transformation platform using advanced artificial intelligence to transform organizations’ workforces. It is the only platform that generates uniquely tailored learning plans that help workers learn critical skills like machine learning, data science, cybersecurity — and anything else — faster than has ever been possible before. Workera’s platform also provides overall team skills insights to organizations to help leaders staff teams effectively and drive innovation. Founded in 2019 by Kian Katanforoosh, Workera is backed by Jump Capital, NEA, Owl Ventures, AI Fund, IQT, Sozo Ventures, Plug and Play, and AIX Ventures. Learn more at workera.ai.

Introducing Workera’s pioneering new skills visualization tool, SkillMap AI Workera’s SkillMap AI feature is a pioneering solution that uses generative AI to enhance and automate the learning journey. SkillMap AI empowers leaders to design and measure skills that align to their team’s objectives, or the objectives of the organization at large. By generating entire skill maps and ontologies at the click of a button, leaders can assess where their teams stand and how to close their gaps. Workera’s SkillMap AI feature is a pioneering solution that uses generative AI to enhance and automate the learning journey. SkillMap AI empowers leaders to design and measure skills that align to their team’s objectives, or the objectives of the organization at large. By generating entire skill maps and ontologies at the click of a button, leaders can assess where their teams stand and how to close their gaps. A common challenge for organizations is that learning and development teams can’t efficiently create and manage the volume of skills in their workforce – particularly when it comes to aligning skills with roles and career growth inside complex ontologies and taxonomies. In addition, teams can struggle to identify, measure, and mentor unique skills essential to their specific needs and address skill gaps. “A common challenge for organizations is that learning and development teams can’t efficiently create and manage the volume of skills in their workforce.” SkillMap AI aggregates skills and competencies from industry standards set by experts, using inter-organizational data and the Workera Skill Ontology crafted by expert psychometricians. SkillMap AI delivers value by crafting skill domains complete with measurements, assessments, and rapid lessons tailored from custom prompts. How do we power hyper-personalized learning through data and AI? Hyper-personalized learning generates vast amounts of data, which can be analyzed to gain essential insights into employee performance and how effectively they’re learning. Here at Workera, we use unprecedented levels of data granularity to predict how a person learns most effectively, and structure the upskilling pathway around this intelligence. This highly-granular data means assessment and measurements are delivered not just in the context of the learner’s journey, but in the context of the entire team – and then, in the context of the team compared to established benchmarks in the sector or industry. Business leaders can use this detailed data to make informed decisions about investments in training, workforce development strategies, organizational structure, succession planning, and more. The best solutions for hyper-personalized learning are those that use AI to steer the learner journey. Solutions that integrate generative AI as an automation or co-pilot in the learning pathway ensure the development of the employee stays true to the learner’s individual needs and existing competencies, but still exists within a framework defined by the organization. This enables general competencies and business-specific skill sets to be interwoven – at a pace and design that makes sense for the learner as an individual. The cross-organizational benefits of hyper-personalized learning Leading business executives recognize that an educated and skilled workforce is a competitive advantage: organizations that adopt hyper-personalized learning are likely to attract and retain top talent, which can provide a significant edge in the market. By then upskilling this talent to match the goals of the business, leaders can build a more skilled and adaptable workforce that’s better prepared to meet the challenges of the ever-changing workplace. It’s not just teams that can benefit from a more personalized approach to learning, either: customized leadership development programs ensure business leaders themselves benefit from hyper-personalized leadership development programs that address their unique strengths and weaknesses – helping them become more effective leaders, and thus creating a virtuous circle of continuous learning and development throughout all levels of an organization.

