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Companies are investing in AI, which is having a huge impact on every aspect of their organizations, including how work gets done. Organizational changes are far-reaching and profound, impacting the types of talent companies need and how jobs are defined.
Experts believe that companies will spend sufficient time and resources in 2026 to upskill their employees and retool their processes to accommodate AI. While IT is not immune, CIOs can play a greater role in guiding the enterprise and leading collaboration to guide change.
In some areas, such as recruiting and customer service, this change has been occurring for some time. For example, in software development, last year AI coding tools.
“We have one large technology customer who has shifted 25% of their developers to prompt engineers,” he said. Kye Mitchell, Head of Experis USPlease refer to Employees who specialize in creating inputs For generative AI models. “We’re definitely seeing change. I don’t think we’re 100% sure what that will look like, but change is happening.”
In addition to adding new job titles and changing some job descriptions, companies are further enhancing existing roles that involve AI. mitchell The company said it is tracking an increase in demand for roles that support AI implementation, including data scientists, data architects and AI engineers.
According to , the impact of AI adoption on the tech workforce is complex but evolving. be Comptia Analysis published in November. almost two-thirds of companies admit that AI is a cover for unpopular staffing decisions such as hiring freezes and layoffs. However, some companies have utilized AI to replace positions. 48% It said it had reassigned employees to other positions.
“The relationship between AI and human effort through workflow automation and enhancement means that many jobs will change. New jobs will be created and some will disappear,” the IT industry group said in a report.
According to , changes in the roles and responsibilities of IT occupations have been uneven so far. Forrester Vice President and Principal Analyst JP Gounder.
“There’s been a lot of automation and AI being used in things like help desks.” gounder Said. “A few years ago, you would often find people running around resetting passwords. They don’t look like information security analysts who need to use AI tools, but AI tools are more of an augmentation tool.”
As companies adjust role expectations, CIOs can focus on the upskilling potential of internal employees, both within and outside of the IT department, to help steer organizations through change.
“We need to find ways to use AI in ways that allow us to solve problems more effectively,” he said. gounder.
Culture change and training
As AI changes the definition and scope of IT roles, CIOs can successfully navigate the transition by focusing on underlying processes and training employees to adapt.
“To do things fundamentally differently, we need to develop skills that focus on moving faster, embracing innovation, and taking a reimagined approach with this technology,” he said. Audi Rowe, EY Americas AI Experience, Strategy and Transformation Consulting Leader.
Technology company executives can start by building a team of cross-functional leaders dedicated to rethinking processes and training. This is the approach software company Informatica has taken to guide its AI journey. CIO Graham Thompson said CIO Dive.
A cross-functional team helped create a training curriculum that leveraged external resources, including: Coursera and LinkedIn Learningestablish a common ground understanding of the definition of AI.
“The mistake many of us made was thinking that if we gave GenAI to our employees, they would be more productive and that would somehow generate business benefits.” thompson Said. “That doesn’t work. We need to redesign how the process runs.”
Agentic AI is introducing new roles, even new types of colleagues, and posing new problems. Adding “digital colleagues” agent management This will be an important skill that should be honed throughout the company. Dorit Zilbershot, Group VP of AI Innovation, ServiceNowhe previously told CIO Dive.
“Employees at all levels are responsible for coaching, supervising, and optimizing their digital colleagues,” says Z.Ilvershohe said.
The influx of agents into the enterprise is already changing employee expectations. a KPMG report Found Almost two-thirds of organizations In response to the adoption of agent AI, we changed our approach to entry-level hiring. The company said the change highlighted the growing demand for competencies in data, automation and responsible AI.
A focus on in-house skills will also help meet that demand, according to Lowe. “As we move towards more agentic ways of working, we also need to develop the skills of our employees to understand how to move into different roles, how to move into higher value roles and roles that are more focused on innovation. We also need to move into roles that are more focused on monitoring and judgment to make sure we are developing and operating in a responsible way,” he said. row.
The task of modernizing the role of technology is complex, but CIOs need to find ways to leverage the potential benefits, Thompson said.
InformaticaFor example, we use agent AI tools internally to monitor cloud instances across multiple providers, optimize usage, and ultimately reduce cloud spending by $1 million last year. he Said.
By delegating repetitive tasks previously assigned to junior staff to AI, IT will be able to focus on big-picture projects. thompson.
“plus,” thompson “We can provide an additional $1 million for innovation.”
