Introduction

Welcome to Recruiting Realities, the show that brings you the latest developments and insights in the world of recruitment. Today, our hosts, Yazad Dalal and David Garrett, are diving into the topic of ‘AI in the workforce and its impact on the US job market’ with special guest Elin Thomasian from TalentNeuron. 

Together, they’ll unpack what AI really means for roles, tasks, and adoption across the enterprise, and how leaders can move from redesign to impact with confidence.

Yazad Dalal
Hi everyone! I’m Yazad Dalal, Chief Growth Officer here at Joveo and welcome to Recruiting Realities, where we bring to you the latest developments and insights in recruitment. Today, we’re speaking about AI in the workforce with our own in-house labor market economist, David Garrett. And we’re thrilled to have a special guest with us from TalentNeuron, our amazing partner for end-to-end workforce transformation, Elin Thomasian, who has held senior leadership roles in talent acquisition at Goldman Sachs, at Moody’s, at Prudential, at Workday, at UKG. Truly impressive person! Welcome, Elin!

Elin Thomasian
Thank you so much for having me. What a great day to be on your show!

Yazad Dalal
It is a show, isn’t it? And for our listeners at Joveo, we publish Interactive Insights across all major occupations in the US. You can check that out on our website – joveo.com/interactive-insights/

So, we have taken, for this special episode, a lot of the data that we capture from 50 million applications that we’re processing every year, a lot of data that we’re seeing from our friends at TalentNeuron, as well as from Stanford university, from Microsoft, from Pew research, from the OECD statistics. And we have kind of developed a POV on what we see the labor market impact will be of AI. And I want to share before we get started, because I have a lot of questions for Elin and for David, four key perspectives from Joveo on what we think the job market is going to look like as we kind of enter this new age.

So the first thing that we’re seeing is, it’s a fancy term, entry level job compression. This is something that you would have seen in headlines on LinkedIn, but the data is showing us that since the launch of ChatGPT back at the end of 2022, there’s already been a 16% decline in employment for the 22 to 25 year old cohort. And where we’re seeing the most impact, unfortunately, negative impact, software development, customer service, and interestingly, content creation jobs. If you think about social media managers and other roles, RFP writing, these are also getting impacted, especially also in the legal profession.

The second area where we see impact is administrative roles. 40 jobs have been identified just within administration as the most susceptible to AI disruption. If we look at the top 10 – translators, seems pretty self-evident, writers in general, customer service reps. So, we start to think about automation and chat bots.

And the White House Council of Economic Advisors has also confirmed that about 10% of all US workers are in these highly susceptible roles.

The third area of impact we see is in an interesting intersection, healthcare and trades, skilled trades. So in healthcare, of course, we think about registered nurses, physical therapists, but even physicians are listed in the 40 least vulnerable jobs. And then the other interesting piece is skilled trades. Now, I’m from an Indian family. I can tell you that Indian parents are obsessed with lawyers, doctors, and engineers, right? I studied English literature, so maybe I was their disappointment, but that was meant to provide you with job security. But actually within the trades, we’re also seeing minimal AI exposure. Electricians, plumbers, HVAC technicians and experts, anything that requires physical dexterity, and a human touch. These seem to remain protected.

And then lastly, the fourth area of impact that we’re seeing is from our own data. We’re seeing across 50 million US job postings that about 12% of those 50 million have a really high exposure to disruption by AI. About 77% have a medium AI exposure, and just over 10% have a low AI exposure.

We of course also have a very unique visibility into blue collar susceptibility to AI, that often mainstream research tends to miss. And we’re seeing that there’s a big gap between manufacturing being disrupted by automation. So there’s large, high-volume employers with the large factories, very susceptible, but as I said earlier, if you’re doing house calls to fix plumbing, you’re probably in a very safe space.

So, these are some of the observations that we’ve made from our perspective, but Elin, I have lots of questions. Let’s get started. You have deep experience in workforce transformation. Would love for you to share with our audience what you’re seeing and where AI tools are being deployed to augment workforce transformation.

