What 100,000 Jobs Disappeared Means for Your Survival
In the last two weeks alone, I read news of 100,000 jobs eliminated. Not over quarters or fiscal years. Two weeks. This isn’t a projection or forecast. It’s happening now.
One Tier Isn’t Enough Anymore
The workers losing their jobs aren’t technically incompetent. Many are highly skilled at what they do. Their problem is simpler and more devastating: they operate exclusively at Tier 1 when Tier 1 alone no longer protects anyone.
Tier 1: AI Tool Literacy (Your Entry Ticket, Not Your Career)
What it is: Using AI tools to work faster. Cutting a 2-hour report to 30 minutes, generating content drafts, automating routine analysis.
Why it’s not enough: When everyone has access to the same tools, operational proficiency stops being differentiating. You’re not competing against people without AI anymore. You’re competing against everyone else who also has AI.
What we’ve learned from the data: Based on the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025:
86% of employers expect AI and information processing to transform their business by 2030
63% of employers plan to complement/augment workforce with technology
66% net increase for creative thinking (4th fastest-growing, tied with resilience/flexibility)
Who’s vulnerable:
The content writer using AI to write faster without editorial inspiration
The analyst producing reports without strategic context
The designer perfecting pixels without understanding business impact
These workers may be proficient. But they’re still in the 100,000 list.
Tier 2: AI Project Capability (Where Advantage Lives Today)
What it is: AI transformation (86%) far exceeds other technological trends like robotics (58%) and energy generation (41%). This drives demand for analytical thinking and systems thinking as essential orchestration skills.
The capability gap:
86% of employers plan to augment (not replace) workforce with technology
Analytical thinking and systems thinking rank as top-demanded, the highest percentage among all technological trends (compared to robotics at 58%, and energy generation at 41%)
The distinction:
Linear thinking (displacement): Use AI to do existing tasks faster
Inventive thinking (amplification): Use AI to enable entirely new workflows
Silo workers are failing and fading out sooner than we expect because technical proficiency without systemic understanding equals functional obsolescence.
We can learn from the Canva lesson: Adobe defended technical complexity as a moat. Canva asked a Tier 3 question: “What if everyone could design?” This question (rewriting the rules of what’s possible) is why Canva disrupted an industry leader. Not better technology. Better thinking about what problems actually matter.
Tier 3: Human Exclusive High Ground (The Irreplaceable Layer)
What it is: Capabilities AI fundamentally cannot replicate. Creative thinking (66% net increase) and resilience/flexibility (66% net increase) rank among top-demanded skills. The WEF report explicitly identifies these as the most significant differentiators between growing and declining roles.
Why AI can’t compete here: AI optimizes within known parameters. It cannot:
Invent entirely new categories or business models
Exercise strategic judgment under radical uncertainty
Understand unstated human needs and emotional contexts
Why 100,000 Jobs Vanished?
Those jobs disappeared because they existed at Tier 1 in isolation:
Routine execution without strategic integration
Tool proficiency without systemic understanding
Efficiency optimization within existing workflows
The jobs being created require Tier 2 orchestration and Tier 3 invention:
Strategic coordination of AI capabilities
Creative thinking that generates new possibilities
Adaptive resilience in unprecedented situations
Here is a survival framework
If you’re only at Tier 1: You’re vulnerable. Anyone with tool access can match your output.
If you’re at Tier 2: You have near-term competitive advantage, but only if you’re continually inventing new applications, not just optimizing existing ones.
If you’re at Tier 3 without Tier 1 and 2: You’re strategically valuable but operationally inefficient. You need to integrate AI capabilities or risk being outpaced by those who combine human creativity with machine scale.
We must admit that the critical mindset has been shifted. Don’t hold your technical mindset:
Values precision within established frameworks
Protects expertise through complexity
Views democratization as threat
Train yourself with the inventiveness mindset (amplification opportunity):
Values outcomes over process perfection
Uses accessible tools to explore new possibilities
Views democratization as enabler for creating what wasn’t possible before
Our silo worker who is a designer obsessed with kerning will face disruption. The designer who uses AI to prototype 50 variations, test them with real audiences, and invent entirely new approaches creates irreplaceable value.
Facing your destiny
When you read about 100,000 jobs eliminated in two weeks, ask yourself: “Which tier am I operating at?”
If your answer is “I’m really good with ChatGPT”, that’s Tier 1. That’s not enough.
If your answer is “I orchestrate strategic planning by integrating LLM with my historical sales data while discovering new market entry plans”, that’s Tier 2. You have near-term advantage.
If your answer is “I’m inventing product development cycles that weren’t possible before AI enabled data-driven prototyping process”, that’s Tier 3. You’re building a moat.
The jobs aren’t disappearing because AI is replacing humans. They’re disappearing because humans operating at Tier 1 alone are competing against everyone else who also has Tier 1 access.
The future doesn’t belong to those who use AI efficiently. It belongs to those who use AI inventively. To compose symphonies that couldn’t exist before.
The orchestra is infinitely larger now. The question is:
Are you still playing scales, or are you composing new music?
