So it's the old Cath-22, supercharged by AI: You can't get a job without experience and you can't get experience without a job. The new twist is that AI can do the entry job that you would have started on to get the experience to get the "proper" job. There is no way around this gap :-( . AI will take away the bottom rungs on the ladder. Eventually more humans will be needed to replace those retiring, but they will be taken from the PhDs - not because a PhD is necessary but just because they are the best available.
Nice article. I think of this in terms of time vs tokens: more business owners and hiring managers will push tasks to (AI) tokens instead of paying for people's time.
For those who skill levels will justify having their time paid for - might end up being a good few years until AI agents are universal...
I’m a glass-half-full (to overflowing) kind of person, so here’s my take: internships--whether undergrad or grad, big or small--can be a springboard for navigating the future of work. With the shift toward “unbossing” (think less hierarchy, more autonomy and collaboration), what matters most is how you showed up: initiative, adaptability, connection. It’s not about having the perfect experience--it’s about reframing what you’ve done to take a bold step forward. That’s your real leap--your "jump the shark" moment, in the best way :)
Would You say that this would include future skills like EQ to be more important? I find this to be especially difficult with those on the Autism Spectrum...
Great points, Kenneth. Emotional intelligence--and the "soft" skills tied to it--are evolving, especially as we factor in neurodiversity and the unique experiences of those with ASD. With AI and automation reshaping roles, the workplace is becoming even more complex, and we’re already seeing teams being reorganized around these changes.
You nailed it: we need to focus on where the gaps are now and where they'll be in the next year and in 3–5 years. That’s where the biggest opportunities will be—for college students, recent grads ready to repurpose their strengths, and even those mid- or late-career.
You can't show up at all if you are not hired. There's a hollowing out process going on. The only way to get a job, even as an intern, will be to get to the top of the application pile and the only way to do that will be by doing a PhD, no matter how irrelevant it is to the job at hand.
Couldn't we also say that PhD's could be irrelevant potentially due to the "overqualifying" premise? Or would they take on a more abstract role & think more big picture?
The point of the PhD is not to be relevant but simply to show that you are smarter or more dedicated than the mere BScs/BAs. This is the big mistake that governments all around the world made when they pushed for more people to go to university - They thought that business wanted qualifications when all business really wanted was to know who the top 15-20% of candidates were.
That's a fair point, I have just seen where many PhD's are overqualified & businesses are afraid of their leverage when it comes to compensation. Most businesses seem to rather hire a bachelor's for far cheaper & care more about in-site training & adaptation, and use college as only an index of commitment. Although, I could see the argument where PhD's could have the upper hand, where there would be no negotiating floor for them, & bachelors are deemed under the necessary requirements. It's just that businesses typically hire exactly what's required & train what's later, to be cheap & save...
I know this rule breaks with big fortune companies, just thinking towards the average company, or do You think that we are headed towards bigger monopolies?
Appreciate your response, Nick. The hollowing out of the U.S. workforce has been decades in the making. I come out of semiconductor manufacturing in Silicon Valley and saw it up close. Learned pretty quickly how to be scrappy if I wanted to stay employed. I'm an optimist (not a Pollyanna)--more pragmatic. I’ve spent years focused on the space between tech breakthroughs and the workforce transitions that follow. And even before the pandemic and AI took the spotlight, I had a strong sense things were going to get bumpy--for a lot of people.
Since this thread is about new grads, I answered with them in mind. Hopefully they’ve got an internship or apprenticeship under their belt--if so, great. That’s something they can use to reposition themselves for this market. But it’s going to take a strategic, surgical, and scrappy approach.
I live in a university town and mentor college students regularly. I help them take their smarts and add a scrappy mindset to the mix. And trust me--they work for the time I invest. No prima donnas allowed.
There’s a lot of anxiety in the system--markets, employers, workers (employed and job-hunting alike). And yeah, it’s rough. No sugarcoating it.
That said, on a brighter note: I know of a virtual internship in the legal field. DM me if you're interested.
Is a lack of new grad roles an issue across all industries? I know it’s huge in software but I haven’t been paying enough attention to other fields to know if it’s an issue there as well.
This is a bit pessimistic. People will adapt to the changing economy.
With the rise of AI, what's inevitable is a decline of white collar work and a rise in (well paid and respectable) blue collar trades. Gen Z is doing this now: https://youtube.com/watch?v=vspYdePRl6E
ChatGPT can't do welding, landscaping, HVAC repair/installation, and construction.
Im still not aware of any real cases where there is a 1:1 replacement of human for AI substitute, but so many analyses seem to imply that this is a more straightforward thing that it is or will be.
Thus, adding to this wonderful post’s many thoughts, I would suggest that the overall reshuffling of work to include AI offers a new path. It’s really around upleveling to the higher task level and finding your value there.
I don’t think so. Maybe my comment made the whole adjustment sound easy- but at this point I think you have to figure out what is needed in specific contexts and sell it to companies as a service.
Companies don’t realize yet all they are in for as they embrace more AI. But as they do the pain points will become clearer, and there will be new opportunities. That being said they may not be traditional jobs as we have come to expect with a stable and predictable set of assumptions about the future
So it's the old Cath-22, supercharged by AI: You can't get a job without experience and you can't get experience without a job. The new twist is that AI can do the entry job that you would have started on to get the experience to get the "proper" job. There is no way around this gap :-( . AI will take away the bottom rungs on the ladder. Eventually more humans will be needed to replace those retiring, but they will be taken from the PhDs - not because a PhD is necessary but just because they are the best available.
