The Disappearance of the Entry-Level Job

The headlines are terrifying. Every day seems to bring another story about how AI is going to wipe out entire categories of jobs. “The Disappearance of the Entry-Level Job” is a popular one.

These articles paint a grim picture of a world with no starting point for a career.

Like most things, the truth is somewhere in-between. While it’s true that many familiar junior-level positions are being changed or eliminated, that doesn’t mean there are no junior-level positions.

Say it with me: “the jobs will change”.

What Was an Entry-Level Job?

To understand where we’re going, we have to look at where we’ve been. What kind of work has traditionally been given to a junior employee?

Usually, it’s tasks that are necessary but tedious. They don’t require a lot of deep expertise, but they consume time that senior employees don’t have.

• Write unit tests for these two or three functions.
• Find all references to Customer ABC in System XYZ and put them in a spreadsheet.
• Respond to common customer requests with pre-written templates.
• Pull IT support tickets from the queue and either resolve simple ones or re-route them.

These are discrete, well-defined tasks. They are perfect candidates for automation. And yes, AI is getting very good at doing exactly these kinds of things.

The Work Never Ends

If AI can do all that, then why do we need the junior person at all?

Because there still isn’t enough time in the day to do all the work.

AI has limits, and anyone who uses it regularly hits those limits. It reduces the time and complexity required to perform a task, but it doesn’t reduce them to zero. The tasks still have to be supervised, verified, and initiated. People still have a limited amount of time.

Businesses don’t want to stop growing, either. With few exceptions, every business is looking for an edge. They have competitors who are also trying to grow, often at their expense. Right now, sales teams are getting requests for new products and features. Many of those requests are turned down because the company just doesn’t have the manpower to deliver them.

Doing the same work with fewer people isn’t a strategy for growth. It’s a strategy for stagnation.

Senior Tasks Become Junior Tasks

The real change isn’t the elimination of work; it’s the elevation of it. Tasks that used to require a senior level of oversight or experience are becoming the new baseline.

Let’s look at those old entry-level examples and see what they become in a world with AI assistants.

• Old: Write unit tests for these two or three functions.

• New: Verify the AI-generated code meets all requirements, including full unit test coverage, proper documentation, and adherence to enterprise standards.

• Old: Find all references to Customer ABC in System XYZ and put them in a spreadsheet.

• New: Create reports for all customers who meet a specific criteria, verify the accuracy of the data, and provide a high-level analysis focusing on a particular topic.

• Old: Respond to common customer requests.

• New: Monitor and review chatbot transcripts for customer requests that are not resolved properly, or for responses which could be improved to better serve the customer.

• Old: Pull IT support tickets and resolve/re-route them.

• New: Resolve IT tickets across multiple platforms and technologies, using AI-driven diagnostics to handle issues that previously required escalation.

The new entry-level job isn’t about doing the tedious task. It’s about managing the process. It’s about quality control, analysis, and oversight. The scope has expanded, and the value of the junior employee’s contribution has increased.

The Winning Strategy

Business leaders who settle only for doing the same amount of work with fewer resources will eventually lose. They will lose customers to competitors who re-purpose their employees to do more.

A discussion about how these new entry-level employees become senior-level employees could be had, but it’s not the point right now. All of the examples above are immediate. These are things that can, and should, be done now.

Businesses which embrace this shift and use technology to empower their workforce will have a massive competitive advantage.

If anything, companies should consider hiring more entry-level people. Beginners come with fewer preconceptions about how things should be done. They are a blank slate, ready to learn the new way of working without being held back by the old one.