Hewlett Packard Enterprise Antonio Neri’s current CEO has been Rowed to CEO from the company’s call center agent. Walmart CEO Doug McMillon started with a summer gig that helped him unload the truck. The same goes for GM CEO Mary Barra. Mary Barra began as an 18-year-old with an automaker’s assembly line. These are like career ladder success arcs that inspired workers and Hollywood, but AI is set to replace many entry-level jobs, so you can also write corporate characters from the plot.
The rise of AI is consistent with considerable organizational flattening, especially within the mid-sized management ranks. At the same time, humanity’s CEO, Dario Amodei, is one of those who can potentially wipe out 50% of entry-level jobs by AI as technology improves.
All the uncertainty in the Corporate Org Chart introduced by AI occurs when university graduates struggle to find a role, but raises the question of whether or not the career ladder is about to break, and the assumption story of the corporate leaders who have always created a key part of America’s Esther is set to be a thing of the past. If the concept of going from bottom to top was always an exception to the rules, it helped to pump the heart of American corporations. At the very least, removing the initial rung of the ladder raises important questions about the transfer of institutional knowledge and upward progress of the organization.
Looking at data from the largest public technology companies and mature venture capital funded startups between 2019 and 2024, the venture capital firm Signalfire was discovered. Head of Research at Signalfire. This data extends to sales, marketing, engineering, recruitment/HR, operations, design, finance and legal core business functions, with a consistent 50% decline.
However, Signalfire’s partner Heather Doshay says the data should not lead job seekers to lose hope. “The loss of a clear entry point doesn’t just reduce opportunities for new graduates, it shapes how the organization develops talent,” she said.
As Amodei told CNBC earlier this year, if “at some point, we reach an AI system that is better than almost every human in almost every task,” then the key issue for workers is how the idea of entry-level work evolves as AI continues.
It certainly has a flatter organization. “The ladder is not broken. It’s just replaced by something that looks all the way flat,” Doshay said. In her view, the classic concept of a CEO rising out of the mail room is a perfect example, as it has been a long time since he worked in a real mail room at many companies. “The bottom lang is gone,” she said.
The new “entry level” may be a more advanced or skilled role, but rather than allowing the lower Lang to develop advanced skills, it pressures new graduates to acquire these job skills themselves, rather than being able to learn them while they are already doing unlanded jobs. According to Dosha, it should not be a career killer.
“When the internet and email emerged on the ground as the required skills of a common company, new graduates were properly positioned to become professionals by using them in schools. “What’s important is how new graduates can leverage their ability to become experts and be seen as desirable technologically savvy workers at the forefront of AI advancement,” she said.
However, she admits that she may not be very comfortable with recent alumni looking for her current job. “My heart is directed towards new graduates in 2024, 2025 and 2026, when we are in an era of uncertainty,” Doshay said.
The university has transformed schools into AI training grounds, with several institutions shocking major deals with humanity and companies such as Openai.
“Historically, technological advancements have not hurt employment rates in the long run, but they have short-term consequences along the way,” Dosha said. “The entry-level careers of graduates have been the most impact these days, which could have lasting effects as they continue to increase their careers with fewer experiences while still having fewer employment opportunities,” she added.
Anders Humram, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Chicago, said that predictions about the long-term labor market impact of AI are very speculative, and companies are just beginning to adapt to the new generative AI landscape. “We currently have two and a half years of experience with the Generated AI Chatbot, which is spreading widely throughout the economy,” Humlum said, adding, “These tools have not made a significant difference in employment or revenue in our previous occupation.”
Looking at the history of labor and technology, he says that even the most transformative technologies, such as steam power, electricity and computers, took decades to create large-scale economic impacts. As a result, the reshaping of the company’s structure and culture takes time to become clear.
“Even if AMODEI is right that AI tools ultimately match the technical capabilities of many entry-level white-collar workers, I think his predictions underestimate both the time required to adjust workflows and the ability of humans to adapt to the new opportunities these tools create,” Humlum said.
However, a key challenge for businesses is to ensure that the benefits of these tools are widely shared across the workforce. In particular, Humlum said his research shows a significant gender gap in the use of generator AI. “Employers can significantly reduce this gap by actively encouraging recruitment and providing training programs to support effective use,” he said.
Other AI researchers worry that the biggest problem isn’t the ladder of careers at the lowest Lang, but in the end, the stability of any Lang is all to the top.
If predictions about AI advancement ultimately lead to super intelligence, Max Tegmark, future president of Life of Life Institute, says it doesn’t matter whether the 50% entry-level jobs are accurate, and 50% entry-level jobs will be wiped out, will grow to 100% across all careers.
In that world, whether you’re the last call center, distribution center, or assembly line worker, or you reach the CEO desk, you may be counting the day of success. “If you continue to race first with completely unregulated AI, you will first see a massive concentration of wealth and power from workers to those who control the AI, then you will see it in the machine itself, as the owners control them,” Tegmark said.
