Execution jobs are disappearing, strategic jobs are holding, and AI-adjacent technical roles are exploding. Sustainability and compliance roles are collapsing.

AI’s Real Impact on Work: What 180 Million Job Postings Reveal

by ChatGPT-5

A massive, data-rich study of 180 million global job postings from January 2023 to October 2025 provides one of the clearest, most granular pictures yet of how AI is transforming the labour market. The analysis moves past speculation and anecdotes to answer a deceptively simple question: Which jobs are growing—and which ones are shrinking—right now? The results show that AI’s impact is sharp, selective, and asymmetric. Some jobs are being automated away at breathtaking speed, while others are unexpectedly resilient or even thriving. A pattern of bifurcation is emerging: execution jobs are disappearing, strategic jobs are holding, and AI-adjacent technical roles are exploding.

The Baseline: A Tough Job Market Overall

Job postings fell by 8% year-over-year in 2025—closely matching external labour market indicators—establishing a credible benchmark for evaluating role-specific changes.

This baseline matters. Roles declining more than 8% are deteriorating faster than the market itself.

Most Surprising Findings

1. Senior leadership roles barely declined at all

While postings for individual contributors fell sharply and manager-level roles dropped moderately, senior leadership roles (Director, VP, C-suite) declined only slightly.

This is counterintuitive in a world of layoffs and AI-driven productivity tools. Yet it aligns with an emerging trend: AI empowers strategic decision-makers to operate more independently, reducing the need for coordinating teams beneath them.

2. Customer service jobs are not being mass-replaced by AI

Customer service representatives—routinely framed as the most vulnerable to chatbot automation—declined only modestly, outperforming the overall market decline.

Human empathy, judgement, and accountability continue to matter.

3. Influencer marketing is one of the fastest-growing fields

Influencer marketing specialist roles grew significantly in 2025 after already growing the previous year.

This reflects a deeper trend: in an online world saturated by AI-generated content, consumers increasingly trust individuals—not brands, not corporate ads, not SEO-driven content.

Most Controversial Findings

1. AI is hitting creative “execution” roles hard

Computer graphic artists, photographers, and writers all experienced multi-year declines—suggesting structural erosion, not a temporary macro blip.

These are precisely the roles generative AI can most easily automate: producing, editing, drafting, rendering.

Meanwhile, creative directors, creative producers, and product designers remain stable or growing—because strategic judgement, client interaction, and holistic decision-making cannot be automated.

2. Sustainability and compliance roles are collapsing—even more than creative roles

Corporate compliance specialists, sustainability specialists, environmental technicians, and even senior compliance officers are among the steepest declines.

This is politically charged. These roles are disappearing not because of AI but due to regulatory rollback and reduced enforcement in key markets. AI is not the only disruptive force—politics and policy are reshaping labour demand even faster.

3. Medical scribes may be the first healthcare role meaningfully reduced by AI

Medical scribe postings declined notably year-over-year, while comparable healthcare admin roles remained stable.

This strongly suggests AI-generated clinical documentation is already substituting for human scribes.

Most Valuable Findings

1. AI-adjacent technical roles are exploding

Machine Learning Engineer job postings continue to surge, following explosive growth in the prior year.

The entire AI infrastructure stack is expanding:

• Robotics engineers

• Applied/research scientists

• Data center engineers

These roles underpin AI’s physical deployment and computational backbone.

2. Software engineering remains extremely resilient

Despite fears of mass redundancy from coding assistants, most software engineering roles grew or remained stable.

AI enhances engineers rather than replaces them.

Frontend roles showed minor decline—likely due to automated “vibe coding” tools—while backend and complex engineering remain in strong demand.

3. Data analysis roles are stable despite AI tools

Data analysts and data management specialists continue to grow slightly.

AI can produce SQL, charts, and summaries, but deciding what questions to ask and what data to trust still requires human expertise.

4. Revenue strategy roles are rising

Director of Revenue roles show strong growth—reflecting increasing sophistication in revenue operations, product-led growth, and lifecycle monetization.

Core Pattern: Bifurcation Everywhere

The data reveals a consistent story:

Creative work

• Strategic roles: stable

• Execution roles: declining sharply

Marketing

• Traditional roles: shrinking

• Influencer/creator-driven roles: growing

Corporate hierarchy

• Senior leadership: stable

• Middle management: slightly negative

• Individual contributors: hit hardest

Tech

• Backend/AI infrastructure: strong

• Simple front-end or commodity tasks: softening

AI is not replacing whole professions—it is hollowing out specific layers within them.

How Business Leaders Should Use This Information

1. Reallocate workforce investment toward strategic and judgment-heavy roles

Roles requiring creativity + judgement + stakeholder interaction remain resilient. Leaders should:

• Protect and develop high-level creative thinkers

• Reduce reliance on roles performing routine execution

• Upskill ICs into hybrid strategic/technical capacities

2. Build AI competency internally—not just buy tools

The most rapidly expanding roles reveal a critical truth:
AI advantage will come from internal capability, not outsourcing.

Invest in:

• AI infrastructure

• In-house experimentation

• Proprietary model deployment

• RAG/AI orchestration

3. Reconsider managerial layers

AI is eroding the need for middle-management oversight. Leaders should:

• Flatten hierarchies where appropriate

• Equip directors/VPs with AI tools to be more autonomous

• Redeploy displaced managers into value-creating roles like revenue strategy or data-driven operations

4. Protect customer trust

Customer service workers are stable because trust matters. Leaders must:

• Blend AI triage with human escalation

• Avoid full automation in emotionally sensitive contexts

• Use AI to empower—not replace—service agents

5. Engage deeply with brand authenticity

Influencer marketing’s rise signals a collapse in trust in traditional channels. Businesses should:

• Invest in creator partnerships

• Measure influence with robust attribution

• Avoid generic AI-driven content that erodes brand credibility

6. Prepare for regulatory whiplash

The collapse of sustainability/compliance roles underscores the importance of staying ahead of political volatility. Leaders must:

• Avoid over-reactive cuts in compliance capacity

• Build adaptable frameworks that survive regulatory shifts

• Monitor geopolitical and trade-policy indicators closely

Conclusion: AI Is Reshaping Work from the Inside Out

AI is not unleashing mass unemployment—but it is surgically transforming the labour market. The winners are:

• high-judgement strategic roles

• technical AI infrastructure builders

• creators and influencers

• backend engineers

• revenue strategists

The losers are:

• execution-focused creative workers

• sustainability/compliance staff

• medical scribes

• front-end commodity developers

• individual contributors without strategic responsibilities

For business leaders, the message is clear: AI is a force multiplier for strategy, not a replacement for it. The companies that thrive will be those that actively redesign their workforce architecture—combining human judgement, AI-enabled productivity, and authentic engagement with customers and markets.

Source: https://bloomberry.com/blog/i-analyzed-180m-jobs-to-see-what-jobs-ai-is-actually-replacing-today/