Nice article. I think of this in terms of time vs tokens: more business owners and hiring managers will push tasks to (AI) tokens instead of paying for people's time.
For those who skill levels will justify having their time paid for - might end up being a good few years until AI agents are universal...
I’m a glass-half-full (to overflowing) kind of person, so here’s my take: internships--whether undergrad or grad, big or small--can be a springboard for navigating the future of work. With the shift toward “unbossing” (think less hierarchy, more autonomy and collaboration), what matters most is how you showed up: initiative, adaptability, connection. It’s not about having the perfect experience--it’s about reframing what you’ve done to take a bold step forward. That’s your real leap--your "jump the shark" moment, in the best way :)
yep, that's the more positive take, also very important!
Would You say that this would include future skills like EQ to be more important? I find this to be especially difficult with those on the Autism Spectrum...
Great points, Kenneth. Emotional intelligence--and the "soft" skills tied to it--are evolving, especially as we factor in neurodiversity and the unique experiences of those with ASD. With AI and automation reshaping roles, the workplace is becoming even more complex, and we’re already seeing teams being reorganized around these changes.
You nailed it: we need to focus on where the gaps are now and where they'll be in the next year and in 3–5 years. That’s where the biggest opportunities will be—for college students, recent grads ready to repurpose their strengths, and even those mid- or late-career.
You can't show up at all if you are not hired. There's a hollowing out process going on. The only way to get a job, even as an intern, will be to get to the top of the application pile and the only way to do that will be by doing a PhD, no matter how irrelevant it is to the job at hand.
Couldn't we also say that PhD's could be irrelevant potentially due to the "overqualifying" premise? Or would they take on a more abstract role & think more big picture?
The point of the PhD is not to be relevant but simply to show that you are smarter or more dedicated than the mere BScs/BAs. This is the big mistake that governments all around the world made when they pushed for more people to go to university - They thought that business wanted qualifications when all business really wanted was to know who the top 15-20% of candidates were.
That's a fair point, I have just seen where many PhD's are overqualified & businesses are afraid of their leverage when it comes to compensation. Most businesses seem to rather hire a bachelor's for far cheaper & care more about in-site training & adaptation, and use college as only an index of commitment. Although, I could see the argument where PhD's could have the upper hand, where there would be no negotiating floor for them, & bachelors are deemed under the necessary requirements. It's just that businesses typically hire exactly what's required & train what's later, to be cheap & save...
I know this rule breaks with big fortune companies, just thinking towards the average company, or do You think that we are headed towards bigger monopolies?
Appreciate your response, Nick. The hollowing out of the U.S. workforce has been decades in the making. I come out of semiconductor manufacturing in Silicon Valley and saw it up close. Learned pretty quickly how to be scrappy if I wanted to stay employed. I'm an optimist (not a Pollyanna)--more pragmatic. I’ve spent years focused on the space between tech breakthroughs and the workforce transitions that follow. And even before the pandemic and AI took the spotlight, I had a strong sense things were going to get bumpy--for a lot of people.
Since this thread is about new grads, I answered with them in mind. Hopefully they’ve got an internship or apprenticeship under their belt--if so, great. That’s something they can use to reposition themselves for this market. But it’s going to take a strategic, surgical, and scrappy approach.
I live in a university town and mentor college students regularly. I help them take their smarts and add a scrappy mindset to the mix. And trust me--they work for the time I invest. No prima donnas allowed.
There’s a lot of anxiety in the system--markets, employers, workers (employed and job-hunting alike). And yeah, it’s rough. No sugarcoating it.
That said, on a brighter note: I know of a virtual internship in the legal field. DM me if you're interested.
I shared this one with my 28 yr old son. I think he mostly uses AI in productive ways, but he can definitely relate to the woes described.
Is a lack of new grad roles an issue across all industries? I know it’s huge in software but I haven’t been paying enough attention to other fields to know if it’s an issue there as well.
Important question, this needs more research (I'm sure Thompson is on it)
It's all true but still it's only one part of the picture. The other part of the picture is:
- The relevance of traditional organizations is shrinking
- The gig economy keeps growing
- The creator economy will be huge
There are plenty of options for those who understand that, like academic degrees, the relevance of entry-level corporate jobs is evaporating.
This is a bit pessimistic. People will adapt to the changing economy.
With the rise of AI, what's inevitable is a decline of white collar work and a rise in (well paid and respectable) blue collar trades. Gen Z is doing this now: https://youtube.com/watch?v=vspYdePRl6E
ChatGPT can't do welding, landscaping, HVAC repair/installation, and construction.
Im still not aware of any real cases where there is a 1:1 replacement of human for AI substitute, but so many analyses seem to imply that this is a more straightforward thing that it is or will be.
Thus, adding to this wonderful post’s many thoughts, I would suggest that the overall reshuffling of work to include AI offers a new path. It’s really around upleveling to the higher task level and finding your value there.
True. But are there as many positions open in those higher level tasks?
I don’t think so. Maybe my comment made the whole adjustment sound easy- but at this point I think you have to figure out what is needed in specific contexts and sell it to companies as a service.
Companies don’t realize yet all they are in for as they embrace more AI. But as they do the pain points will become clearer, and there will be new opportunities. That being said they may not be traditional jobs as we have come to expect with a stable and predictable set of assumptions about the future