Elin Thomasian
AI tools are most effective when they’re used to augment your job architecture. So, at TalentNeuron, we offer a dynamic job architecture platform solution that takes into consideration all the market and labor data moves that are happening, that are affecting roles, skills, and tasks. So all the roles that you mentioned in our platform solution show what percentage are going to be automated and not just the percentage intelligence, but what tasks within the role and then what technologies are going to replace those tasks. And what we’re seeing clients doing is taking that information and being able to think about, what does that mean in terms of triggering role redesign, and then eventually doing strategic workforce planning in knowing that you might have to do that in mass, in parts of your organization. So we’re seeing that as the biggest impact in where you can use AI.

Yazad Dalal
I think what’s really interesting about what you just shared is, we like to speak in grand terms and, and often, you know, provocative terms. Oh, it’s going to replace an entire job. But what I’m hearing from you is that it’s more likely to replace or disrupt specific tasks that fall within your job. The job itself or the outcome that an employer pursues by having a role may not change as dramatically, but the day-to-day requirements, perhaps the KPIs and certainly the tools that you use in order to execute your role may require some retraining and adaptability, which I think is really interesting. I want to maybe dive a little bit deeper. There is this myth, and I completely agree that it’s a myth, about AI replacing jobs and that specifically unemployment will go up. I agree that this is not a dystopia that we’re heading towards. What are you seeing and hearing? And what’s this, maybe two part question, what is the silver lining that you see heads of talent acquisition heading towards? But also, you’ve told me often about the impact of role redesign and how that always leads back to workforce transformation. So share with me your thoughts on that as well.

Elin Thomasian
I think, anecdotally, people are, you know, the economy is shaky, the global political climate is shaky. So I think a lot of companies are being cautious and that’s leading to them being conservative in headcount growth. And so, where are they going to be the most cautious in? The areas where they think they want to do more experimentation to understand if AI can replace some of those roles and tasks. So I don’t think the proof is there right now that, you know, these roles are getting eliminated and these head counts are being affected by AI.

I think this is like cautious, conservative headcount planning while they’re experimenting on where it actually will make the impact. So that I just wanted to mention that, anecdotally, as you know, head of TA, I can imagine, you know, management coming to the head of TA and saying – Hey, slow the campus recruitment, you know, headcount process and recruitment process because we’re still thinking through what our headcount and pyramid looks like in the next three or five years. So I can see there being caution. However, what the work that’s really being done then to actually put some impact behind the hypothesis is let’s look at where AI is going to impact us the most, what business units, what job families, what percentage is it going to affect it? And then let’s think about how quickly we can get the commitment and the ability to be able to actually change the workforce to adopt this new way of working that needs new technology or needs new automation. And so I think these two things are working in parallel and they’re not exactly causation. They’re just working in a parallel. And for some people, it’s a bit of a misnomer to think that if head count is going down in a certain sector, people have found the key to automation and that’s why it’s happening. I think there’s just a lot of experimentation going on, on where that’s going to have the biggest impact.

Yazad Dalal
I want to get to David in a second, but you just made me think of something. You know, there’s a lot of push now towards being an AI-first organization. I think the CEO of Goodwill Industries, if I’m not wrong, they published an email that he shared with his entire organization, basically saying that he wants to see every employee at every level executing their job with an AI-first mentality and that if they aren’t starting with what AI tools they’re using to augment their job, they’re at risk.

Is that something that you’re seeing more and more from your clients and maybe, even more provocatively? I’ve seen already a couple of Chief People Officers be retitled as Chief AI Officers. Do you think we’re going to see more and more of that?

Elin Thomasian
I think they’re getting re-titled to Chief AI officers because HR is the one who owns the job architecture that allows for everyone to look with the microscope of like, where AI is affecting the mark, you know, the organizational structure. So if HR isn’t doing that role and is not helping lead the way with management to understand how that’s going to affect their roles, their operating model, their org design, as well as the technology tools that they’re going to be using, then obviously they’re not the strategic partner in workforce transformation. And we all know that’s really what HR does is help management think through workforce transformation from all angles, while finance looks at it from a financial headcount and budgeting perspective. So HR is involved. They’re in the middle of this conversation, and they’re bringing the insights to the table in order for management to make these decisions.

