Last week I sat down with Mo Gawdat, former Chief Business Officer at Google X, 12 years inside one of the most advanced AI labs in the world.
I asked him how much time we have before the job market really shifts. He said 2 to 3 years.
That number didn't surprise me. But then Mo shared the 4 skills he thinks matter most right now — I realized I'm only good at half of them.
Here's his list and my honest self-assessment. I know you love it 😂
1. Master AI (Mo's take: treat it like a survival skill)
This one I'm fine on. Every week my team tests new AI tools — not out of curiosity, out of necessity. When we don't, we spend more time and lose money. It's that direct. If AI isn't part of how you work right now, the gap between you and the people who use it is compounding every month.
2. Move fast, stay uncomfortable (Mo's take: chess is over, this is squash now)
Also where I live. We reinvent video formats constantly, test new topics, launch new products. What worked 3 months ago might already be dead. Mo described it well — entrepreneurship used to be chess, where you'd plan 10 moves ahead. Now it's squash. You react in real time or you miss the ball.
3. Build things that actually help people (Mo's take: your AI reflects your values)
This is where Mo got me. Every AI you build mirrors your ethics back at the world. And I sat there thinking — do I actually prioritize that? Or do I just care about speed and product-market fit and figure the ethics part will sort itself out? Honest answer: I don't think about it enough. Not daily. Not the way I think about growth or revenue. That's changing.
4. Question everything you see and hear (Mo's take: stop being gullible)
Mo uses 3 different AI models and cross-checks them against each other before he trusts a single output. Gemini for the science, DeepSeek for what's missing, ChatGPT for the writing. I started doing the same thing after our conversation.
The amount of confident-sounding nonsense online right now is about to get 100x worse. Training yourself to catch it isn't optional anymore.
Two out of four I'm strong on. One I need to fix. One I just adopted.
So, that's where I am — not a perfect score, but an honest one.
Feel free to reply to this letter if you want to share how this episode shaped your vision or priorities for next couple of years.
— Marina