The data tells a clear story. The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis found that occupations with the highest AI adoption are experiencing the steepest unemployment increases. Meanwhile, Anthropic's recent report reveals AI usage remains "uneven," concentrated among higher-income groups.
This is happening now to knowledge workers who expected to be augmented, not displaced. We're witnessing unprecedented simultaneous productivity gains and economic displacement at unprecedented speed.
As CEO of a technology solutions company serving the contact center industry, I see AI's workforce impact every day in one of the economy's largest employment sectors. Our clients wrestle with the same challenge—delivering exceptional customer experiences while meeting aggressive cost reduction targets through AI automation.
I've learned that executive compassion during this transition will determine whether companies thrive or undermine their foundations.
Every executive I know is caught in an impossible bind. Shareholders demand AI-driven efficiency gains. Competitors are achieving cost advantages through automation. The "do more with less" mandate isn't coming from malice but becoming competitively necessary for survival.
Yet these same leaders know that their employer brand, talent retention and organizational culture depend on genuine care for their workforce. They want to be compassionate, but quarterly earnings calls don't reward compassion. They want to invest in human development, but AI can often perform the same tasks faster and cheaper.
This is about conflicting agendas. Most executives would love to have their cake and eat it too, but the rules of business and economics don't allow this luxury.
This leaves us with what we actually control: how we treat each other during this transition.
Everyone sees what's happening. Everyone feels the stress—from frontline workers to senior leaders to executives. The uncertainty isn't confined to any single level of the organization. It's pervasive, and everyone knows it.
Compassion doesn't require technology or programs. It requires acknowledgment of what's happening right in front of us, and an appropriate human response. Executives should reach out personally, beyond corporate messaging, to recognize that workers matter and are valued.
It means frontline managers extending patience, grace and empathy in every interaction. It means giving people the benefit of the doubt when performance wavers, because job insecurity makes everyone less effective. It means granting others grace in daily life, like the slow shopper or distracted colleague. Everyone is carrying the weight of this transition, whether they acknowledge it or not.
The math is also compelling from a business perspective. We have critical shortages in nursing, skilled trades, eldercare, teaching and countless other human-centered roles. Simultaneously, we're automating cognitive work at unprecedented speed. The mismatch isn't a problem but an opportunity, if we approach it with intentional compassion.
But compassion can't be abstract or occasional. It needs to operate at scale, person to person, immediately with:
• Transition Support: Whether individual-to-individual aid, systematic job matching or business investment in worker transitions, those benefiting from AI can help displaced workers move to equivalent or better opportunities.
• Psychological First Aid: Job displacement trauma is real. Human connection during career transitions is essential for mental health and successful adaptation.
Some of this requires no AI, budgets or institutional approval—only the recognition that the smallest acts of human decency, multiplied across millions of daily interactions, can address what challenges our society most. An executive taking thirty seconds to acknowledge a customer care or facilities worker. A manager offering flexibility when someone seems overwhelmed. A colleague sharing genuine appreciation instead of rushing past.
The systematic transition support does require investment, but these costs are rounding errors compared to the economic windfall businesses are realizing from AI adoption.
These aren't grand gestures. They're the basic human responses to shared stress that we all have the power to provide, every single day.
The same technology reshaping work could simultaneously enable unprecedented coordination of human support. AI could optimize for human flourishing rather than purely productivity metrics.
Imagine AI systems that match displaced workers with available positions or coordinate community mutual aid at scale. Whether AI drives deeper division or greater connection depends entirely on our choices and intentions. The evidence that we've lacked balance in AI execution is becoming clear, and timing is critical to course-correct.
If you're building AI-powered companies, you're shaping the economic reality everyone else will live in. Every product decision is a vote for the kind of society you want to inhabit.
You have an opportunity that previous generations didn't: Building AI systems that deliberately amplify human potential rather than simply replace human labor. The question isn't whether you can maximize efficiency, but whether you can maximize human flourishing.
If AI-driven prosperity doesn’t translate into broadly shared human flourishing, what’s the point? We’ll have optimized for metrics that ultimately hollow out the society that made prosperity possible in the first place.
Every day we delay individual action while waiting for institutional solutions, more people experience displacement without support. Every day we choose efficiency over compassion, we accelerate toward a world where technological abundance coexists with human suffering.
Technology leaders need to embed compassion as infrastructure in their AI strategies.
Start with transparency about AI’s workforce impact before you deploy automation—not after. When doing so, make retraining budgets non-negotiable line items tied directly to AI implementation costs. If you’re investing $5 million in AI that will displace 50 roles, allocate proportional resources to move those 50 people to equivalent or better positions. Measure success by both cost savings and transition success rates.
Then, build feedback loops where workforce concerns inform AI deployment decisions. Create advisory councils that include frontline workers who will be most affected. Their insights will improve your AI strategy and demonstrate respect for their expertise.
Companies should also partner with organizations in understaffed sectors like healthcare, skilled trades and education to create direct pipelines for displaced workers. These partnerships address real market needs while supporting your people through change.
Your AI decisions shape your organization’s future and workers’ realities. Building systems that amplify human potential creates sustainable advantage and shared progress.
