The worry is actual. In conferences, Slack chats, and after-work drinks, one query is quietly consuming away at thousands and thousands of workers: Will AI take my job?
In public, CEOs prefer to sound reassuring. They are saying generative AI will “improve productiveness” or “streamline operations.” However once you truly learn what they’re telling their very own workers, or what slips out in investor memos, the message is chilling: digital employees are right here, they usually’re not simply assistants. They’re replacements.
Let’s take a more in-depth take a look at what among the world’s strongest tech CEOs are saying. Not in hype movies, however in official inside messages, weblog posts, and investor updates.
1. Amazon’s Andy Jassy: “We’ll want fewer folks”
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy lately printed a company-wide message that sounds cheap, till you truly learn it.
“As we roll out extra generative AI and brokers, it ought to change the way in which our work is completed. We’ll want fewer folks doing among the jobs which can be being completed at present… We anticipate this may cut back our whole company workforce as we get effectivity features from utilizing AI extensively throughout the corporate.”
The important thing phrase? “Subsequent few years.” That’s company converse for 2026 to 2028. Not ten years away. That is quickly.
Jassy is just not speaking about automating solely easy or repetitive duties. He’s getting ready workers for a actuality the place AI replaces total job classes throughout the board, and the place hiring slows or stops altogether for roles that machines can now do.
2. Duolingo’s Luis von Ahn: “Headcount will solely be given if” AI can’t do the job
In a memo posted to LinkedIn, Duolingo CEO Luis von Ahn was much more blunt. “Most capabilities may have particular initiatives to essentially change how they work… Headcount will solely be given if a group can’t automate extra of their work.”
Translation: No extra hiring except your job is not possible for AI to do. The corporate is betting that the majority groups will quickly want fewer people.
3. Shopify’s Tobi Lütke: Why can’t AI do it?
Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke shared an analogous directive on X: “Earlier than asking for extra headcount and assets, groups should show why they can’t get what they need completed utilizing AI… What would this space appear like if autonomous AI brokers have been already a part of the group?” Lütke is brazenly asking managers to reimagine groups as if AI brokers are already built-in, and to justify why any people are nonetheless vital.
— tobi lutke (@tobi) April 7, 2025
The message from these CEOs is obvious: human workers at the moment are the final resort. The brand new default is automation.
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff lately said that AI is already doing 50% of the work inside his firm, shortly earlier than saying one other 1,000 job cuts. The CEO of Klarna, a serious fintech firm, was much more blunt, revealing that AI has already allowed the corporate to cut back its workforce by 40%.
The Actuality: Digital Staff Already Exist
These aren’t future situations. That is already occurring.
The explanation for this sudden shift is the speedy evolution of AI expertise. As OpenAI CEO Sam Altman defined in a latest podcast, the newest “reasoning fashions” have made a vital leap. In easy phrases, these AI programs can now do extra than simply discover data; they will “suppose” by advanced, multi-step issues. Altman urged these fashions can cause on par with somebody holding a PhD, which means they’re now able to performing the excessive degree analytical duties as soon as reserved for extremely educated people.
This functionality is being actively harnessed. Three sources working at main AI labs instructed Gizmodo that they’re coaching highly effective fashions to carry out actual world duties in almost each “information work” career, together with banking, monetary evaluation, insurance coverage, legislation, and even journalism. These sources, who requested anonymity as their contracts prohibit them from talking publicly, described how their work is utilized in facet by facet comparisons with AI fashions to refine the expertise till it could produce skilled grade output with minimal errors. Digital workers are already doing our jobs; the present part is just about making them extra excellent.
The “subsequent few years” Jassy spoke of could also be nearer to 2 years at most.
Layoffs Are Accelerating
Contemplate the tech business’s latest layoff developments. In 2024, 551 tech firms laid off almost 152,922 workers, in response to information from Layoff.fyi. The tempo has accelerated dramatically this yr. In simply the primary six months of 2025, 151 tech firms have already laid off over 63,823 folks. On common a tech firm lower 277 employees in 2024. If that price is maintained for the remainder of the yr, the common variety of layoffs per tech firm in 2025 would soar to 851, roughly thrice the 2024 common.
Whereas there isn’t a direct proof linking all these layoffs to AI, the pattern is going on throughout a interval of document financial power. The Nasdaq simply closed at an all time excessive, and eight of the world’s ten largest firms are within the tech sector. Worthwhile, rising firms are shedding employees at an alarming price, and the quiet implementation of AI is essentially the most logical clarification.
Our Take
Tech CEOs gained’t inform you outright that you just’re being changed. However the memos converse for themselves.
AI is already right here, and your organization is probably going constructing a roadmap to automate you out of your position. One inside pilot mission at a time. One chatbot at a time. One hiring freeze at a time. If you wish to perceive what’s subsequent for the American workforce, don’t hearken to the advertising and marketing. Learn the footnotes within the CEO’s weblog. As a result of they’re already telling you the reality.
