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A year ago, Shopify chief executive officer Tobias Lütke told his staff they couldn’t hire anyone unless they proved the work couldn’t be done by artificial intelligence.
The memo captured the mood as AI began to seep into workplaces: more machines, fewer people. Many experts warned that young workers would be hit hardest because entry-level jobs are often easiest to automate.
But that’s not exactly how it’s playing out – even at Shopify.
While the hiring rule made headlines, the Ottawa-based company was also ramping up its paid internship program. Last year, it brought on 1,000 intern engineers in Canada and the U.S., up from around 70 the year before. From that group, it hired almost 200 university graduates, says Farhan Thawar, the firm’s head of engineering.
“We really feel like AI will replace tasks, not jobs,” he says.
Shopify plans to bring in another 1,000 interns this year. Mr. Thawar says it’s critical to hire people fresh out of college and university. He points to one intern who used AI to cut six lines of code, saving Shopify about $600,000 in infrastructure costs.
“Younger people tend to have that curiosity with these tools,” he says. “And they come with a level of [AI] fluency that we want to inject in our culture.”
As AI spreads, many workers are feeling uneasy. Will it replace them? Younger people are especially concerned. An Express Employment Professionals survey found 55 per cent of Gen Z and 52 per cent of millennials in Canada worry about losing their jobs to AI, compared with 33 per cent of Gen X and 16 per cent of baby boomers.
But that concern overlooks what’s going on in some organizations. Junior jobs aren’t entirely disappearing. Instead, they’re changing.
The old starter job built on repetitive tasks is fading. In its place are roles that ask young workers to think, question and guide technology from day one. As AI takes over routine work, companies are giving early-career hires exposure to higher-level work sooner.
AI is reshaping the skills companies need and the career paths they design, says Lewis Curley, a partner in KPMG Canada’s people and change practice. In short, AI is speeding things up. Young workers are moving into more complex work earlier in their careers.
“It’s not that AI is necessarily replacing jobs, it’s that AI is changing the skills needed and kind of career paths that organizations want to put in place,” Mr. Curley says.
AI know-how matters for entry-level workers today. But soft skills that are harder to automate are also increasingly prized, he says.
A recent KPMG survey of U.S. business leaders backs that up. Sixty-three per cent said adaptability and continuous learning are the most important entry-level skills, followed by critical thinking and problem-solving at 61 per cent.
Sixty-four per cent of survey respondents also said AI has already affected how they approach hiring for entry-level roles. At KPMG, for example, interviews have long tested judgment and communication. Now, candidates are also asked how they use AI and how they check and refine results from tools like ChatGPT.
Firms are also getting creative in how they assess soft skills. Consulting giant McKinsey & Co. is more often relying on results from its proprietary gamified test, Solve, which assesses how candidates think through problems.
Blair Ciesil, a partner in global talent attraction at McKinsey in Washington, D.C., says the firm is increasing entry-level consultant hiring this year because “while AI is changing the nature of entry-level jobs, it’s not at all reducing the need for humans.”
In the past, graduates may have been tasked with gathering information and conducting research. Now, AI can do that work much faster. That means new employees are being given more responsibility to analyze data, question AI’s results and find answers.
“We’re looking for people who can ask smart questions, who are curious and who can really interrogate the data,” Ms. Ciesil says.
If entry-level roles are being rewritten rather than disappearing, business leaders may need to reconsider their hiring strategies. Where should they start?
First, rethink what “entry-level” means. When new hires are making decisions earlier and overseeing technology from the start, the job is no longer just about basic tasks. Clear expectations and support are key to not overwhelm them.
“You need to think where people in entry roles will be contributing,” says Tony Fang, a professor of economics at Memorial University of Newfoundland, who studies workforce issues.
A recent study he was involved in shows employers are looking for a mix of tech and soft skills. The Future Skills Centre, which surveyed 1,700 small- and medium-sized business leaders in Canada, found the most in-demand skills over the next three years will be digital know-how, communication skills and adaptability.
“Firms may need to start redesigning their entry-level job requirements” to reflect shifting responsibilities,” Prof. Fang says.
Finding top young talent may also become more difficult, so firms need to get more inventive in identifying the best hires. One option is to follow Shopify’s lead and invest in internships or co-op programs.
In addition to helping Shopify spot talent, Mr. Thawar says the company is learning as much from interns as interns are from working at the e-commerce giant. “It’s a pipeline of talent for us,” he says.
Companies should also invest in AI training, says Nancy D’Onofrio, the Toronto-based director of national strategic accounts at HR consultancy Randstad Canada. Young people want to work at companies that offer it, she says, because they know they’ll need to build AI skills throughout their careers and don’t want to fall behind.
She cites a recent Randstad Canada survey that found 37 per cent of workers would quit their job because of a lack of AI training – up 14 percentage points from the previous year.
“From a career perspective, do I want to stay in an organization that’s not investing in and growing my AI skills?” she asks. Probably not.
At McKinsey, Ms. Ciesil cautions against overemphasizing a candidate’s AI skills during job interviews.
“Six months ago, we might have said we need to test if people can prompt AI well. Not anymore,” she says, noting that the technology is changing too fast for that to be effective.
Instead, she says ideal candidates are “voracious learners,” people who are “relentlessly skeptical,” and “excited about big, messy problems” with no clear answers.
“AI is going to be massive,” Ms. Ciesil says. “We’re betting on humans.”