And you can’t make these decisions without having a view of a dynamic job architecture that is going to show you every step of the way, quarterly, monthly, and annually, how far AI is affecting each role, each task, and what technology tools they need to get ahead of in order to adopt them. But having that information isn’t enough. It’s also, how does the organization absorb this new way of structuring their people strategy, right? So it’s not only looking at the data, but also as an HR leader, knowing how to affect the change, how to upskill the organization, how to help them adopt the technology, how to make sure that they are redesigning the organization in a way that won’t be disruptive to their business impact.

So HR is really at the center of all this. So it is no surprise that I think the role of the CHRO as well is being redesigned.

Yazad Dalal
You just made me think of something that I hadn’t thought about deeply before, which is how important it’s probably going to be to move from redesign to adoption and the change management that’s required for that. I’m almost imagining program management and change management functions in leadership roles within an HR department, or at least umbrella, in order to affect the change that’s getting redesigned. I think that’s really wonderful. Thank you!

And David, you’ve talked to me often about differentiating between, what we’re talking about now is AI driven impacts, but also comparing that to cyclical impacts. Tell us a little bit more about that.

David Garrett
Yeah, I mean, Elin kind of already had actually touched on it previously. With the current labor market as is, there’s the cyclical changes, which are your short term changes in economic business cycles. You know, it’s consumer confidence, it’s inflation, it’s credit cycles, anything that sort of swings, you know, the pendulum between an expansion and a recession, but ultimately kind of returns back to that long term trend. But, you know, a structural change is anything that’s more long term and it’s a fundamental shift in industries, economies. It can be caused by a slow moving chain, such as changes in demographics and where people are living. Or obviously, a breakthrough in technology that transforms really how work is performed, the way we view work, and how workers interact with their jobs, which is where AI comes in.

I personally fall into the camp, kind of like Elin was saying earlier, I think most of the shifts in the labor market recently have been cyclical. I think they’re more driven by macroeconomic factors – the rise in uncertainty, inflation. And I don’t think we’ll see the long-term impacts of AI take place until over the course of this next decade. There will be these pockets of layoffs. You’ll have changes in current job structures, more obviously growth in jobs requiring AI. And, you know, you could even end up in something akin to a jobless recovery for knowledge workers. And I think that’s the thing I’m more concerned about long term, which is where economic growth continues, picks up even, but employment has remained stagnant or weak. But ultimately, I think a lot of the rise in unemployment, particularly in the farming sectors, manufacturing, obviously those are sectors as we discussed are not necessarily fully impacted by AI as much as software development, but even youth unemployment goes up first during downturns, right? People are doing less college campus events, people are hiring less entry-level roles. So it’s kind of a not clear mix of whether it’s strictly AI related or companies hedging their bets a little bit to kind of weather out what’s going on currently.

Yazad Dalal
Yeah and I think the message that I’m hearing from you and from all of these conversations is about change. You know, 20 years ago, it was all about digital transformation and making those migrations to digital tools. I think there’s a big temptation to talk about this as ‘AI transformation’, but I really like the way Elin and at TalentNeuron are talking about it. Fundamentally. it’s ‘Workforce transformation’. What’s changing is the way we work and the way we interact with the machines that we’ve built.

And so I think that’s extremely exciting. A big thank you, Elin, for joining us and David. A big thank you to all our partners at TalentNeuron. And of course, thank you to all of you, our listeners. Don’t forget to visit us at joveo.com and we’ll see you again soon!

Conclusion
That wraps up this episode of Recruiting Realities! We unpacked how AI is transforming the workforce from the evolution of job roles and the importance of dynamic job architecture, to the critical role HR plays in driving adoption and change management.

A big thank you to Elin Thomasian from TalentNeuron for sharing her insights, and to all of you for tuning in!