I understand. It’s not that you really love your job. It’s just that you really, really, really don’t want AI to take it.
And AI is coming for your job; no doubt about that. Some fancy-schmancy artificial intelligence super-app is working 24/7 so it can do what you do better, faster, cheaper and without all the aggravation that comes from any employer foolish enough to hire you.
Of course, your employer would never confess their interest in an employee whose only desire is to be plugged in. All of which makes it refreshing when an AI company, instead of insisting it will make your work easier, admits that their goal is a product that will make your work disappear. And your job, as well.
That company is a San Francisco start-up called
Mechanize. As I learned in “This Company Says It Out Loud: It Wants AI to Take Your Job,” a Kevin Roose article in The New York Times, Mechanize “is building artificial intelligence to automate white-collar jobs ‘as fast as possible.’”Is your job on the Mechanize hit list? If you’re a doctor or a lawyer or any of “the people who design our buildings and care for our children,” you’re in the crosshairs. Not to mention everyone who works in research, marketing, finance and customer service. Let’s make it simple. If your job requires thinking, you don’t have to think about it; you’re toast.
The job-threat level is especially high for entry-level positions. While powerful AI systems may not have mastered the skills required to be a highly compensated manager — hey, giving orders and going to lunch isn’t easy — they have already mastered the skimpy job skills expected from a new hire.
To reassure wet-behind-the-ears newbies and calm wizened veterans like yourself, I offer this list of the five essential survival skills required to keep a job that no large language systems have ever come close to learning.
No. 1: Schmoozing. It isn’t enough to do your job; you also need to develop relationships with the people in your company who don’t do your job. This will protect you when one of these idiots rises up in the company and is suddenly in a position to make your promotion possible or your life miserable.
For all its intelligence, AI systems can’t make friends. Google Gemini will never stop computing long enough to complain to Anthropic’s Claude over the pathetic prompts its humans are using. Anti-social behavior like this leaves these powerful AI systems lonely and vulnerable, which is a huge advantage for friendly folks like me and thee.
No. 2: Blaming. Anyone who wants to stay employed will always have one or two easy targets in their pocket. AI systems don’t have pockets, so they won’t keep track of Julia in marketing, whose wacky, out-of-the-box ideas could succeed but could just as easily blow up.
It’s employees like Julia who you will point to when your project hits a wall and that wall starts falling on you. Who can a super-duper AI system blame? The server farm in Iceland?
No. 3: Kissing up. Even the most powerful AI systems aren’t smart enough to know this formula for steady employment: Never spend more time doing your job than you spend telling your boss how well they do their job. For a shrewd human, wise in the ways of work, it’s all you-you-you. For an AI chatbot, it’s all “me-me-me.”
No. 4: Ducking. Knowing when to keep your head down is a uniquely human survival skill.
Yes, you would be a hero if you could straighten out the shipping department, but what’s most likely to be shipped out is y-o-u. ChatGPT may be smart, but it will never react to an assignment by saying, “Hey, Grok, you handle this. I’m busy.”
No. 5: Goofing off. No matter how much a large language model knows, it still doesn’t know when it’s time to take a break. You do. Feel free to relax all you want after turning over to your AI assistant all the work it can gobble up. When it eventually blows up, you’ll be rested and ready.
No one will argue when you toss out the electronic interlopers and return the workflow to your fellow flesh-and-blood workers, who will gather together to celebrate your elevation to the highest ranks of the company. Which brings up another deficiency of AI systems.
They’re no fun at office parties.
Bob Goldman was an advertising executive at a Fortune 500 company. He offers a virtual shoulder to cry on at bob@bgplanning.com.
Copyright 2025 Creators Syndicate, Inc.