How and why are businesses using generative AI? For leaders such as Chief Technology Officers, Chief Data Officers, and Chief Information Officers, embracing generative AI in the workplace brings a wealth of opportunity to drive productivity and transformation. It also means leaders need to consider how to design meaningful career pathways for team members. The impact of Gen AI on how teams execute their roles depends on a number of factors: Which tasks are being automated or enhanced using generative AI like large language models (LLMs) as co-pilots? Who in the workplace is most affected by these changes and what are the short and long term implications for their careers? Who makes the decisions about how and where generative AI is being used in the workplace, and what ethical considerations are there around responsible Gen AI usage? In a recent Workera survey, the majority of respondents reported actively using generative AI in their roles – marking a sea change in the way tech teams, in particular, are working and will be working in the future. In a recent survey of its own, McKinsey reports that one-third of all its respondents say their organization is already regularly using generative AI in at least one function. This means that 60 percent of organizations with reported AI adoption are actively using generative AI in their workplace. In addition, 40 percent of those reporting AI adoption at their organization say their companies expect to invest more in AI overall thanks to the potential transformation generative AI can bring, and 28 percent say generative AI use is already on their board’s agenda. How is generative AI impacting roles? According to McKinsey, current generative AI and other technologies have the potential to automate work activities that absorb 60 to 70 percent of employees’ time today. This is a sharp uptick from McKinsey’s own predictions in 2017 that generative AI technology has the potential to automate half of the time employees spend working. “Gen AI could deliver value equal to an additional $200 billion to $340 billion annually at full implementation levels.” McKinsey also predicts that banking, high-tech and life sciences are just three of the industries that could see the biggest impact in their revenues from generative AI use in the business. For example, across the banking industry Gen AI could deliver value equal to an additional $200 billion to $340 billion annually at full implementation levels. In retail and consumer packaged goods, the potential impact is also significant – estimated to be around $400 billion to $660 billion a year. How many organizations are already using generative AI? We surveyed data practitioners working in a variety of roles such as Machine Learning Engineer, Data Scientist, AI Scientist, Software Engineer, Chief Information Officer, and CEO. We found that76% of respondents report already using generative AI to enhance their working practices, while 24% are not currently using it. Of these 24% of users not currently using generative AI, 76% reported that they foresee themselves or their organization using GenAI in the workplace in the near future – while 24% of these respondents reported that they do not currently use Gen AI in the workplace, and that they don’t foresee it being used in the near future either. “Of our respondents who told us they’re not currently using generative AI in the workplace, over 75% told us they will be using it in the near future.” This sentiment seems reflected across the sectors. TechRepublic reports that 53% of companies they surveyed are “exploring or experimenting” with generative AI technology and 13% of those organizations are working with or optimizing AI models they already have in place. 34% of those TechRepublic surveyed are “formalizing” a generative AI solution, currently moving “from pilot programs to production”. Get access to our entire survey data to find out which tasks are the most productive when using generative AI, and which tasks are the least productive. Download our FREE ebook, 'A Leader's Guide to Generative AI Skills in the Workplace'. How much more productive are businesses when using generative AI? In our survey, we asked participants to estimate how their productivity has or will improve when using generative AI as an input source or as a co-pilot. Respondents were asked to assume a task currently took them 10 hours to complete without any input from generative AI, and then to estimate how long a task does take or would take to complete from zero hours (where generative AI enables the task to be fully automated) to more than ten hours (where generative AI actually increases the amount of time a task would take to complete). “Respondents who are already using generative AI to help enhance or co-pilot their work reported experiencing an average 168% increase in productivity.” We found that text-heavy tasks like language translation, text analysis, documentation generation, and email drafting were the four tasks with the biggest increase in productivity. Assuming these tasks would have originally taken 10 hours to complete without generative AI, the respondents who are already using generative AI such as LLMs to help enhance or co-pilot their work reported experiencing an average 168% increase in productivity. What this means for leaders According to McKinsey’s updated adoption scenarios, half of the work activities currently happening in organizations “could be automated between 2030 and 2060, with a midpoint in 2045” – a decade earlier than McKinsey’s previous estimates. This is likely accelerating thanks to a potent combination of “technology development, economic feasibility, and diffusion timelines”. McKinsey surmises that “generative AI can substantially increase labor productivity across the economy, but that will require investments to support workers as they shift work activities or change jobs.” For leaders, this means supporting their teams to upskill rapidly, sustainably, and comprehensively. Upskill rapidly to ensure the pace of skills keeps up with the pace of technological innovation and team members have a strong foundation on which to build increasingly cutting-edge skills. Upskillsustainably to ensure an organization is focused on staying in the highest category of learning velocity and team members feel consistently supported. Upskillcomprehensively with solutions designed to generate end-to-end ontologies that constantly assess knowledge levels and address skill gaps, preventing a slowing down in learning velocity.